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978-1-63140-162-6 17 16 15 14 1 2 3 4
SUNGLASSES AFTER DARK: FULL BLOODED COLLECTION.NOVEMBER 2014. FIRST PR INTING. Sunglasses After Dark andSonja Blue Nancy A. Collins. 2014 Idea and Design Works,LLC. The IDW logo is registered in the U.S. Patent and TrademarkOffice. IDW Publishing, a division of Idea and Design Works, LLC.Editorial offices: 5080 Santa Fe St., San Diego, CA 92109. Anysimilarities to persons living or dead are purely coincidental. With
the exception of artwork used for review purposes, none of thecontents of this publication may be reprinted without thepermission of Idea and Design Works, LLC. Printed in Korea.IDW Publishing does not read or accept unsolicited submissions ofideas, stories, or artwork.
Originally published as SUNGLASSES AFTER DARK issues #1-6
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Ted Adams, CEO & PublisherGreg Goldstein, President & COORobbie Robbins, EVP/Sr. Graphic ArtistChris Ryall, Chief Creative Officer/Editor-in-ChiefMatthew Ruzicka, CPA, Chief Financial OfficerAlan Payne, VP of SalesDirk Wood, VP of MarketingLorelei Bunjes, VP of Digital ServicesJeff Webber, VP of Digital Publishing & Business Development
IDW founded by Ted Adams, Alex Garner, Kris Oprisko, and Robbie Robbins
WRITTEN BY
NANCY A. COLLINS
ART AND COLORS BY
STAN SHAW
LETTERING BY
THOMAS MAUER
COVER BY
STAN SHAW
EDITS BY
JUSTIN EISINGERAND ALONZO SIMON
DESIGN BY
GILBERTO LAZCANO
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Stan ShawOctober, 2014
INTRODUCTION
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I G O T S O M E T H I N ' T O S A Y T O Y O U A N D Y O U B E T T E RL I S T E N :T H E S TO R Y O F S U N G L A S S E S A F T E R D A R K : TH E F U L L B L O O D E D C O L L E C T I O N
Four years ago, I signed the contract with IDW to
reprint the comic book adaptation ofSunglassesAfter Dark in graphic novel form. Ever since then,
whenever I mention the project to my fans, the
majority of them exclaim: Cool! Its about time! I
always thought she would make a great comic book
hero!, completely unaware that there was a six-issue
miniseries in the mid-1990s.
The reason for why even my dedicated fans know
nothing about the comic book adventures of my most
famous literary creation is a classic study in Fin de
Sicle Comic Book History. The publisher of the
original miniseries was Verotik Publications, owned
by heavy metal artist Glenn Danzig of Misfits and
Samhain fame. Glenn was a fan of my Bram Stoker
award-winning novel, Sunglasses After Dark, and
approached me about adapting it for his new
company. The idea was for Sunglasses After Darkto
bring in a more mainstream audience, as I had just
left a successful two-year stint as writer for DCs
Swamp Thing series.
I was then introduced to artist Stan Shaw, and after a
test run adapting my short story Aphra confirmed
that we were compatible, we began brainstorming on
character design. Since I was living on the Lower
East Side at the time, and he was in the Pacific
Northwest, most of it was done via an ancient, pre-
internet technology known as the thermofax. (You
had to be there.) However, as Stan and I labored over
bringing Sonja Blue to life as a comic book
character, neither of us was aware as to the exact
nature of all the other Verotik titles, save that they
were utilizing such heavy-hitters as Frank Frazetta,
Esteban Maroto, and Simon Bisley.
The first story Stan and I collaborated on, Aphra,
saw print in Verotika #4, alongside a story called A
Taste of Cherry. What followed after its publication is
a long, complicated, and graphic story, one that
ultimately involved obscenity laws, the state of
Oklahoma, and the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund.
While the case was eventually dismissed, the ultimateresult of the scandal was that Verotik titles were
often treated like plutonium. They werent displayed
with the other comics but were, instead, kept behind
the counter in sealed bags with nothing but the title
visible. This includedSunglasses After Dark, even
though it was essentially a PG-13 title designed to
bring in the Vertigo-buying crowd. That meant the
onlyway to buy a copy was to already know about its
existence and pick it up at your local comic book
store. If your friendly neighborhood shop didnt carryit, the only other recourse was to buy it directly from
Verotik Publications, either through the mail or their
online shop (while the internet was still in its wobbly
colt stage), at one of the few conventions they
showed at, or at one of Danzigs concerts. It also
didnt help that the fabled Comic Book Implosion and
Distributor Wars between Diamond, Capital Comics
and Heroes World (which resulted in the closure of
scores of comic retailers in North America) was
occurring at the exact same time. So thatis why,
almost 20 years after the fact, most Sonja Blue fans
are still completely unaware she ever appeared in
comic book form. (Phew)
Both Stan and I have always feltSunglasses After
Darkgot a raw deal and never had a chance of
finding its audience. We became friends during the
production of the series and have remained in touch
throughout the years, and the topic of somehow
finding a way to reprint the series was one we always
went back to. But since Danzig still owns the originalcolor film of the series, and there was no way we
could afford to buy it from him, we would have to
start from scratch. Luckily, Stan and I owned the
rights to the original artwork and scripts, but the cost
of re-coloring and re-lettering the hundreds of pages,
much less printing them, was prohibitive.
But time passed, and with it came the age of digital
coloring and lettering, as well as the rise of the
collected graphic novel. Suddenly, the ability to give
Sunglasses After Dark the second chance it deserved
was no longer beyond our grasp. When my old friend,
Jeff Connor, contacted me in 2009 about writing some
prose stories for IDW, I mentioned that Stan and I were
looking for a way to reprintSunglasses After Dark,
and one thing lead to another... and so here we are. As
to the particulars behind the Herculean task of digitally
recoloring the entire series, I will leave that to Stan to
describe in his own introduction. (Eds Note: He does
not.) As for myself, I used the opportunity to go back
and reconfigure my original dialog and narration so thatthe story reads less like the adaptation of a novel and
more like agraphic novel.
So here is Sonja Blue, in all her punk vampire /
vampire-slayer glory: No sparkling allowed.
Nancy A. CollinsOctober, 2014
INTRODUCTION
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