Not By Something as Accidental as Blood – Bash Back

It’s funny what you can find hidden right in plain sight. Sometimes you know it’s there, but you just don’t know where to look. Perhaps you’ve seen it in other forms, in various other permutations. Other times you can find it through word of mouth, the knowledge of a particular colour, or even a symbol. What was formerly unseen or unspoken about has never been either of these things if you know how to listen, and where to look: especially if you know someone who can point you down the way.

I found Bash Back: A Story of the Queer Mafia Issue #0(1) through word of mouth: specifically through a friend of mine a few days after the shootings at the Pulse in Orlando, Florida. They had this webcomic circulating in their Friends’ feed for a while and they described it to me as something along the lines of a “revenge LGBTQ+ story” around a literal and a particularly emotional “safe space” — that summed up a lot about what they felt about the events in the Pulse and what they wish could be done in response to other homophobic crimes like it.

I actually went to web search the comic itself, but I had trouble actually finding it. I was surprised. It sounded like a comic that would have been easy to find, especially when my friend sent me the link and I realized it was on Tumblr.

Bash Back is a webcomic written by Lawrence Gullo and Kelsey Hercs, and also graphically designed by Gullo and illustrated by its other co-creator Fyodor Pavlov. Fyodor Pavlov is an erotica artist who has contributed work such as “A Gentleman’s Gentleman” to The Queerotic Comic Anthology, and currently collaborates with his creative partner and husband the writer, cartoonist and burlesque artist Lawrence “Zan” Gullo (or Lewd Alfred Douglas) on the webcomic Baritarian Boy. Gullo himself created the long running webcomic series My Life in Blue, while Kelsey “Zelma” Hercs is a performer and playwright that adapted Arno Schimdt’s Bottom’s Dream, a novel inspired by Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream into the script for a surrealist queer burlesque performance. According to a podcast interview with Graphic Policy (2) Hercs is doing her first comics work and collaboration with Bash Back.

The comics influences in the creative minds of these three creators are also interesting to note. Lawrence Gullo states that X-Men was important to him during his formative years due to relating to its mutant characters being ostracized and isolated, yet also being deserving of love. (3) Fyodor Pavlov also related to the X-Men as metaphors for queer character representation, even if they were all mostly of white ethnicity, but it is the explicitly gay anti-hero couple in The Authority (4) that influenced him.

Unlike Gullo or Pavlov, Kelsey Hercs was primarily influenced by what can be considered to be LGBTQ+ webcomics: specifically Gullo’s My Life in Blue, Rosalarian (Megan Rose Gedris’) YU+ME and I Was Kidnapped By Lesbian Pirates From Outer Space. (5) At one point in their interview with Graphic Policy, Hercs states that while she hadn’t been interested in mainstream comics but she later realized just how particularly “relevant” webcomics content became to her own life even if it didn’t figure into her previous writing. (6) Bash Back‘s creative team, as a whole, note webcomics content being made available for free and believe that they allow for more creative experimentation and diversity: granting these stories platforms and visibility for publishers “the opposite of mass media.” (7)

However, when the team is asked by one of Graphic Policy’s interviewers whether or not there is “a community of webcomic creators” where they talk about diversity, Kelsey Hercs mentions there is something of an erotic artist community that might include some “webcomic folk,” but it seems to be Fyodor Pavlov who states that “Tumblr is a great platform for artists in general” whose works get found on “reblogs” and user dashboards. (8)

Perhaps there is something to be said about Tumblr webcomics – or at least webcomics themselves – being part of something not unlike a twenty-first century Underground or alternative comix scene. Before Flame Con, hyper-links to Bash Back seem to have often been circulated primarily on Tumblr or LGBTQ+ social media circles: something made inadvertently invisible to mainstream or “normative society” at large. More specifically, when asked about the choice using in Tumblr as a platform and what virtues can be gained from it, the team explains that there are many people involved in activism on Tumblr and as such Bash Back can be used as a place of discussion and escapism. (9) Even the team’s Kickstarter Campaign (10) to create physical copies of Issue #0, especially for presentation for the 2016 Flame Con and to be issued out to backers by October, (11) is in the spirit of an independent art scene: both an act of innovation and a crowdfunding goal for its intended audience.

