EXQUISITE CORPSES: RASCAL RANDY #1 Preview & Interview with Tyler Boss

Following the end of Exquisite Corpses’ first “season,” we’re getting miniseries that dive into some of the story’s best and/or strangest characters. First up: Exquisite Corpses: Rascal Randy #1, written by Tyler Boss, with art by Dylan Burnett, colors from Jordie Bellaire, and letters by Becca Carey. Ahead of the issue’s release on July 8th (and pre-order cutoff on June 15th), we have an interview with Tyler Boss, teasing the new miniseries, along with a preview you can read right now!

How did you come to take on a solo series for Rascal Randy, and why did this character jump out to you as your favorite of Exquisite Corpses’ killers?

Tyler Boss: If I’m remembering correctly, it was actually pretty early at the writers’ room for Season One of Exquisite Corpses that the team at Tiny Onion asked me to start thinking about what a Rascal Randy solo series would look like. It wasn’t a guarantee that it would happen, but they sort of planted that seed there. I think the reason I was asked about him specifically was because every time we played Exquisite Corpses: The Game, I would pick Randy. I would also play him in character, doing a voice and bopping around. I always chose him because I loved his contrast to the other killers. Whether it was the sleek design of Fox Mask, or the ruthless efficiency of a Lone Gunman, I loved the idea that some guy in a bunny suit could not only be their equal, but actually their better. 

You were part of the original “Corpse Crew” writers’ room in Buffalo. How did that experience influence how you handled Rascal Randy’s backstory?

Tyler Boss: One of the rules we lived by in the room was to focus more on the civilians of Oak Valley, and less on the killers. The more you see Michael Myers, the less scary they become. The killers are the dessert to the meat and potatoes of our town’s gen pop. That said, readers coming for a Rascal Randy story are going to want to see a lot of Randy. So, in trying to find what the angle was for an interesting Randy story to tell that would satisfy both audiences’ expectations and what would be the best story to tell for Randy, we landed more on the history of the Rascal Randy character and the horrors of that story. 

We know Rascal Randy is New Jersey’s selection for the game, but this mini-series promises to reveal the origin of Rascal Randy the rabbit in Aurora Springs, NY. Can you tease the backstory you’ve developed for Rascal Randy and how it ties to Aurora Springs?

Tyler Boss: I don’t want to say too much as that’s the fun of this book, but the story shifts and moves across time and space to tell Randy’s story. We start the first issue in Aurora Springs in the very recent past, but then issue #2 opens in the 1920s. As we jump around in Randy’s history, though, they all link to one another, so there is this recursive logic driving them. The things happening in the 1920s inform what’s happening in our recent past that informs what’s happening in 2009 that then comes back again and informs what’s happening in our recent past. There’s a sort of curse haunting this character throughout his history. 

You are teaming up with artist Dylan Burnett for this series. Can you talk about your collaborative process and how Dylan’s style is perfect for the world of Exquisite Corpses?

Tyler Boss: I mean you said it, Dylan’s been the perfect collaborator for this project. I’ve been lucky enough to work with Dylan once before on one of my other Image Comics series, What’s the Furthest Place from Here?, and I am so grateful to be working with him again on Randy. Setting aside the surface aesthetic of Dylan’s style — which operates in such a wonderful space of cartooning being informed by not only western comics, but also video games and manga — it’s his storytelling that I think is even stronger. He’s such a natural cartoonist whose panel-to-panel compositions feel so effortless and natural. They evoke masters like JR JR and Jaime Hernandez. His style is so flexible that he can work in any genre, too. So, getting to see him flex his horror muscles has been such a blast.  

In the series announcement, it was described as being as “sweet and cuddly as a porcupine”. Is it a challenge to balance younger characters with a killer rabbit mascot and brutal violence?

Tyler Boss: Not really, actually. Kids’ lives are so much more blunt and brutal and immediate than the facade adults can put up. In some ways, Randy is the perfect reflection of that. He’s a perversion. On first look he should be something comforting and safe, but you scratch a little deeper and you start to see the cracks in its teeth. The matted fur and sweat stained pits of people looking back on their childhood and saying, “oh fuck. Well, that’s where that trauma came from, huh?” 

With the first issue hitting comic book shops on Wednesday, July 8, can you give our readers a tease of the terrors that await them over the course of the mini-series?

Tyler Boss: There’s going to be plenty of blood, barbarity, and bunnies. The book is a constant escalation of one issue after the other, so buckle up because it’s going to get real weird, real sad, and real nasty. But in a fun way.

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EXQUISITE CORPSES RASCAL RANDY #1 arrives in comic book shops on July 8th, with a FOC (pre-order deadline) of June 15th.

MINISERIES PREMIERE

THE COTTON-TAILED EXQUISITE CORPSES KILLER GETS A SPINOFF ORIGIN STORY.

The sleepy little town of Aurora Springs, NY, has exactly one claim to fame: it’s the birthplace of Rascal Randy. Not the man in the suit—the man has never mattered. He was no one until he put the mascot head on for the first time, until he felt the life leave someone’s body through the thickly furred gloves of the suit.

No, Aurora Springs is the birthplace of Rascal Randy the rabbit, who, once upon a time, was poised to become the greatest animated character this country had ever seen—until greed and tragedy changed his trajectory forever.

Now, before the events of EXQUISITE CORPSES SEASON 1, witness the final murder spree of this iconic killer, as chaos hops into town with buckteeth bared and ears flopping…and the secret, sordid history of Rascal Randy is finally revealed.