So I want you to picture a comic book page. But
it's not a normal page at all. The characters
inside aren't just talking to each other. They're
screaming. Oh, wow. Yeah. And they aren't just
screaming at the other characters. They're actually
screaming at the reader. Right. And then. They
start physically tearing the paper they're drawn
on, like bursting out of the panels, trying to
escape the actual comic book itself. That is
wild. It really is. It's hallucinatory, it's
disturbing, and the whole thing is set in a literal
insane asylum. Honestly, it sounds like the kind
of, um... underground experimental nightmare
fuel you'd find in the back of some really dusky
comic shop. Exactly. Right. You'd assume the
guy drawing this is some avant -garde recluse
living completely on the fringes of society.
But here's the kicker. Yeah. That exact same
artist is the comic industry's go -to guy for
the Muppets. And Popeye. And, you know, family
-friendly Marvel superheroes. It's just, I mean,
it is one of the strangest and most delightful
contradictions in the entire medium. Totally.
And today we are trying to figure out how one
human being can bridge the gap between a psychological
breakdown in an asylum and Kermit the Frog singing
a song. It's quite the jump. It is. So for this
deep dive, we are looking at the career of Roger
Langridge. And it's a career that really defines
the standard laws of comic book gravity. Yeah.
Langridge is a New Zealander. He was actually
born on Valentine's Day, 1967, who eventually
moved to Britain. And if you look at his bibliography,
based on the encyclopedic records we have, it's
like looking at a whole history of comics compressed
into one person. How so? Well, he's done the
gritty student press, the weekly British sci
-fi stuff, newspaper strips, and the massive
corporate blockbusters, all of it. And that's
really the mission for our deep dive today. We
aren't just, you know, listing out what he wrote.
We want to understand how his brain works. Right.
Like, how do you maintain a consistent artistic
voice when you are jumping from a silent clown
to Thor, god of thunder? And that is the central
question for you listening at home. Is he a chameleon
who changes his colors to fit the book, or does
he force the world to change its colors to match
him? Let's actually start with that psychological
breakdown I mentioned earlier, because this wasn't
just some obscure sketchbook doodle. This was
really his breakout moment. It was. He started
back in 1988 doing regular art for Krakom. Ah,
yes. Right, which is the Auckland University
Students' Association magazine. Which is the
absolute classic training ground. I mean, you
can get away with murder in the student press.
It's where you experiment. You definitely do.
But the real shift, the big jump happens when
he starts working on Judge Dredd, or specifically
the Judge Dredd magazine. I know Dredd, you know
Dredd, it's usually very grim, gritty, futuristic
fascism, big guns, big chins. Usually yes, that's
the formula. But Langridge brought something
entirely different to the table. He worked on
a strip called The Straight Jacket Fits. Written
by David Bishop, Brian. Written by David Bishop,
art by Langridge. And the title itself should
give you a clue. Because it's set in an insane
asylum. Exactly. But the sources describe the
art style very specifically. They call it surreal,
hallucinatory, and convention bending. What does
that actually look like on the page? Because
the word surreal gets thrown around a lot. It
does. But think about the physical structure
of a comic page. You have a grid of boxes, the
panels. Those panels are supposed to be the safe
window into the story. In The Straightjacket
Fits, language decided that the panels weren't
windows at all. he made them prison bars. Oh
man, that is so cool. Right. The characters in
the asylum start to realize they are trapped
in a comic strip. So the hallucination isn't,
you know, dragons or monsters. The hallucination
is the medium itself. So they're seeing the page.
Exactly. They start pushing against the black
ink borders of the panels. They physically interact
with the gutter that's the white space between
panels. So when the source says they burst from
the edge of the frame, it's not a metaphor? No,
it is totally literal. They are tearing the reality
of the page. And this is crucial for understanding
language. Even early on, he wasn't just drawing
a script. He was manipulating the architecture
of the book itself. He's playing with the format.
He understands that a comic is a physical object,
and he's totally willing to to get a laugh or
to get a scare. It sounds incredibly meta, like
Deadpool, before Deadpool was really mainstreaming
that sort of thing. It was very ahead of its
time. But it also established his vibe. He's
comfortable with chaos. He's comfortable with
the idea that reality in a comic book is totally
flexible. OK, so you've got this guy who is a
master of chaotic, frame breaking, noisy visuals.