It is probably no coincidence that Bash Back‘s title also has some specifically LGBTQ+ activist resonances.

There is a group called Bash Back! that, according to Queer Ultraviolence: Bash Back! Anthology’s “Communiqués” primarily took place between 2007 to 2011: a collective of queer and anarchist projects utilizing civil disruption and disobedience against American institutions to make discrimination against LGBTQ+ people known. (12) Certainly, there is some indication that some of Bash Back’s creative team has passing awareness of this group. Kelsey Hercs in her alias of Zelma on her Tumblr states: “I also write a queer ultra violence webcomic called Bash Back with Lawrence Gullo, and art by Fyodor Pavlov,” (13) while Lawrence Gullo has sat on a panel at FlameCon at the Salon called “Queer Ultra Violence.” (14)

(15)

However, “Bash Back” as a logo seems go further back into LGBTQ+ history. It originates from the organization known as Queer Nation: a group founded in 1990 by HIV/AIDS activists from ACT UP. (16) While Bash Back‘s creative team may have been informed by the activities Bash Back!, it seems very likely that Queer Nation’s march in New York city – the site of the original Stonewall riots and the diverse and cosmopolitan setting of the comic itself (17) – along with calls to action, righteous anger, caution against passive resistance as benefiting the establishment from carrying “banners or signs that say BASH BACK,” (18) and pamphlets such as the Queer Nation Manifesto (19) have definitely had an influence over the spirit of their work.

It was in 2012 on Fyodor Pavlov’s Tumblr blog that the idea for the Bash Back series was revealed along with one sketch and concept. On his post from that time, he states “[Lawrence] and I have a dream project – a Coen brothers/Quentin Tarantinoesque cathartic and inexcusably violent blockbuster about the gay mafia called Bash Back!” (20) Certainly, Fyodor Pavlov seems to expand on this statement through a Tumblr post he made in 2014 about its plot and creative process, accompanied by further character sketches. (21)  Interestingly enough, Bash Back was published in another incarnation by Lawrence Gullo in the Geeks OUT! Presents POWER! anthology (22) though it’s in “a different art style” and although it is more condensed, prototypical and colourful than the extended Issue #0 webcomic, it does have something which may be a “spoiler” for the story itself. “Bash Back” in Geeks Out! Presents POWER was shown at FlameCon on June 2015. (23) According to Mr. Tullyman’s review of the anthology, Lawrence Gullo’s “Bash Back” was one of “a select few [that] used their stories as platforms for political or ideological beliefs.” (24) In essence, Gullo’s original published story is more quickly blatant and direct about its ideals in six pages while the webcomic created by the team spreads this sentiment out through more character development.

Bash Back has direct fictional inspirations as well. In an interview with Bobby Hankinson of Towleroad entitled “LGBT Comic-Con ‘Flame Con’ Tackles Sex, Violence and Queer Representation In Comics,” Gullo states that Bash Back “was inspired by The Godfather and general Quentin Tarantino violence,” (25) while in an interview with Geeks OUT Lawrence Gullo, under his performance name Lewd Alfred Douglas, adds that “It’s The Pink Menace, it’s the X-Men, it’s James Bond, it’s Tarantino …” (26)

The actual webcomic itself begins with a jarring dichotomy. Its opening captions state: “We used to be kings. Our people ruled the world. We conquered not only with armies, but with art, religion, love. We were the stuff of legends.” (27)

These lines evoke what some would consider to be LGBTQ+ figures of history: people such as Alexander the Great, Socrates, Sappho, Michelangelo, and so many possible others. The captions do not refer to anyone or any time period specifically. This is a contrast to the introduction of Lawrence Gullo’s “Bash Back” where he plainly lists within his use of lush grandiosity and brilliant colour “King Christina, Achilles, Empress Elagabalus, Alexander, James the First, Emperor Hadrian, King Ludwig II and Sappho” and states “This is a reminder of our glorious and fearsome heritage. Ours is not a succession of mere bloodline but one of a superior aristocracy of the spirit. We are the children of genius – kings – heroes – the gods themselves.” (28)

Yet the fact that the team’s Bash Back doesn’t go out of its way to mention names or visualize specific figures gives the beginning an almost a near-mythic resonance that the comic attempts to describe. However, it is precisely the mythic quality of these words that manages to make the reader think about thousands of years of art,  philosophy, ideology and innovation created by people that that many in contemporary times would consider to have homoerotic influences along with sexual orientations and identities different from the heterosexual and social mainstream.

