WWE Superstar MAVEN Goes to Hell in All-New Comic (Interview)

The Maven comic project is currently being crowdfunded on Indiegogo. The series tells the story of a professional wrestler who makes a tragic mistake, and is sent to hell; in order to atone, he becomes a bounty hunter for the underworld, tracking down souls throughout history that have managed to escape their fate.

Maven (TBD)

Story By:	Maven Huffman & Antonio Brice
Writer:	Antonio Brice
Artist:	Ariyibi Toluwalase
Color & Lettering:	Rage Graphix
Cover Artist:	Francesco Tomaselli
You might think you know about Maven Huffman. You watched him on MTV, winning season 1 of WWE Tough Enough. From there he would wrestle for millions of fans around the world for 5 years. Maybe you've watched him on YouTube? What if I told you that in a parallel world Maven died and was resurrected as an immortal bounty hunter from Hell, tracking down hundreds of escaped souls throughout history? This is Maven!

The real Maven sat down with Screen Rant to talk about his new comic, his time in the WWE ring, his YouTube channel and more, in a fascinating conversation, which can be found below.

Former WWE Superstar Maven Is A Bounty Hunter From Hell In His All-New Comic Series

Maven Is Available To Fund Now On Indiegogo

Screen Rant: Maven, thank you for taking the time to speak with us. Let’s start off with how this project came to be. Was this something you pursued, or were you approached to make a comic book?

Maven Huffman: It’s funny. So, I work in the city – and by city, I mean New York City – I have an office right on Wall Street, and a few years back, I went to a signing…and I met a guy who was an illustrator for Marvel. After that interaction, he came and met me in the city…he brought his artwork and laid it out, and he planted the seed in the back of my head for me to have my own comic. He said, “I’ll illustrate it, I’ll write the story however you want it written; we’ll make you the hero.” At the time, I was thinking, yeah, I could be this guy who works in the financial district in New York by day and then fights crime at night. And then he hit me with how much it would cost. [Laughs] It was a little bit out of my price range at that time. But the seed was planted, and the idea never left.

Well, fast-forward a few years, once the YouTube channel came out and was a success, I had a guy hit me up – Antonio Brice – and Antonio had pretty much the same idea. You know, we’ll do a story together, I’ll have input on the story…One of the things that I love about what Antonio is doing is that they’re planting me in an already-established group of heroes. So, I’ve been telling people, “It’s like I’m Hawkeye in the Marvel movies .” (laughs) I’m just inserted (into the universe) in a very cool way.

You know, I’ve had a lot of cool stuff. I’ve got this action figure here (motions to figure over shoulder), I’ve been in video games… Being in a comic book, man, that’s just another thing on the bucket list. As a kid from the South, I can’t believe it’s happening.

SR: Your character in the series sounds pretty complex; basicallym he's a guy who makes a mistake and has to make amends for it. What went into the decision to bring this added layer of complexity?

MH: I think that layer of complexity only supports the life that I’ve had. One of the things that I do on my YouTube channel is, I’m open and honest. About myself, about my shortcomings… about the baggage that I have in my life. I don’t hide it. I don’t go on YouTube and try to pretend that I’m this perfect person. I’m not on social media taking pictures of my dinner in the south of France on the perfect vacation that I’m on. Anything but...

I’m a regular person who happens to have a YouTube channel, who happens to have had a pretty cool job back in the day, but… I still make mistakes. I have made mistakes. I’m still learning from the mistakes I’ve made in the past. So to me, it only made sense to have the character follow that same path.

Hey, I’m not always perfect. I haven’t always been a model citizen. But you know what? I’m striving to be better, and as long as I’m better than the person I was yesterday, that’s how I live my life now. As long as I’m better than that guy, that’s all that matters. I love that this character echoes that sentiment.

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SR: I’m curious about your own history with comics. Were you ever a fan? Did you read them as a kid?

