Good Trouble Productions specializes in works of creative nonfiction in comics and other visual media, publishing through imprints Good Trouble Comics and Appalachia Comics Project. It was founded in 2019 by Andrew Aydin, Kelly Sue DeConnick, Valentine De Landro, Matt Fraction, and Vaughn Shinall.
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Our History:
It started with a duckface selfie.
It was Dragon Con 2014. John Lewis and I were doing a panel there to promote MARCH: Book One. It was his first time formally “appearing” at Dragon Con, though he had come a few times before over the years to meet me for lunch and watch the crowds.
We had a good-sized audience for our panel. We spoke, we took questions, and as the panel ended, a woman with bright red hair came up from the audience to introduce herself. It was Kelly Sue DeConnick. She seemed a little nervous. John Lewis was used to that. But then she explained she had a tradition of taking a particular kind of selfie with people she liked and admired, and she hoped he might be open to it. John Lewis was always up for a good selfie.
I remember Kelly Sue laughing sheepishly as she explained, “It’s called a duckface selfie. You have to do your lips like this…” John Lewis laughed and said, “I don’t know if I can make my lips do that… but I’ll try.”
So, for a few minutes there in the emptying panel room in the basement of the Hyatt Regency–the same hotel where many bold face names stayed the night before Dr. King’s funeral in 1968, and where I had many of my most formidable introductions to the medium of comics–John Lewis and Kelly Sue DeConnick practiced making duckfaces, giggling and laughing and having the kind of fun that John Lewis deeply relished but rarely had the opportunity to experience. I watched dutifully, my phone ready to snap a photo.
That moment lives in my mind as a precious memory. And the photo is adorable.
But it was also the start of something special. As John Lewis and I walked away, he quietly confided to me, “I like her. She has a great energy.” And that was the start of our friendship with house DeFraction. John Lewis became more of a regular at comicons as MARCH grew in popularity, and our paths continued to cross. Before too long, we met Kelly Sue’s husband, Matt Fraction, and our run-ins became something we looked forward to. We became like an extended family.
Fast forward to 2019: I was approached by curriculum developers who had integrated MARCH and were looking to build on that success by developing more comics to teach history and civics. Since I was still on his congressional staff, and we were working on more books and projects, I felt it was appropriate to ask John Lewis for his blessing before taking on another side project.
He asked mischievously, “Are these going to be good trouble comics?”
I had never made comics from scratch before. I was a writer who handed off his scripts to talented artists and designers and editors who did the heavy lifting of taking my simple word documents and transforming them into works of art that moved people. There was really only one person I could call for help: Kelly Sue.
I could say that she agreed to help, but that wouldn’t be sufficient. Kelly Sue and Matt started meeting with me regularly, giving advice, providing introductions, lending their expertise, their experience, their contacts, and their infrastructure. They brought in Valentine De Landro and Lauren Sankovitch. They gave me a road map and, in some ways, a lifeline.
Our first effort was a comic we called Registered. The idea was “Magic School Bus” meets civics. I wrote the first draft and they both gave notes and did passes before we handed it to Val to bring to life. And boy, did he bring it to life. I remember holding the first printed copy and being almost prouder of it than I was of MARCH.
And when it came time to decide on a name for our comics line, I thought back to John Lewis teasing me when this all started. Is it going to be a good trouble comic? I asked him if it would be okay if we called our comics that. I remember him laughing a little bit before saying, “Young man, I insist.”
In the years since, we made comics for institutions, companies, non-profits. We still do that some, but we have grown and shifted our focus to making comics for the public–comics that probably would never otherwise be made. We all have a contribution to make, Congressman Lewis used to say. This is what we can do to give a little hope and inspiration, to help shine a light on the unseen and overlooked, and help build a more perfect union. There has never been a more important time for all of us to learn about civics, our history, how things came to be, and how our history shapes where we are going. I hope you will join us.
Andrew Aydin
Co-Founder