Editor's note — A little history...
The idea behind Starr and Staff dates back to 1984 where high school friends fascinated by Japanese culture—or at least, martial arts and ninjas—dreamed of one day creating their own comic books.
When
sent me the script for A Mirror Image Storm, the first of the Starr and Staff graphic novels, it had been a long time since I’d last thought about these characters. At that moment I found myself back in a high school art room in 1984, having lunch with a group of friends dreaming about one day running our own comic book company. After what seemed like the blink of an eye, we all left high school, grew up, and set those dreams of drawing funny books aside for the dispassionate life of working to pay the bills.One fateful day in that art room, my friend Jeremy Eaton shared an idea that played on his interest in Japanese culture. I have to admit, that back then all that I knew about Japanese culture I learned from TV and comics: shogun, samurai, and ninjas—especially ninjas. I’m not sure how he originally opened the discussion, but Jeremy’s comic book idea featured twin ninja brothers who were opposite sides of the same soul.
What Jeremy described eventually became known as Alliance, featuring Staff—named after his fighting implement of choice, and Starr—for similar reasons. I added the extra “r” to his name to maintain symmetry between the two brothers.
Jeremy explained the storyline as being a representation of Yin and Yang. The twin brothers at odds with each other represented the dual nature of the war of good and evil deep inside every human soul. Looking back, it was a profound concept for a creative team comprised of 15-year olds. I can’t speak for the other artists in our group but I was less concerned about the nuances of the story and just wanted to draw super-hero ninja battles.
Our group of artists, including my friends E-Da Soong and Joseph Wu, brainstormed with Jeremy some ideas for the backstory and character designs. To spread the work around, Jeremy and I were going to handle the writing tasks, and E-da, Joseph, and I would share the drawing duties.
Joseph drew some of the finalized costume designs for these unique twin super-heroes. Here’s a sample of their mirror-image outfits.
We thought of a couple of different story concepts about a young boy who discovered a shuriken with mystical properties. In both versions, the boy discovered that when he cracked the token in half, the two ninjas appeared out from nowhere.
In one idea, the boy released the two brothers, who were imprisoned in the shuriken by an evil wizard, and unleashed their age-old battle into our current day. In another version, the boy disappeared and his soul split into two for a temporary time when the super-ninjas were needed. After a while, the ninjas disappeared and returned the soul to the boy when the shuriken’s halves rejoined.
I use the term “story” loosely. While I might have written a few short stories in our after-school Creative Writing Club, I didn’t have the faintest idea of how to plot and write a long-form story, let alone scripts for a comic book series. Plus, the Japanese culture was as alien to me as actually living in Japan—and I also wasn’t much into research.
A couple years passed, and my friend Lucia Tang from the Creative Writing Club stumbled onto one of our irregular lunchtime gatherings. She mentioned that she saw someone in the library drawing comics on his own. Eventually she introduced me to Kenneth, and we shared a mutual love for not only the same comic writers and artists, but took the career of making graphic novels seriously, long after our other friends went to college.
Over the years, Kenneth and I formed a collaborative bond where he wrote and drew comics, and also wrote extra stories for me to draw. When we submitted samples to the major comic book companies, I completed the technical end of lettering, production, and corresponding with the companies for their review and… eventual rejection.
But more to the point, from the time we first met, Kenneth was fascinated by the idea of Starr and Staff and we asked him if he would like to try writing it. And so, almost forty years ago, Kenneth delivered the first 64-page plot for Staff and Starr: Yin and Yang.
The plot in this 1986 version of the story focused on Takeyoshi as Staff, while Starr existed only as a mysterious foil with no identity or speaking lines. The story took some pretty dark turns as Takeyoshi explored the battle between the dark and light sides of his soul. And interspersed throughout the seriousness were humorous notes intended for the artist (me); for example, one early battle scene described a melée with a plethora of martial arts weapons “(Except origami hats! No origami hats!)” What made this comment especially charming was that a later scene featured that different version of Tomie at home folding origami frogs.
I updated the character designs in 1989 in my own explorations for presenting the story.
Again, life circumstances and other interests took us away from completing those projects. But, Kenneth has never been known to let go of a solid idea.
Over the next several decades, the characters would long for their stories to be told. In 2019 Kenneth returned with a cohesive 40-page script that explored the concept of a soul at war with itself in more convincing ways.
While most of the same elements exist: the character names, martial arts, the Yakuza, (and origami models!), how they’re introduced and what they seek to accomplish feels more real and complete. There’s intrigue, excitement, a great deal of speculation about the future, as well as thematic additions to WW II history.
And this story isn’t over yet.
Addendum
Last week, Kenneth mentioned that the next Starr and Staff manga will release sometime next year. Nevertheless, after considering the different possibilities for fiction here on Substack, starting next week we will be trying an experiment. We are pleased to announce that for the upcoming months we will present a Starr and Staff novella here, one chapter a week. The novella will delve into the backstory of Yukiko and her father exiling themselves from Japan after the scandal that erupted when Yukiko's mother was attacked and left in a coma.
Starting next week, watch for regular instalments of: Memoirs of a Shattered Soul!
You’re reading: Starr and Staff: A Mirror Image Storm
Read the chapters in order:
I liked the finished comic and this article amazes me how an idea from so long ago evolves into what it eventually becomes. Looking forward to the novella.