You would think the logical next step is something
even louder, maybe heavy metal album covers or,
I don't know, horror comics. You would think
so. And that is exactly where he pivots. He goes
from the noisy asylum to absolute silence. Wow.
He creates Fred the Clown. Now, this seems to
be the passion project that really put him on
the map with the critics, right? It absolutely
did. He'd been working on it in the background
for years. He did web comics. He self -published
small press titles. Just grinding away at it.
Yeah, until Fana Graphics books finally collected
it in 2004. Yeah. But the core of Fred is that
it's a massive tribute to Buster Keaton. The
silent film star. Correct. Classic silent comedy.
I have to pause here because I've seen Buster
Keaton movies. The whole point is the movement.
It's the stunt work. You know, the house falling
on him, the crazy train chases. It's incredibly
kinetic. It is. So how on earth do you translate
that to a comic book where the images are completely
frozen? You have hit on exactly why this project
was so insanely ambitious. Look, in a silent
movie, the director controls the time. You watch
Keaton run for 10 seconds. You see the train
coming. You feel the speed. Right. But in a comic
book, The reader controls the time. You can glance
at the entire page in a split second. So the
punch line could be totally ruined before you
even read the setup. Exactly. To make a silent
clown funny on paper, you need absolute mastery
of pacing. You have to use the size of the panels
to control how fast the reader's eye moves across
the page. Oh, that makes sense. You have to draw
the body language so clearly that the reader
practically feels the movement. even though it's
static ink on paper. So if the stray jacket fits
was all about breaking the panels and breaking
the rules, Fred the Clown was about perfecting
them. That is a fantastic way to put it. It's
disciplined. It's precise. If you look at a Fred
Page, it's almost musical in its rhythm. And
the comic industry really recognized that difficulty
and that achievement. Yeah. Looking at the list
of accolades here, it's a bit ridiculous. He
was the winner of the National Comics Award for
Best Online Strip in 2003. A huge deal. And then
look at the nominations. Two Eisner Awards, a
Harvey Award, a Rubin Award, and an Ignaz Award.
That is basically the royal flush of comic book
awards. It really is. And it validated that this
wasn't just some gimmick. He was doing actual
high art with this funny little clown. And this
creates that amazing tension in his career. On
one hand, he's the Judge Dredd guy, surreal,
gritty. British sci -fi. And on the other hand,
he's the Fred the Clown guy, silent, elegant,
classic Americana style. And somehow those two
wildly different roads merge and lead us directly
to the Muppets. Which brings us to his Master
of Licensed Properties era. I find this transition
so weird because usually indie darlings who win
Ignatz awards do not go on to work for Disney
or large corporate conglomerates. They stay in
the indie scene making obscure, beautiful graphic
novels. True. But think about what the Muppets
actually are. Well, they're puppets. They're
chaotic. They're funny. They are vaudeville.
The Muppet Show is fundamentally a variety show.
Oh, right. It's slapstick, it's terrible puns,
it's physical comedy, and it's heavily meta.
I mean, they are always breaking the fourth wall
and talking directly to the audience. Oh, I see
exactly where you're going with this. He's already
done all of that. Precisely. Fred the Clown proved
he understood vaudeville timing and physical
comedy. The Straightjacket Fits proved he understood
meta -commentary and total chaos. Roger Langridge
was practically genetically engineered in a lab
to write The Muppets. So when Boom Studios hired
him in 2009 to work on The Muppet Show, it wasn't
a sellout move. It was just a perfect fit. And
that's exactly why it works so well. He was there
from 2009 to 2012 as the writer and usually the
cartoonist too. And he wasn't trying to just
trace or copy the TV show. Right. He was translating
the spirit of the show into the language of comics.
He captured the voices of Kermit and Fozzie perfectly
sure, but he also captured the frantic, manic
energy of the backstage scenes just using his
panel layouts. It cemented him as this really
safe pair of hands for massive, beloved brands.
Which leads us to Popeye. Yes, Popeye. Now, the
Muppets I get, but Popeye feels... I don't know,
risky. Not in a dangerous way, but in a, does
anyone actually care about Popeye in a 2012 way?
