'Parallel' Interview: Rock N' Roll And Alternate Realities with Jason Douglas

In the following interview, writer Jason Douglas tells us more about who Landon is, what he's meant to become, and what to expect from this special edition of the Ringo Award-nominated Parallel. 

PREVIEWSworld: Let’s get into Parallel: Special Edition. Catch us up to speed. What is the story about?

Jason Douglas: Parallel is a dark sci-fi twisted tale that begs the question of the audience: What price would you pay for a second chance at the dreams you thought you left behind forever?

PREVIEWSworld: What can you tell us about Landon? Why is he the absolute wrong person for the job?

Jason Douglas: Landon is pushing 30, going through what we are calling these days, his “quarter-life crisis”, and has woken up to the reality that the dreams he deferred nearly a decade earlier are probably gone forever. The difference between Landon and the rest of us is that his existential dread about time passing, his depression, and angst over missed opportunities has manifested in a parallel version of himself reaching out and offering that second chance he thought was gone forever…. unfortunately for Landon, the cost of that chance is NOT necessarily in his physical and mental best interests.  

He is a flawed character, like so many of us, and our sympathies for him early in the book may begin to shift slightly when we see the harm left in the wake of his choices, past and present! 

PREVIEWSworld: Why is his dream so important to the plot?

Jason Douglas: Landon is a stand-in for all of us. The irrational confidence we all have in our own bright and shining futures when we are in our late teens and early twenties, the dreams we are so sure will manifest, are also so casually deferred and set aside for the convenience of now (pay the next bill, get to the next thing).  We “KNOW” there will always be time to write that thing, to travel to that place, to meet the one, to follow our dream…

Landon is no different when he sets aside his dreams of a career in music. That relatable existential dread of a life slipping away is what triggers the voices and visions that haunt him.  The reader then gets to decide, along with the characters Landon interacts with, whether or not this is all very real or just happening inside Landon’s own head.   

PREVIEWSworld: How did you get involved with Source Point Press publishing?

Jason Douglas: Source Point Press and I came together in a rather unconventional and a-typical way (at least as far as creating comics in the 21st century is concerned). I wrote the first half of the script for PARALLEL in a bubble, on my own, one summer, taking a break from writing one-act plays for middle school kids (my day job is that of a public school teacher and drama club director). Halfway through, I decided to see if this was a thing that had the potential to exist in the world beyond my own lifelong dream and laptop.  

I looked around online, was quite discouraged to find nobody wants your unsolicited script, and then (motivated by a large dose of blissful ignorance) did not give up but instead popped my script into a manilla file folder from my classroom (replete with color paper clips from my desk drawer) and took it to Motor City Comic Con. to shop it to publishers!