“Toy Story meets True Detective” Brett Uren talks Torsobear volume 3 now on Kickstarter
We first saw the bizarre yet brilliant world of Brett Uren’s toy detective Torsobear in an obscure Norwegian anthology called Outre Press. But this month it returns to Kickstarter to help finance it’s 3rd full volume of toy based crime noir. It’s been an eventful journey for lead character Ruxby Bear since that first case, so we catch up with creator Brett Uren to get the lowdown.
Torsobear is out now on Kickstarter, tell us about what fans can look forward to in the new volume? How will the story develop in this volume? Any new characters or angles with this one?
Brett Uren: Volume 3 ‘Back on the Blocks’ raises the tension developed through the series to it’s highest point. There are riots and protests all over Toyburg, and Huggington is bringing in villains with tanks to beat them down. Naturally Ruxby is thrown into this mess, and how he deals with it will be the book’s focus, along with the mysterious disappearance of Toyburg’s most vile entity, The Copycat. We wanted to look mostly at the characters we began with, so that we can tie up the arcs of reader’s favourites – but introduce them to characters that have only been mentioned before.
Things have moved on quite a bit since that initial crime noir story in Outre, did you expect it to develop in to such a diverse world?
BU: It was never a serious idea, as in Outre I was making the joke outline of a complete universe. It really got out of hand, didn’t it? All credit to the other writers and artists like Cy Dethan, Glenn Møane, Carlos Zamudio & Saoirse Towler for adding all the depth and complexity from what really was a napkin sketch compared to where we were – and that was out of the pure joy and exuberance in creating something new.
One of our favourite additions in volume 2 was the characters based on old 80s Saturday morning cartoons – will they be returning and will we see more of the back story involving the Saturday Morning Wars?
BU: Saturday Morning Wars is now fully Kieran Squire’s baby, with a little guidance he has come up with a whole history for the conflict between ’80s/’90s action figure cartoon tie-ins, as the aggressive marketing of the period is played out in Toyworld. The story itself is going to bridge between ‘yarns’ in the book and totals 26 pages. It is a beast and he gotten the larger chunk of it completed – Kieran is THE man.
You’ve got a diverse group of artists working on Torsobear do you have you any new artists and writers joining you for this volume? Or is it the usual crew returning? Any stories which you’re particularly looking forward to unleashing on the world?
BU: As we’re closing out many characters arcs, lots of the original teams return – such as the amazingly talent Saoirse back painting Janos Honkonen’s story of industrial action in Playstoria. There are a couple of new faces to the series, like artists Yen Quach and Steven Sharar, plus writer Mike Orvis. The stories they are working on involve ancient beings, cults and transcendent thinking, which are all damned exciting. The finales for Snaplok (Cy’s character) and Ruxby are totally unlike anything we’ve tried – that’s most of the fun!
Is this going to be the final volume of a trilogy or do you have plans for more?
BU: For me, it was always about Ruxby and this is his final starring role. Other writers have sent in street crime stories, and a previous team want to base a music-themed one shot in Playstoria’s Song Bear bar – so I think Toyburg will continue for as long as people have cool ideas to try, even if my only involvement is editorial.
And finally can you sum up Torsobear in 5 words for those who’ve never seen it before?
BU: Toy Story meets True Detective
You can back Torsobear volume 3 on Kickstarter by pledging here.
Or you can purchase the first two issues from torsobear.com.