That was definitely the gamble IDW Publishing
took. They launched it as a four -issue mini
-series. Basically a trial balloon. Like, let's
see if there's any nostalgia left for this spinach
-eating sailor. And what happened? It absolutely
exploded. The source material notes that it was
so successful, IDW upgraded it to an ongoing
monthly series before the second issue even hit
the shelves. That is unheard of. Yeah. Usually
publishers wait for the sales numbers to come
in after a few months before committing to an
ongoing book. They didn't need to wait. They
saw the immediate reception, Langerage scripted
it, and the artist Bruce Osella, who did an incredible
job mimicking the original 1930s style, they
just tapped into something really special. But
why did it work so well? Was it just older readers
buying it for the nostalgia factor? I don't think
so. I think it goes back to that kinetic energy
we talked about with Fed the Clown. Langerage
didn't write Popeye as some dusty museum piece.
He modernized it. He wrote it as a high -energy
action comedy. He treated Popeye like a superhero
who eats vegetables. It was funny right now,
not just funny back then. It's interesting that
he scripted Popeye, but didn't actually draw
it. It shows how versatile he is. But he certainly
didn't put down the pencil for good, because
then Marvel came calling. And this has to be
my absolute favorite part of the deep dive. The
Marvel monsters. Yes. Because the House of Ideas
usually wants you to pitch Spider -Man or the
Avengers. But language goes straight for the
D -list. Or the Z -list, really. He teamed up
with Sky - to revive the pre -superhero monsters.
For you listening who might not know, before
Marvel was the Marvel we know today, they published
comics about giant, ridiculous monsters with
names like Fin Fang Foom and Goom. Yeah. They
were just big kaiju -attacking cities in the
50s and 60s. Right. And most people completely
forgot about them once Spider -Man and the Fantastic
Four showed up. Mm -hmm. But language and gray
brought them back as the Fin Fang Four. The concept
is just its peak language. They took these giant
city -destroying dragons and monsters and made
them roommates? Essentially, yes. They miniaturized
them, put them in giant human clothes, and had
them trying to integrate into normal human society.
Just the visual of a giant green dragon wearing
purple shorts and working a mundane service job.
It's totally absurd. And it fits that Fred the
Clown aesthetic perfectly. It's bringing that
indie underground weirdness straight into the
glossy corporate world of Marvel. Yeah, they
did a lot of these, right? They did. There was
the Marvel Monsters, one shot in 2005, a Marvel
Holiday Special in 2006, Avengers Giant Size
in 2008, and even digital comics on Marvel, Digital
Comics Unlimited. It really feels like he carved
out a little weird corner of the Marvel universe
where he could just be silly. He did. Now, he
played the main sandbox, too. He did Thor. The
Mighty Avenger in 2010, which was a very sweet,
critically -acclaimed take on Thor. But his heart
clearly lies with the oddballs. Speaking of oddballs,
I have to talk about the titles of his other
works. I feel like if you just read the titles
of Roger Langridge comics, you instantly understand
his soul. They are a genre unto themselves. Okay,
here we go. Knuckles the Malevolent Nun. Co -created
with Cornelia Stone. Yeah. It just screams British
indie comic, doesn't it? It really does. Frankenstein
meets Shirley Temple. That was from the A1 anthology.
It's a high concept collision of pop culture.
And snarked. Which he did at Boom Studios. Or
The Rocketeer. Hollywood horror. He just seems
to be having so much fun with the actual language
and concepts of these things. He embraces the
absurdity. He doesn't try to make comics cool
or edgy in the modern sense. He loves the inherent
silliness of the medium and he's not afraid to
show it. Oh. And we should definitely mention
his family collaborations, too. Right. He worked
with Andrew Langridge. Yes, on Art Deco for Fandagraphics
from 90 to 92, and then Zoot from 93 to 94. So
he's always been a strong collaborator. Now,
we've painted a picture of this wildly successful
award -winning creative genius. He's reviving
Popeye. He's hanging out with Thor. He's got
Eisner nominations lining his mantelpiece. It
sounds like a very glamorous life. It does, but
there is one section in the sources that I think
is actually the most important part of this entire
discussion, and it's the part that brings us
right back down to earth. The working artist
section. Yes. Because while he is doing all these
prestigious high profile projects, Roger Lengridge
is also a working illustrator for hire. Like
day job kind of stuff. Exactly. The sources mention
he does work for Doctor Who magazine. Right.
