BNP At NYCC: An Interview With Joe Casey, Writer of MCMLXXV – 1975 If Ya Nasty

I interviewed Joe Casey at NYCC about his new book MCMLXXV (1975) from Image Comics. The comic follows Pamela Evans, a taxi-driving woman who has an enchanted tire iron that she uses on ninjas, monsters, and street gangs. Yeah. It’s a wild ride. The series takes place in a fictional Manhattan in 1975, and there are loads of musical references to make any aficionado like myself happy. Learn more about Joe and his work in this interview.

New York Is Like This Black Nerd Problems: MCMLXXV is heavily influenced by music. So it got me wondering, what was the inspiration for this series? Was it an image you built off of, a character, or maybe a song? Joe: The character came first. This idea of this kind of character. It’s cool iconography. The tire iron, and the cab and all that. Then you have to think of the story to go along with it. And that’s where my—I have sort of a scratch mix mentality when it comes to comics. Especially ones that I come up with. Where I’ll say “Well, I’ll throw in this from this influence. I’ll throw in that.” And see how it all mixes together. Some things don’t make it. You start throwing things in that don’t fit. So you gotta get it outta there. So the street gangs, the monsters, the time period, the character, those things were the ones that ended up fitting together. And at some point it just feels right. And there you have it.

BNP: So 1975 the year was always part of the plan? J: Yes, because once I knew it was a period piece, because I like that er…