Cassius comic book receives generous Kickstarter funding
Written by Ysabel Cacho
Featured image from Kickstarter
Photo from Kickstarter.
For Julius Caesar the ides of March brought about his downfall but for two SCAD students, Emily Willis, a writing major, and her fiancé, Ann Uland, a sequential arts major, the ides of March was their good luck charm. On March 15, the two of them launched a Kickstarter to help fund their project, a comic book called “Cassius,” which was written by Willis and illustrated by Uland.
The story of “Cassius” is “an action adventure comic basically centered around this fictional Roman city called the Latium,” explains Uland, who created the story. “It centers around our main character called Junia, who has been cursed with this ‘mark of Cassius.’ Cassius, in her world, is this legendary figure that is said to bring great change. Now Junia has to survive since there are so many people who want to utilize her for political and powerful means. She has to take on more than one person can really bear alone.”
“Cassius” was inspired by Shakespeare’s tragedy, “Julius Caesar.” Both in the play and in history, Cassius is Brutus’ friend who convinces him to murder Caesar. “The character of Cassius, for me, was always the interesting guy who was never expounded on,” says Willis. “Shakespeare did a good job of trying to put some context and making it seem interesting and sympathetic people. But yeah, I thought there must be something more to this guy. You sense there’s a background. [Brutus and Cassius] clearly have this bond and they would do anything for each other and Cassius was able to convince Brutus to kill another dude for him.” However in Willis and Uland’s story, it’s Junia, not Cassius, who is the main protagonist. They describe Junia to be “tenacious, clever and horrendously mischevious.”
“I get a kick when we pitch [Cassius] because people’s eyes light up,” adds Willis. “It’s Roman lesbians kicking ass and it’s inspired by Julius Caesar. People just get this grin on their faces!”
Their idea did more than just put a smile on people’s faces. Within one week of launching their Kickstarter project, Cassius was already funded for $3700. This inspired Uland and Willis to push for their stretch goal: raising $5800 for their second issue. Not only did they reach their goal a few weeks later but they also reached $6062.
Their success didn’t come without any hardship. Willis had to take the spring quarter off just to manage the Kickstarter. The two of them were constantly on social media to spread the word. “There’s a difference [between] running a Kickstarter and running a successful Kickstarter,” says Uland. “You have to prod it all the time. I feel so obnoxious because sometimes it’s the fifteenth tweet of the day and I’m still like, ‘Have you backed Cassius today?’”
They credit their “lovely fans who are terribly helpful and incredibly sweet” for reaching their goals. Before Cassius, Uland and Willis had worked on other comics that they published online, which developed a fan base. The two would go to conventions and meet people who were interested in their comics and ask them if they had anything new, which allowed them to spread the word about Cassius.
Uland and Willis were also able to reach out to people who weren’t part of their initial fan base. They attribute their success to their passion for creating stories that they love. “Not to sound terribly arrogant but [Cassius] has a good premise,” says Willis. “I think it helps when you’ve got people who are just as passionate as we are too.” “People respond well to you if you generally love what you’re doing,” adds Uland. “Everyone can tell the difference if you’re doing it for the money or if you’re doing it because you get to tell your absolute favorite story.”
Another attribute to their success is their knowledge on the subject matter. Uland and Willis immersed themselves in the Roman culture. “We lucked out on Barnes and Noble,” says Uland. According to Willis, “I think the difference is that it’s queer Roman women by queer women.” “If you write about what you know then it usually goes off a little bit better sometimes,” says Uland.
“The focus isn’t on the characters’ sexuality,” says Willis. “It’s just an aspect of them.” “And it’s diverse women kicking butt,” adds Uland.
Diversity plays a huge role in their story. Although Willis was heavily inspired by Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar,” “I have my own take on writing women. I don’t like the strong female trope, which is ‘I gotta be cold and unfeeling to be badass.’” To make sure that she didn’t have any gender biases, Willis wrote Junia in a gender-neutral pronoun because she “didn’t want to accidentally fall into that trope that society has given us of writing women to a specific role. So I wrote ‘they’ they entire time.”
Even though it helped Willis avoid the clichés, it was confusing for Uland. “She was doing it for multiple characters so they wouldn’t all fall into the gender bias and I’m reading the first script thinking, ‘Oh man, who’s doing what?’ But no, we figured it out eventually,” she says.
Another stereotype they tried to avoid was the trope Uland describes as “a bunch of old white dudes with togas and leaves in their hair. It’s a very stylized and very narrow slice of Roman life,” she says. “The Roman Empire spanned so much of the Mediterranean and other places. Throughout history, it touches all over these other cultures and it becomes almost the first melting pot places.”
Despite reaching their goal, Uland and Willis will be making more issues for “Cassius.” They planned out three story arcs with around six to seven issues for each arc. “If things go well, we’ll do another Kickstarter for issues three and four,” says Willis.
For now they are getting ready to publish the issues by mid-July.
Willis hopes that “Cassius” will inspire people to start their own stories of women “kicking ass.” “We need more of this,” Uland says. “That can’t happen with just one creative team alone. I hope people realize that there is a place for them. Even if they aren’t comic people but writers and whatever their creative medium is, I hope they feel like they can put up a wider diversity of women.”
Conventions, mainstream comics and indie comics are slowly starting to give their female characters more than just a love story such as the new release of Miss Marvel, the new female Thor and even Spider-Gwen. “It’s about time,” says Willis. “The most we can do is contribute just a little to that then that’s awesome.”