MH: I loved the illustrations. It always amazed me at how good these artists truly were. I was the kid that would get a comic and look at the pictures, but really didn’t read the story. I was into art as a child, so I would open up a comic and try to draw exactly what I was seeing on the page. Obviously, I wasn’t that good… Having that type of talent, to me, that’s just from the Good Lord above.

But I always loved the Superman comics. I never really realized that there was any money that went into them until I got older, but I just loved the artwork. Art was something I truly loved doing while I was growing up… although my talent was limited. I’m actually half-decent (laughs), but it’s nothing like what these guys in comics can do. But again… this comic is just a bucket list thing that I can’t actually believe is happening.

SR: So I understand a lot of this first story comes out of your love of westerns. What is it that attracts you to that particular genre?

MH: When I was growing up, it was a way different time than it is now. Entertainment in the house… most people had one, maybe two TVs in the late seventies/early eighties. That’s how it was in my house; we had one television, and when my dad was home, the television was on what he wanted to watch. My dad was a big western guy, a big John Wayne fan… and I hated it. Hated them growing up (laughs). To me they were boring. You know, I wanted to watch cartoons or something like that, not some black-and-white western.

But, as I’ve grown up… It’s kind of like yardwork. I had to do so much yardwork growing up, and I hated it. But now, it’s one of my favorite things to do. It’s one of the things that I can calm myself with, and not have to worry about YouTube or an interview… You know, I don’t have to worry about how the video this week is doing. I can just immerse myself in making my yard look nice.

Well, the same thing with westerns. The older I’ve gotten, I’ve just got a new appreciation. And I literally find myself, like my dad, sitting down and watching old John Wayne movies, and I love them now. So I think it’s something that I had to grow into and appreciate, and now, it’s one of my go-tos. I watch the same old westerns; I watch things like Have Gun, Will Travel , or The Rifleman with Chuck Conners… I probably watch an episode every day.

SR: My dad’s favorite show is Have Gun, Will Travel, so I grew up with that, too.

MH: Oh, I love it. Paladin (the lead character of Have Gun, Will Travel ) is one of my favorite characters on TV, bar none. I think he’s one of the best characters ever. I actually have in my phone a whole page full of Paladin quotes. I’ve probably got five or six quotes from that show, from him. I love it.

SR: I’m interested in the art of writing compared with the art of professional wrestling. Did all of your years putting matches together in the ring help sharpen your storytelling instincts?

MH: Absolutely. The one thing you learn once you start wrestling is all we’re doing is telling stories. That’s it. Good guy vs. bad guy… that’s all wrestling is. Finding a reason to make the crowd cheer, finding a reason to make the audience hate the villain, or – in our world – the heel. That’s all it is.

When you go into writing, it’s the same way… then you try to look into how we can have our hero – how we can have our babyface – have a common bond with the reader. Because that common bond is not only what’s gonna make them flip from page two to page three, but it’s gonna make them want more from the story.

And I’d be a fool to say that my goal was just one comic. I want a bunch of comics, a bunch of stories… I want people to get done with this story and say, “Okay, this was good. I want more.” And the only way to do that is through good writing. And the only way to have good writing is to find something that links us with the person reading the story.

Maven's Past As A Professional Wrestler Is Deeply Tied To His Future In Comics

Maven Is The Product Of Years Of Mistakes Made & Lessons Learned

SR: You’ve had this incredible rebirth with your YouTube channel, and it seems wrestling fans have responded well. After your years away from the business, how has it felt to come back and get such a response?

MH: Man, it’s weird. The thing that scared me the most when I left the wrestling business… You know, I got used to being known as “Maven the Wrestler.” And I thought that when I left the business, I thought I wouldn’t be known as that anymore. What I didn’t know was that I’m always gonna be known as Maven the Wrestler. That’s how people still introduce me all these years later. It’s just, once you do that job… it’s like a former president. You don’t stop calling them “Mr. President” after their term’s up. I’m always gonna be Maven the Wrestler.