And then you look at the scene in contrast to the captions: a colourless world where a man receives oral sex from a young boy on his knees in a dirty graffiti-filled public men’s restroom. As an artist Fyodor Pavlov himself has gone on record for having more background in historical illustration, particularly in his comics works, than in the contemporary. He has also stated that he’s had to simplify his style for such modern-day aesthetics. Indeed, one of the interviewers at Graphic Policy notes his style to be an art nouveau influence in the form of his black and white art. ⁽²⁹⁾ It is ironic, in a terrible sort of way, how an artist that may well usually portray that grand tradition of art and love in history ultimately creates an environment of stark monochrome colour and flowing lines depicting a scene from the restroom culture of shame that has especially defined many gay men’s lives for decades.

This juxtaposition of images and words reminds me of the sentiment behind the following passage from Alan Moore’s The Mirror of Love: “Disqualified from open love / we rendezvoused in squalor, / all we were allowed [...] Our culture / embracing Colette, / writing so perfectly Missy’s name / upon her anklet, / also came to know / dark hallways; / reeking lavatories, / reminded in our tenderness / of our equivalence / with shit.” (30)

Indeed, the scene on the opening page of Bash Back is further cemented with more captions. They state: “And now look at us. We are clowns. We are victims. We exist to be punished, used, and thrown away.” ⁽³¹⁾ It is an echo of “Bash Back’s” captions when Gullo writes, “We are the children of greatness, and yet spat upon. They tell us we should be grateful not to be stoned to death, burnt on the pyre, fed to their dogs, locked away in camps, forcibly corrected until we are as bitter, misshapen, and colorless as they are.” (32)

This is how the story starts. And it could continue from there as such. The story between these two men could begin and end in the metaphorical and literal ghetto of same-sex restroom assignation. You can almost see it going into the tropes of “the new kid being taken advantage of,” or the reluctant and circumstantial male prostitute getting discarded like trash, or even getting abused. It wouldn’t even be terribly surprising if this interaction ended with a hate crime: with them being discovered by police, or a group of vicious homophobes, or even with one partner beating on and abandoning the other. It even seems to be going there with the older man short-changing the younger man, denigrating him, then physically accosting and threatening if he blackmails him. (33)

It’s at this point that the following page reinforces the tone set by the last captions of the very first. It is stated in the beginning: “But mark me – all of you. We will rise again. And they’ll all be sorry.” (34) Suffice to say, all the would-be tropes are broken by a man threatening the life of the would-be abuser with a knife inscribed with the Spanish words: Que tudas mis heridas sean mortales (35) or, roughly translated into English, “That all my wounds be deadly.”

The weapon itself seems to resemble a Corsican vendetta knife, which is appropriate considering how the subtitle of Bash Back refers to the “Queer Mafia” and when you look at the theme it is supposed to embody: that of a revenge fantasy.

But really, when it comes down to it, as far as Issue #0 stands now Bash Back is less about vengeance and more about defending a place that defies the main narratives of inequality and hypocrisy. In other words, Bash Back is a blade cutting through preconceptions with the idea of family: specifically about The Family.

I would like to give a special thanks to the Queer Nation New York website and, in particular, T.L. Litt for the scanning and contribution of the “Bash Back” photograph – originally published in OutWeek Magazine – from the Demonstration of April 29, 1990 in response to the pipe-bombing outside Uncle Charlie’s.

In Part II of this article, we will get to take a look at some of the characters in Bash Back and just how their representation reflects what is – and isn’t – The Family.

