What with the rebellion and all!
Chapter 214: To Dublin and beyond...
Hi.
I tend to talk a lot about how I don’t leave my house. I think the only reason it comes up so much is because I used to travel all the time. I’ve been to 48 states, 33 countries, and 5 continents. So being a shut-in is new to me. Newish. But late last month not only did I go out in the daylight (hiss) but I flew to Ireland for 9 days.
The whole thing was all very last minute, so if I didn’t call you to come hang out, that’s why. I wasn’t even sure I was going until the week before. But in the final weeks of December the movie adaptation of our book 4 KIDS WALK INTO A BANK began shooting. So I boarded a plane to Dublin from lovely JFK airport in NYC and flew across an ocean to watch them make it. The following day, Tyler and his wife (and the designer of our book’s amazing wallpapers and artist on many excellent variant covers) Courtney followed.
Upon landing in Dublin, for reasons only I know, I decided to tell the Passport Control officer that I was sort of there for work and sort of there for pleasure. He stared in confusion as I explained that they were making a movie of my book and I was going to visit the set. I might have mentioned that I was a producer, but not exactly a working producer. To say that he gave no fucks would be an overstatement. His complete lack of interest was truly admirable. I only share this anecdote because when Tyler arrived the following day he did the exact same thing but instead of saying “they’re making a movie of my book” he said “they’re making a movie of my book starring Liam Neeson” and, in what would become a recurring theme of the trip, that changed everything. The passport control officer (maybe the same one) was so excited he asked them to wait while he got a pen and paper so he could write down the name of the book. They love Liam.
I’ve been to Dublin a handful of times in my former life and I’ve always loved it. The people are kind, the city is lovely, and the economy seems to be entirely liquid- 50% pubs / 50% coffee shops. I don’t drink beer but I love a nice pub, and I don’t drink coffee but I love a good cocoa, so this all suits me fine. The thing I like to do most in any city is just wander, and so after we got into our airbnb (and napped) we wandered until we found some food.
The food was actually really good, even if Tyler always got preferential treatment. Compare his curry(L) to mine(R). His has a little star because he’s a special little boy. Mine has a drawing of the small intestine because I’m disgusting, I guess.
After a few days of wandering, eating, doing tourist shit, and visiting friends, it was time for us to go to meet up with Black Mask Studios head/ movie producer Matt Pizzolo and go to the 4 KIDS WALK INTO A BANK set.
It’s a very strange thing to walk into a world you and your friend created while riding the subway together late at night. I don’t have a lot to compare it to. But seeing how hard the location scouts, set designers, and production coordinators all worked to match our book was very humbling. It is an incredibly thrilling and yet wildly surreal thing. It is our book, but it’s not. It is our characters, but it’s not. I’ve always loved making a comic and putting it out into the world where it ceases to be mine and becomes the readers. This is like that, but in a much more literal way. A bunch of amazingly talented people like our director Frankie Shaw, our writer Matthew Robinson, and the really brilliant cast all took a thing and made it theirs. I compared it at one point to writing a cookbook. The recipe came from me but the food itself I didn’t touch.
I wanted to share some pictures from the set…
But we aren’t allowed to do that yet.
I can’t even talk too much about it. I can just say that after countless meetings and phone calls, rewrites and revisions, close calls and complete breakdowns, it was pretty wild to see it all come together. In Hollywood a lot of stuff gets optioned. But a very small amount of it ever makes it across the finish line, so at a certain point you have to adopt an “I’ll believe it when I sit down in the theater” mentality in order to protect yourself. No matter how much Tyler or I might have tried to will a movie into existence, it is something beyond our means. But our producers at Picturestart, Erik and Jessica, and our director, Frankie, really did fight like hell to get this made. So it was really great to get the chance to hang out with them on set for a couple of days, take it all in, and actually finally believe it.
And getting to watch Frankie and the cast work was truly a joy. Again, hard to describe it as anything other than surreal to have a lot of people from a lot of movies that we really love walking around talking and looking like people we made up.
I’m excited for you all to see what everyone has spent so long working on. But you’ll have to wait a bit. They’re still filming now but when the powers that be clear me to share some photos and whatnot I will. And hopefully we can show you some other secret stuff before too long.
In the meantime I don’t have much else to add. We worked a lot in our airbnb. I drank a lot of Butler’s hot chocolates, which really are the best.
We walked down a lot of streets that looked like they’d be a good place to get attacked by skinheads.
I ran into a friend from work. And his… dad?
I heard Fairytale Of New York played over 2,000 times and never got sick of it.
I went to Trinity College and visited the library, which is the real life location of the Jedi Library in Attack Of The Clones, and somehow was more Star Wars-y in person than it was in the movie.
I saw the Book of Kells but they wouldn’t let me take a picture with it our touch it, even after I told them I was making a movie with Liam Neeson. I told the guard if its that precious they should CGC it.
I never learned what the hell this was.
We went to the Archeology Museum and saw the bog bodies which, if you don’t know what they are, brace yourself.
They are people who were sacrificed hundreds and hundreds of years ago and their bodies were miraculously well preserved by various bogs. Not enough to be killed and left in a bog, this guy above had his nipples cut off because in olden times sucking a king’s nipples was a sign of respect, and the people who killed him wanted to make sure he wouldn’t even get to be a respected king in the afterlife. I read that and had to then go on with my day, so now you have to as well.
And finally we took the time to go hang with our friends at Big Bang Comics who all still have their nipples. Well, we hung out with John. Bruno is too good for us it seems. But when we went to the shop we got to do something we’ve been meaning to do for a while now. Big Bang made a top secret exclusive version of WHAT’S THE FURTHEST PLACE FROM HERE? vol. 1 featuring cover art from the Prince of Ireland himself, Declan Shalvey. Isn’t it pretty?
So not only did Tyler and I sign them, but Declan did as well. These are real limited edition and we won’t be making them ever again, so if you want a copy stop into Big Bang or you can mailorder them at the link below. They will ship them anywhere in the world, you might just have to email them to sort it out.
Thanks to John for being one of my favorite folks and for making 3,000 miles away still feel like home.
Anyway, Dublin is great. If a guy in line at kebab stand calls you a mean word that starts with the letter C at 2am, just find a way to let him know you’re making a movie with Liam Neeson. He will literally shove his drunk wife out of the way to shake your hand.
Stay safe. Take care of each other. Los Angeles forever.
-Matthew Rosenberg
NYC 1/11/25
I laughed so many times.
Bruno is not Irish so he is just immune to your Liam Neeson peddling ways.