The origin of Captain Sternn and Hanover Fiste

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From page 13 of Comic Book Profiles #2 (Spring 1998), here’s Bernie Wrightson’s answer to the question “How did Captain Sternn come about?”: “I realized when I was working on Running Out of Time for Kitchen Sink that Captain Sternn came out of my teenage years, from the movie, The Great Escape. It was always one of my favorite movies. When I was a kid, all my friends identified with the Steve McQueen character, but I was fascinated with the James Garner character, who played a con man. He was a really smooth liar, just this side of being oily. I realized that Captain Sternn looks like James Garner from the Great Escape. So I guess that’s where it came from.”

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Berni talks about the inspiration for the Hanover Fiste comic that appreared in Heavy Metal with Gary Groth at The Comics Journal:

GROTH: What about Captain Sternn, speaking of such things?

WRIGHTSON: I did the strip, just for the hell of it, and never really had Heavy Metal in mind and Jeff came over and wanted to know what I was going to do with it, and I said I didn’t know. You think maybe Heavy Metal? He said, sure. But it wasn’t done for anybody but me. I started it while I was living in Florida, I was working on Frankenstein down there. Got bored and felt like doing a strip, so I did Captain Sternn. Got bored with that, put it aside. We moved up here and were here for a few months and then I completely forgot about it and I was digging through some old stuff and ran across it and said, “Aw Hell, I ought to finish this up.”

GROTH: What did you think of the animation?

WRIGHTSON: I was tremendously pleased with it.

GROTH: I thought it was the best thing in the movie.

WRIGHTSON: Well, I tried to convince myself that I liked the movie. I saw it twice. And then came to the realization that I couldn’t stand the movie, but I did like my part of it. And thought there was nothing wrong with that, because that’s the way it is, isn’t it? I think mine was the truest, the truest to its original form, and stayed the closest to me stylistically. And I can’t think of the guys’ names who did it, but I never talked to them, was never in contact with them. But they put their finger on the exact quality I was going for with that. Just this kind of Warner Brothers feeling. And I’m real gratified that they picked up on that immediately.

GROTH: Are you much of a film buff?

WRIGHTSON: More or less, I guess. But I don’t get out to the movies much. Certainly not now [points to leg].

GROTH: Are you kind of isolated out here?

WRIGHTSON: Not really. Kingston is 10, 15 miles away and they’ve got five theatres over there with seven more on the way. Of course, they do a lot of Smokey and the Bandit and they’re still waiting for Chariots of Fire. So they do a lot of good old boy, redneck, kick ass, drive-in stuff up here. [Laughter.] But they still get some good stuff. If you haven’t seen it yet, see the new Richard Pryor movie. It is devastating.

GROTH: Which one?

WRIGHTSON: Live on the Sunset Strip. Well, see them both actually. Because he is so good. He’s just got to be the funniest man alive.

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More of the interview here:

https://www.tcj.com/the-berni-wrightson-interview/

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About Berni Wrightson

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Captain Sternn: Running Out of Time" ad Kitchen Sink Press

Unfinished page from "Captain Sternn and the Space PIrates"

Unpublished panel from "Captain Sternn and the Space PIrates"

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Bernie Wrightson Captain Sternn Illustration Original Art (Undated).