1 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i), Kelsey Hercs (w) and Fyodor Pavlov (i). Bash Back: A Story of the Queer Mafia #0 (30 March 2015-28 March 2016). Webcomic. Blog. Web. 31 August 2016. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/115042398167/bashback-bashback-cover-art-for-bash-back>

2 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs, and Fyodor Pavlov. “Listen to Bash Back, A Story of the Queer Mafia Chat With Graphic Policy Radio on Demand.” Interview by Graphic Policy. Audio blog post. Graphic Policy: Where Comic Books and Politics Meet. N.p., 16 Jan. 2016. Web. (1 Sept. 2016). <https://graphicpolicy.com/2016/01/26/listen-to-bash-back-a-story-of-the-queer-mafia-chat-with-graphic-policy-radio-on-demand/> (1:27-1:35)

3 Ibid. (41:13-43:10)

4 Ibid. (43:11-44:16)

5 Ibid. (39:30-40:30)

6 Ibid. (40:00-40:29)

7 Ibid. (36:38-39:13)

8 Ibid. (51:30- 52:19)

9 Ibid. (32:42-34:27)

10 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs and Fyodor Pavlov. Bash Back: A Story of the Queer Mafia #0. The Royal Baritarian Players. Kickstarter.com. (25 July 2016 –19 August 2016). Retrieved 31 August 2016. <https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1476677298/bash-back-the-queer-mafia-thriller-issue-0/>

11 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs, and Fyodor Pavlov. “Listen to Bash Back, A Story of the Queer Mafia Chat With Graphic Policy Radio on Demand.” Interview by Graphic Policy. Audio blog post. Graphic Policy: Where Comic Books and Politics Meet. N.p., 16 Jan. 2016. Web. (1 Sept. 2016). <https://graphicpolicy.com/2016/01/26/listen-to-bash-back-a-story-of-the-queer-mafia-chat-with-graphic-policy-radio-on-demand/> (28:40-29:20)

12 “Communiqués” in Queer Ultraviolence: Bash Back! Anthology. Baroque, Fray and Tegan Eanelli (eds). U.S.A. Ardent Press, 2011. Pp. 54-256.

13 zforzelma [Kelsey Hercs]. “i-got-some-new-followers-so-welcome-to-my-blog.” Good Decisions Made at 4 AM. (2015). Blog. 1 September 2016. <http://zforzelma.tumblr.com/post/120186049996/i-got-some-new-followers-so-welcome-to-my-blog>

14 lawrencegullo [Lawrence Gullo]. “this-saturday-im-all-over-flamecon-1-my-work.” The Welfare of His Majesty. (9 June 2015). Blog. 1 September 2016. <http://lawrencegullo.tumblr.com/post/121118027260/this-saturday-im-all-over-flamecon-1-my-work>

15 Litt, T.L. “Bash Back.” Miller, Andrew and Duncan Osborne. “Bombing at Gay Bar Raises Community Ire” in OutWeek. No. 46. May 16, 1990. P. 12. Photograph. Web. 15 September 2016.  <http://outweek.net/pdfs/ow_46.pdf>

16 Queer Nation NY. “Queer Nation NY History.” (Updated 25 August 2016). Website. Web. 1 September 2016. <http://queernationny.org/history>

17 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs, and Fyodor Pavlov. “Listen to Bash Back, A Story of the Queer Mafia Chat With Graphic Policy Radio on Demand.” Interview by Graphic Policy. Audio blog post. Graphic Policy: Where Comic Books and Politics Meet. N.p., 16 Jan. 2016. Web. (1 Sept. 2016). <https://graphicpolicy.com/2016/01/26/listen-to-bash-back-a-story-of-the-queer-mafia-chat-with-graphic-policy-radio-on-demand/> (15:27-17:20)

18 Litt, T.L. “Bash Back.” Miller, Andrew and Duncan Osborne. “Bombing at Gay Bar Raises Community Ire” in OutWeek. No. 46. May 16, 1990. P. 12. Photograph. Web. 15 September 2016.  <http://outweek.net/pdfs/ow_46.pdf>

19 Queer Nation Manifesto. New York. (June 1990). ACT UP: AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power. N.p. Web. 1 September 2016. <http://www.actupny.org/documents/QueersReadThis.pdf>

20 fyodorpavlov [Fyodor Pavlov]. “John Doran, an ex-sergeant in the marines who was discharged for being gay before DADT was repealed. Shortly after, he was scooped up by the Family.” Fyodor Pavlov. (2 February 2012). Blog. 1 September 2016. <http://fyodorpavlov.tumblr.com/post/16950531393>

21 fyodorpavlov [Fyodor Pavlov]. “A while back, I posted that first character sketch and talked about a dream project Lawrence and I have had for a few years now.” Fyodor Pavlov. (10 August 2014). Blog. 1 September 2016. <http://fyodorpavlov.tumblr.com/post/94560629710>

22 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i). “Bash Back” in Geeks OUT! Presents POWER! John Curtis Jennison Jr. (ed). Brooklyn, NY: Geeks OUT, June 2015. Pp. 48-53.