One panel, humorous images for the review section.
And this is the one that really got me a weekly
illustration for the UK TV magazine Inside Soap.
Inside Soap. Think about that for a second. This
is a magazine you buy at the grocery store checkout
line to see Who is cheating on who in EastEnders
or Coronation Street? So the exact same hand
that is drawing Thor, the mighty Avenger for
Marvel is also drawing caricatures of soap opera
stars for a weekly gossip rag. Exactly. And I
love this detail so much because it completely
shatters the myth of the tortured artist waiting
for inspiration to strike. Language is a craftsman.
It's a job. It is a job. And think about the
sheer discipline required for inside soap. You
have a strict deadline every single week. The
drawing has to be recognizable, it has to be
funny, and it has to be done on time. You can't
call the editor and say, sorry, the muse isn't
speaking to me today. And you definitely can't
be late because the magazine goes to print with
or without you. That kind of blue -collar artistic
discipline. is rare. And I would argue that is
exactly why he is so good at the big corporate
projects. You mentioned Popeye going from a mini
series to an ongoing series instantly. Yeah.
You can only pull that off if the artist is incredibly
fast and incredibly reliable. That makes total
sense. If you can handle the brutal weekly grind
of a soap opera magazine, a monthly comic book
schedule probably feels like a vacation. It keeps
his skills sharp. Yeah. work fluid, he's not
precious about it, he draws because that's what
he does. Whether it's high art for fanographics
or a quick gag for inside soap, he applies the
exact same level of craft. It's the difference
between being an artist with a capital A and
being a cartoonist. And I think Langridge would
proudly wear the badge of cartoonist. So let's
zoom out and look at this massive map we've drawn
of his career. We started in New Zealand. We
watched him literally break the walls of an asylum
in Judge Dredd. We did. We watched him master
absolute silence with Fred the Clown. We saw
him revitalize the Muppets and Popeye. And we
saw him grinding out weekly illustrations for
TV magazines. It's a truly remarkable spread.
So what is the thread here? If I pick up a Roger
Langridge comic. Regardless of whether it's a
giant Marvel monster or a felt puppet, what am
I getting? You are getting a very specific, very
personal filter. Langridge has a distinct DNA
to his work. It's that unique blend of old -school
vaudeville charm. a deep love for the weird,
and a very clean, rhythmic visual style. He doesn't
disappear into the franchise. No, he doesn't.
And that's really the big takeaway here. When
he works on Popeye, he doesn't try to make it
look like a generic, modern comic. He makes it
look like Roger Langridge's Popeye. He drags
the franchise into his world rather than stepping
into theirs. That's actually a really powerful
lesson for any creative listening to this deep
dive. We're often told to fit the mold, draw
the house style, write what sells. Right. But
language proves that having a strong, eccentric,
highly personal voice is actually a huge asset,
even for massive corporate giants like Disney
or Marvel. They didn't hire him to be a photocopier.
They hired him because he had that specific Fred
the Clown magic. They hired the weird to save
the normal. That is a beautiful way to put it.
So here's a final thought for you to chew on
as you go about your day. We live in a time of
endless reboots. Every movie, every show, every
comic seems to be a remake or a spinoff of something
from 40 years ago. And we usually complain about
it. We constantly complain about it. We say Hollywood
is totally out of ideas. But when you look at
Roger Langridge's career, making Popeye feel
fresh, making the Muppets sing on the page, you
have to ask yourself a question. When we enjoy
these reboots, are we actually enjoying the character,
or are we really enjoying the specific, unique
filter of the artist who is bringing them to
life? Would we care about the Finfane Four if
literally anyone else had drawn them? Probably
not. Exactly. Maybe in this era of big corporate
franchises, the individual artist matters way
more than the intellectual property itself. Just
something to think about the next time you pick
up a comic book. That's all for today's deep
dive into the many worlds of Roger Langridge.
Thanks for listening, and we'll catch you in
the next panel.