Naturally, the lion’s share of gratitude should be attributed to publisher Ed Via, who agreed to underwrite DEADBEATS in the first place, plus a large dollop of credit should rightly be extended to Ed’s wife Sandy Via—without whom my fast-talking salesman technique (which is mostly non-existent) I might not have been able to convince Ed that the webcomic continuation was a good idea. (Of course, this happened at a DARK SHADOWS Fest, too—!) After that, the grateful baton (pass it along, please) must unofficially include Dan Curtis, Art Wallace, Gordon Russell, Sam Hall, and all the other writers and producers of DARK SHADOWS who warped my mind into shapes that will never be corrected. Almost everything and everyone in DEADBEATS has no direct counterpart in DARK SHADOWS (I don’t think that there exists a template for Mason Collier anywhere…), but the DEADBEATS strip would never have existed if there hadn’t been a DARK SHADOWS for me to be exposed before my cerebral cortex was fully-formed. After that, my gratitude extends Down Argentine Way, not only for Ricardo Villagran oh-so-regularly embellishing my work into Art, but also to his daughter Natalia, who stepped in when FedEx began to refuse packages between the USA and Argentina (due to Covid restrictions). Natalia yanked both her father and me into this current century (no easy task…and it won’t last…), with a large, flat-screen scanner and a dream. I was emphatically *not* looking forward to replacing Ricardo—and, thanks to Natalia, I never had to. As far as I’m concerned, the Villagran family is almost as much of the DEADBEATS ONLINE saga as Ed, Sandy, Thom, and me. (In one installment, Natalia’s two children appear as students in Christine’s classroom).

I should make a special point to thank our overworked lettering staff (Would *you* enjoy lettering a “whose vocabulary is bigger?” face-off between Dr. V. V. Ralston and King Hermano??) This includes: our original letterer Kevin Cunningham (on whom I may have burned out on copy completely…!), Susan Dorne, David Lanphear, and our current letterer/webmaster Thomas Zahler (whom my level of blah-blah almost once forced him to want to quit, too; anyone who’s read Thom’s own project LOVE AND CAPES (highly recommended!) must be aware that his level of “what the scripter thinks needs to be included“ and mine is *quantitatively* different. Thom is still lettering DEADBEATS, plus being immensely helpful with everything I don’t understand about the website operation (which is most everything…!).

(Also, an indirect thank-you goes out to Mark Evanier and Paul Dini, who took the initial meeting with Elvira’s personal manager, assuring him that we’d do right by the comic-book property of the Mistress of the Dark. If not for Mark and Paul, Claypool might not’ve secured the ELVIRA license…and our wish-dream operation might’ve collapsed before it ever started). I wasn’t prepared to fly cross-country, so the cooperation and dependability of Mark and Paul made all the difference.) I should also probably toss a shout-out in the direction of Kurt Busiek, who’s responsible for the strip being titled DEADBEATS.

So as the individual DEADBEATS characters take a short break to catch their breaths (those who breathe, of course). I hope that the readership enjoys the upcoming short diversion to the realm of the Glamazons, and will have patience enough to keep checking in to witness what’s next for the DEADBEATS. I expect it to be well worth the wait. As Dr. Ralston would emphasize the point: “Everybody Knows That!”

This essay Is dedicated to the memory of Lara Parker, the most dedicated, defiant—and also affectionate witch who ever existed.