Jacob Phillips and Chris Ryall: Making Megalopolis with Francis Ford Coppola

When Francis Ford Coppola shoots you an email asking you to transform his new movie into a comic book, you say yes and worry about the details later. Chris Ryall got the email. Once he got over the shock ot it, he immediately knew who to contact next: Comic Book Couples Counseling regular, Jacob Phillips. They couldn’t have possibly understood what an undertaking they were committing to during those early days, but nearly five years later, they have the Megalopolisgraphic novel in their hands. It’s something special.

As you’ll hear on this week’s podcast, Francis Ford Coppola wanted Ryall and Phillips to make the comic their own. If that meant chopping up the script or fabricating the designs, so be it. Jacob Phillips approaches the likenesses the way he would any corporate comic character. If he were on Batman, he’d do his version of Batman. So, he’d apply the same logic to Adam Driver. The actor is the design, but the pencils and inks belong to Phillips. The magic is in how the movie and the comic, crafted independently of each other, aligned so well together.

Chatting with Ryall and Phillips allowed us to celebrate both artistic mediums. We discuss the challenges of translating cinematic ideas onto panels, the need for repertoire stories, and the hope within Francis Ford Coppola’s humanism.

Before all that, however, we also discuss the new documentary, Shopping for Superman. Directed by Wes Eastin, the film travels across America, from one comic book shop to another. It’s a must-watch for every comic book reader, as it honors the industry while contemplating where it’s all going in the wake of Diamond Comic Distributors' destruction.

Megalopolis, the comic, is published by Abrams ComicArts and arrives in shops on October 7th. Make sure you’re following Chris Ryall on his Substack, Instagram, and Blue Sky. Also, follow Jacob Phillips on Instagram and Blue Sky.

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