Broken Frontier

What happens after Alice leaves Wonderland? The appearance and disappearance of the blonde-haired little girl has left the place in a shambles: The courtroom is busted up, the Queen of Hearts is furious, and things are looking very bad for the White Rabbit, whom Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee have implicated in "suspicious dealings with the Alice Monster." The White Rabbit's place as the Queen's herald may end with a single pronouncement of "OFF WITH HIS HEAD!" And there's really no way for a rabbit to be a herald if he has no head. The job involves quite a lot of proclaiming. The white rabbit is in a pickle, and he has only his shy housemaid Mary Ann to help him.

So begins SLG's latest Disney comic, Wonderland, by Tommy Kovac (Stitch, Autumn) and Sonny Liew (Malinky Robot, My Faith in Frankie), a full-color series about the chaos in Wonderland that ensues almost immediately after Alice's departure. For writer Kovac, becoming a part of this world was no great stretch. After reading first the Golden Book adaptation of the Disney Alice in Wonderland animated movie and then the original Lewis Carroll novels, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass, Kovac says he "became obsessed."

"I learned to play chess against myself so I could feel like Alice," he said. "I had my dad dig me a deep hole in our backyard so I could pretend it was the rabbit hole and I was falling down it to Wonderland. I know that's weird and a little creepy, but it shows how much I internalized these stories."

The premise of Wonderland--a Wonderland without Alice--did present a challenge to Kovac, however. "We've only seen Wonderland through the lens of Alice's dreams. Without her, what is it like there? Whose subconscious is calling the shots now?"

In the original story, we see Wonderland from Alice's outsider perspective, so in Wonderland, Kovac decided to use a resident of Wonderland, Mary Ann, who never actually appears in the books or movie. She's known only by her name, with which the White Rabbit addresses Alice when he confuses her with his servant girl. "I started wondering who this Mary Ann is," Kovac said, "and what her life is like, working for that bossy, fusty little rabbit."

Kovac's clear vision of Wonderland and its denizens, as well as of the kind of story he wants to tell comes through in his imaginative, scrupulously-crafted script. His aim was to keep the characters and story true to the spirit of the novels, the Disney movie and the Victorian period. As important as the story to this vision is Sonny Liew's artwork. His representations of familiar characters like Tweedle-Dum and Tweedle-Dee and the Queen of Hearts are lively and expressive, while his coloring is subtle and warm, almost as if filtered through sepia tones.

"It was a bit of a challenge at first to draw in a style that was both recognizably 'Disney' yet different, while trying to capture some of the spirit of the original Alice illustrations," said Liew. "In the end, I realized both versions are bound together by their quality draftsmanship, and my job was to emulate that quality."

Kovac and Liew also understand the import of adding on to a story and world that so many have enjoyed and loved. "It feels like finally getting to play with a toy that's been kept in a locked glass cabinet," said Kovac. "I've been staring at it, admiring it, with my nose pressed up against the glass, but now we get to take it out and hopefully add something new and genuine to it!"

Wonderland will be an ongoing, FULL COLOR comic book. Each issue will be $3.50. Issue one was in stores on May 17 The comic is available at comic book stores, Amazon.com and direct from the publisher at www.slgpublishing.com.

Wonderland is the third of four Disney-inspired comic books from SLG Publishing. The first, Haunted Mansion debuted in October 2005 and the second, Tron, in April 2006. The fourth series, Gargoyles by Greg Weisman and David Hedgecock, is scheduled for release in June 2006.