23 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs, and Fyodor Pavlov. “Listen to Bash Back, A Story of the Queer Mafia Chat With Graphic Policy Radio on Demand.” Interview by Graphic Policy. Audio blog post. Graphic Policy: Where Comic Books and Politics Meet. N.p., 16 Jan. 2016. Web. (1 Sept. 2016). <https://graphicpolicy.com/2016/01/26/listen-to-bash-back-a-story-of-the-queer-mafia-chat-with-graphic-policy-radio-on-demand/> (29:28-30:30)

24 HeyMr.TullyMan. “GeeksOut Presents: POWER, Advanced Review.” Article. Geeks OUT. (5 June 2015). Web. 1 September 2016. <http://geeksout.org/blogs/hey-mr-tullyman/geeksout-presents-power-advanced-review>

25 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs and Steve Orlando. Interview by Bobby Hankinson. “LGBT Comic Con ‘Flame Con’ Tackles Sex, Violence and Queer Representation In Comics.” Towleroad. (20 June 2015). Website. 1 September 2016. <http://www.towleroad.com/2015/06/lgbt-comic-con-flame-con-discusses-violence-queer-storytelling/>

26 Gullo, Lawrence “@LewdAlfred.” Interview by Geeks OUT. “You can now read the entire 1st issue of Bash Back – the Queer Mafia Thriller!” Geeks OUT. (26 May 2016). Website. Web. 31 August 2016.<http://geeksout.org/blogs/lewdalfred/you-can-now-read-entire-1st-issue-bash-back-queer-mafia-thriller>

27 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i), Kelsey Hercs (w) and Fyodor Pavlov (i). Bash Back: A Story of the Queer Mafia #0 (30 March 2015-28 March 2016). Webcomic. Blog. Web. 31 August 2016. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/115059128762/issue-0-page-1> (1:1)

28 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i). “Bash Back” in Geeks OUT! Presents POWER! John Curtis Jennison Jr. (ed). Brooklyn, NY: Geeks OUT, June 2015. 48:1.

29 Gullo, Lawrence, Kelsey Hercs, and Fyodor Pavlov. “Listen to Bash Back, A Story of the Queer Mafia Chat With Graphic Policy Radio on Demand.” Interview by Graphic Policy. Audio blog post. Graphic Policy: Where Comic Books and Politics Meet. N.p., 16 Jan. 2016. Web. (1 Sept. 2016). <https://graphicpolicy.com/2016/01/26/listen-to-bash-back-a-story-of-the-queer-mafia-chat-with-graphic-policy-radio-on-demand/> (19:26-22:16)

30 Moore, Alan (w) and José Villarrubia (i). The Mirror of Love. Atlanta/Portland: Top Shelf Productions, 2004. P. 52.

31 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i), Kelsey Hercs (w) and Fyodor Pavlov (i). Bash Back: A Story of the Queer Mafia #0 (30 March 2015-28 March 2016). Webcomic. Blog. Web. 31 August 2016. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/115059128762/issue-0-page-1> (1:1)

32 Gullo, Lawrence (w, i). “Bash Back” in Geeks OUT! Presents POWER! John Curtis Jennison Jr. (ed). Brooklyn, NY: Geeks OUT, June 2015. 48:1, 49:1.

33 Ibid. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/116335937212/issue-0-page-3-edit-font-changed-to-be-more> <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/117011620252/bash-back-issue-0-page-4> (2:4-6, 3:1-5)

34 Ibid. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/115059128762/issue-0-page-1> (1:1)

35 Ibid. <http://bashback.tumblr.com/post/117011620252/bash-back-issue-0-page-4 > (4:2)