Vault Comics is set to release a new creator-owned series about the love is found between a mechanic and a jumble of human organs that used to be a man but now resides in a bio-suit. From the creative team of writer Paul Allor and artist Paul Tucker, Hollow Heart will prove that real love doesn’t discriminate.
The series reunites Paul Allor and artist Paul Tucker, best known for the series Tet, and is part of Vault’s horror imprint Nightfall, set to expand to a full-time imprint after previously focusing just on releases in the autumn.
In an interview, Allor said about the series:
“Empathy is a tool and a burden and a gift. When we see someone in a state of joy, we feel our own spirits lifted; and when we see someone in pain, we realize their pain is hurting us, as well. There are countless stories about people with a pathological lacking in empathy, distorting their view of the people around them,” says Allor. “But Hollow Heart is about what happens when a largesse of empathy does the same thing.”
“It’s about the overwhelming desire to relieve someone’s burden, and how that desire can warp our view of someone, transforming them from a complex being with conflicting wants and desires, into something more abstract: a person defined only by their pain, and by the need to remove it.”
In the same interview, Allor’s collaborator on the series, artist Paul Tucker added:
“One of my favorite experiences watching a film is when a character arrives on-screen, and without saying a word, I am already in their corner. I’m rooting for them and feeling what they feel. I find this all the more effective when the actor is someone I’m not familiar with – no baggage attached.”
“Creating comics gives me a chance to ‘cast an unknown’ for every new project. I can put down lines on paper and find that connection, regardless of the characters’ background or behavior. The creation is an empathetic act. With Hollow Heart, this process becomes meta, as it reflects the book’s main theme. Hollow Heart is indeed about empathy, and more crucially, it explores the dangers of empathy.”
Hollow Heart #1 goes on sale in February 2021 and will launch with a ‘Vault Vintage’ variant cover by Nathan Gooden and Tim Daniel that pays tribute to Frank Miller’s cover to Rom: Space Knight #1.