Deep in the darkest, dankest depths of the Banewoods there is a crumbling old house. In the house lives a girl and her two special little friends. The girl’s name is Violet, and her friends are Dolores and Ralphy. Oh, by the way, they are a broken talking china doll and a smoking soft toy dog, and the girl is an uber-gothic, splatter-porn film making, electric chaos witch!

Welcome to the world of DOGWITCH – a dark, funny and deliciously twisted comic from SIRIUS Entertainment, the home of Jill Thompson’s SCARY GODMOTHER and Voltaire. Its creator is one Dan Schaffer and unlike all those other spooky comic illustrators out there this guy is English. So, what’s he doing with an American publisher? Are British comics houses not good enough?

“I did try over here,” Dan reveals. “The UK thing is a waste of time for someone like me. No publisher in Britain would ever touch anything like DOGWITCH. To get the thing in print, I had to seek out and target a specific publisher that had a bit of an edge, and would be willing to take a risk with it. If I could have found that in this country, sure, I would have been pleased.

Of course, there’s a ton of British talent in the comic industry, but all the energy and passion about comics is in the States. It wasn’t until I started working with Sirius that I actually began to feel proud of what I was doing. Up until then, I was always a little bit embarrassed by it.”

But surely it must make things a little more difficult if your editor is on another continent?

“Not at all,” he says. “My editor is a fantastic bloke. I speak to him just about every day by email. We’ve got a very healthy working relationship.”

So is this your first comic or just the first one to make any impact on the public’s consciousness?

“It’s the first. I spent about ten years illustrating political cartoons for the NASUWT (UK Teacher’s Union), but I stopped all that recently and moved onto comic books. I’ve been drawing some form of comic style art ever since I could pick up a pencil.”

For the benefit of those unfortunate souls who have yet to experience the dubious delights of Ms Violet Grimm’s world, here’s Dan’s brief summary.

“DOGWITCH follows the adventures of a gifted, outcast, reality/snuff TV superstar, fetish witch as she shakes her hoodoo against a violent B-movie backdrop, incorporating the horrors of undead dating, isolation, accidental fame, and sex with demons.”

Cool! Is this horror element influenced by anything in particular?

“Too much TV, I suppose,” he adds with a grin. “And lots of horror movies: Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Evil Dead, to name the most obvious influences. Fast and sharp TV shows like Sex and the City and Buffy inspired a lot of the snappy dialogue. I love horror stuff and can’t sit through any kind of TV show without thinking: Wouldn’t it be cool if all the cast were suddenly set upon by brain hungry zombies, but were still more worried whether they would be getting any that night? I waited, but nobody made anything like that. So, I figured I’d draw it.”

Dan admits to a Gothic influence on the comic. Would he describe himself as a Goth? Or has he moved in Gothic circles the past?

“Back in the 80’s, sure, I was big on black. These days I’m just a comic guy. I don’t move in any circles, but I’m getting to know a lot of Goths through DOGWITCH. It seems to be going down pretty well with them, despite my lack of ‘gothness’, so I guess I must still be in touch with it somewhere in the dark and creepy parts of my brain.”

So why is this dark and gothic world that he sets the comic in such a cheery place?

“It makes the horrors of a bad date all the more funny!” Dan exclaims. “The humour in DOGWITCH stems from the fact that a lot of the traditional horror elements are accepted norms. What’s the most horrific thing about raising a zombie for sex? The dodgy moral and ethical standpoint, the smell? Nope, not in this world. The horror here occurs at the moment he tells you he’s not interested in shagging you.”