The Film Freaks highlights heroes with disabilities in this funny and violent adult comic series
UK-based comedy fantasy writer Johnny Sawyer has launched his comic book, The Film Freaks, in which the main protagonists are people with disabilities.
The story is set in the sleepy town of Dorset in which something goes terribly wrong with the film business when a roman legion is about to attack shoppers and a highwayman is trying to murder tourists. It is up to the local cinema employees with disabilities to save the town. Dylan is autistic and collects power tools; Gadge is a wheelchair user; Ali is OCD and uses illegal cleaning products to clean up the bodies; Toby is an amputee with a steam- powered metal leg with a tea-making function; and finally, Max is the group’s getaway driver and he is blind.
When not writing, Johnny works at a secondary school with blind students, modifying teacher’s lessons into braille. It is his conversations with students that inspired him to write a fantasy series for people with disabilities. We spoke with him to learn more:
Rolling Inspiration: Was there any specific motivation behind selecting certain characters or disabilities to highlight in The Film Freaks?
Johnny Sawyer: Most of the main characters in the book are based on people who I have previously worked with or known personally. I have worked in schools in the UK for over seventeen years with students who have a wide range of different disabilities.
However, the main idea for the book came from a conversation I had about five years ago, with one particular autistic student. He was eighteen years old and said that he did not like reading and never watched TV or films. He said that the reason for this was that he felt that none of it was ever written with people like him in mind.
It was never written for autistic people or for people with disabilities. In his experience, most characters in books that had a disability were always sad, pathetic or just really weak and he was none of those things.
That really struck a chord with me and I knew exactly where he was coming from. A lot of the students that I have worked with who have additional needs, have been incredibly strong people and many have had a great sense of humour. The truth is, in the world we all live in today, they have had to be strong in order to cope on an everyday basis, with whatever life throws at them.
That gave me the idea to write a book where a group of people with disabilities become the heroes who have to save their town and, although each of them has a disability that they have to live with, they do not let it hold them back, but instead they utilise it.
I also did not want The Film Freaks to be a kids book, with the typical, stereotypical, everyone valued equally message. I wanted it to be aimed at adults, exciting, funny and violent. I also wanted it to have the exact opposite of a Marvel Avengers style story. None of my main characters have super powers, they all have disabilities, but when you put those people together they are a seriously formidable team and can handle anything that is thrown at them.
Rolling Inspiration: Why do you think it is important to have a portrayal of strong characters with disabilities in literature?
Johnny Sawyer: Let’s be honest, we live in a world that contains millions of people with disabilities. I personally think it is time that the people who create books, TV and films realise that, and start producing exciting content for that massive community. I am not saying that there is anything wrong with films that highlight the problems that people with disabilities have to face on a daily basis. However, there has to be a point where people with disabilities are given their own action heroes or funny stuff and I want to try to do that.
In this book my characters are given the derogatory name the “film freaks” by the local townsfolk because they all have disabilities and they all work in the local cinema. However, rather than being offended by the name, the group embrace it as their own. After all, as far as they are all concerned, everyone on earth is a little bit freaky, there is no such thing as normal. Furthermore, they may all have issues and disabilities that make them different from other people, but who cares.
When it comes to saving the universe, the characters in my book do not need help crossing the road, before they do it. The film freaks may all have issues, but they would never run from a bar room brawl. They are all seriously tough people, living life and saving lives in their own brilliantly, funny, different ways.
Rolling Inspiration: What do you hope readers will take away from the book?
Johnny Sawyer: I would love for people to read it and then tell their friends about it because they think that The Film Freaks is completely different from anything that they have read before. I also want people to be surprised by it, laugh at it, be shocked, groan at it and not have worked out how it all ends halfway through the book.
Personally, I think that there is nothing worse than starting a book or film and within five minutes being able to predict the end. However, I promise anyone who reads The Film Freaks only one thing: This story has more twists than a cobra caught in a high-speed tumble dryer.
Rolling Inspiration: Are you currently working on future or follow up stories?
Johnny Sawyer: I am presently working on the audiobook version of The Film Freaks, which I hope to release very soon. However, I am also planning another six books in the series. The next one is something that I am really excited about, and I know the story is really violent, bewildering and funny.
One of my friends said that discovering The Film Freaks was like discovering what would happen if Douglas Adams and Quentin Tarantino had a book baby because it was funny but also demented and violent. I kind of liked that, but I just want to write like me. That said, I do not want to spoil the surprise that is coming in the sequel, other than to say that the second book takes place at Glastonbury and just like this first book, it is definitely for adults only.
The Film Freaks is available exclusively from Amazon in hardback, paperback and digital formats. For those with a Kindle Unlimited subscription, the comic book is free.