But where the transition has taken me with the channel… You know, in the grocery store two weeks ago, I had a kid come up to me and ask, “Aren’t you that guy from YouTube that answers wrestling questions?” And, I said, “You know what, I am.” (laughs) But that’s been where the rebirth, like you said – that’s a great word – has come from. I’ve just had to transition into this new chapter of my life, and it’s been very… It’s given me a lot of joy to realize that I can still provide value for the business that I love while teaching people the ins and outs of what it is that we do.

One of the biggest things that I didn’t know was… When my partner started talking to me (about the YouTube channel), I was saying, “You think people really wanna know this?” I didn’t think they did… Well, they do. And you know, I’m not making any illusions out of the wrestling career that I had. I was a mid-carder. Very lackluster, average career, and I didn’t get to leave my mark on that industry. But maybe my mark is going to be left on what wrestlers can do when they get out of the wrestling industry. And that… I take a lot of pride in that.

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SR: I’m also curious about the changes in the whole wrestling business of today, as opposed to when you were with the WWE. Do you think the wrestling business is in a better place, overall?

MH: I one-hundred percent think it’s in a better place. I mean, if you just look at the stock valuation, it’s certainly never been worth more. But where the wholesale change has come in is in safety. When I was coming up, wrestlers were dropping dead. I mean, I don’t want to say we got used to it, but we got used to it. It wasn’t odd to have someone die in their thirties. Hell, in their twenties.

And now, I mean, a good part of it is how much this has changed the world. [Holds up cell phone.] The cell-phone and technology available today, you know, social media… it’s given everybody agency. When I was coming up, I had to rely on the WWE for making me. Making everything about me. Now, these men and women in the business, yeah, they have the backing of an organization, but they can also go out and get themselves over. They can have a fanbase strictly by what they do on social media. That’s a good thing.

But in my day, we had the luxury of not having a camera on us at all times. So we got to be pretty rambunctious… we didn’t live as healthy as these people do now. Once a camera’s on you at all times, and you’re recording so many different aspects of your life, I find that wrestlers

take a lot better care of themselves. And that’s a good thing. I’m happy for that.

SR: What’s next for you? Where do you want the comic to go, and where do you want the YouTube channel to go?

MH: I’ll start with the channel. I would love for the channel to just continue to evolve. I wanna keep giving people information, but I want to evolve in the aspect of maybe bringing other people in. We get a lot of good comments and reactions when I interview others, and I let them tell a story that maybe is under-told or forgotten. Maybe time has just let it fall into the cracks of our memory. And I love bringing people on and letting them share their story, and introduce new fans to something that happened before they were maybe even born.

It amazes me every time I meet a fan that’s a teenager, and they say they watch the channel, because there’s no way they watched me wrestle. There’s no way. So the fact that I can introduce them to the career that I had twenty years ago… I want to do that for other people, as well. That’s how I’d like to see the channel evolve.

As for the comic… I just want to continue to see the story grow. I don’t want to get ahead of myself, because, obviously, this is my first comic, but I would love to be able to have a series of comics. I would love to be able to just continuously have an imperfect hero inspire others. I don’t care who you are out there… Anyone watching our videos, anyone reading our comics… you’re not perfect. No one is. And there’s something that we are all shameful of. But that’s okay… that’s perfectly fine. As long as we grow and we learn, as long as we’re different that the person we were yesterday… Man, that means we’re growing as humans. I want the comic to continue down that path. To show that we can all learn from our pasts, even if our past is something we’d like people to forget.

You know, I’m honored to step into your world; the comics world. It’s not something I took lightly. You know, I got to do my first Comic-Con (at this year’s NYCC), and I’ve done a lot of conventions, I’ve done a lot of signings over the last twenty years… I’ve never seen a fan-base like I saw at Comic-Con. The comic fans, they are die-hard. And that’s something that I have a lot of respect for. I went not knowing what to expect, and I left thinking, this is amazing. This world is amazing. And I’m honored to be a part of it.

Many thanks to Maven Huffman for taking the time to speak with us, and special thanks to Antonio Brice of Ikari Press for setting it all up.

Maven is currently being crowdfunded on Indiegogo.