It's been far too long since we've had a Consumption Gumption interview around here, so I'm incredibly excited to bring it back with none other than the fantastic David Harper.

I've cut back on most of my podcast listening, but David's Off Panel (and The Lowe Post) continue to be must listen for me. There's no better interviewer in the comics space than David—he's thoughtful, engaging, and just a joy, always bringing out the best in his fantastic line-up of guests.

Without further ado...

🎙️ David Harper, writer and podcaster

Watches sports and movies; plays video games; and reads books (and comics)

To start out, can you tell us a little about yourself and where people can follow your work?

Absolutely! I’m David Harper, the person who runs the Eisner Award-nominated (and losing!) subscription comic book website SKTCHD and hosts the weekly comics interview podcast Off Panel. I was born and raised in Anchorage, Alaska and am still there to this day, where I live with my wife Amber and our two cats, Kubo and Kai. I’m also a VP at a local advertising agency running the digital side of the agency, volunteer for a local cat rescue on weekends (and constantly when we have a foster in the house) and spend far too much time thinking about what I want to eat next.

Given comics are obviously a big part of your life, I wanted to get a sense of your habits around digital vs print before we dive any deeper... do you read all of your comics in print? 

“All” is a strong word, but print is my primary lean, for sure. I occasionally read a comic in advance digitally, because it’s not available any other way. If it’s an older Marvel comic, I’ll often reread using that publisher’s all-you-can-eat digital app Marvel Unlimited. But I love the print experience and try to lean in that direction as much as I can. Comics read much better in print, especially when there are double-page spreads involved, and it just feels right to me. I do read in non-single-issue form as well, with plenty of trades, hardcovers, graphic novels, and beyond. Comic books are a versatile medium, and I really enjoy it in all its forms (besides omnibuses).

As someone with a day job and a successful side project (that requires you to read a decent amount of comics), how do you find yourself balancing the things that need to get done and those that you want to enjoy (i.e. sports, video games, movies, and books)?

Poorly? Is that a fair answer? The reality is there’s no way to fit everything in. So, what I do — entirely by accident! — is prioritize what can’t be pushed be back. That isn’t just a reference to my work, either. It’s why live sports also get prioritized, something I haven’t really realized until this moment. They’re live, so if I miss the game the result may become known to me, which I’d prefer to avoid. That’s why I typically watch games as they’re happening. 

What ends up being prioritized are 1) the things I need to get done, 2) live sports, and then 3) everything else. That’s why the most recent video game I completed was Death Stranding (from 2019) and the most recent book I read was Blood, Sweat & Chrome, the Mad Max: Fury Road oral history (from 2022). I just get to #3 whenever I can. That means whatever I manage to play, watch, or read must have been something I was extremely into because it can be a while before I get to them and my interest will have to sustain over multiple years at times.

What's your relationship with your phone when consuming media? Do you watch movies or anything on your phone?

No. Never. My preference is to watch movies in theaters, and my phone is away when I watch. It is actually permanently on silent, as well, and I typically don’t even have it when I watch something. The only exception is I when I am rewatching something or it’s a commercial break (like, on my Hulu account that has ads as I watch The Bear or other shows on there). And the only things I intentionally watch on my phone are videos on social media. I’d never watch a movie or show on there by choice. I do occasionally watch sports, but that’s when I happen to pop outside to chill with my cats or in extremely special circumstances. I have a nice TV and sound system! Why not enjoy the best possible version of something while I’m watching?

I know you are an NBA fan (Pacers, if I'm remembering correctly) so how do sports fit into all of this and how plugged in are you to what's happening with other teams around the league, in the off-season, etc.?

Sports, but particularly the NBA, are arguably my #1 interest. While the Indiana Pacers are my team and I have a tendency of following them very closely (I watched almost every part of every game they played last year on NBA League Pass, save for the game I went to in person for my birthday), to say nothing of reading Pacers’ writer Caitlin Cooper’s writing about them on Patreon and crossing my fingers that The Lowe Post (the only podcast I listen to) will cover them.

But my sports love extends beyond the Pacers. I have a pretty expansive knowledge of everything that’s going on in the NBA at any given moment and follow offseason moves and even in-season happenings closely. I am a bit of a fan!

How are you feeling about the future of the Pacers given their run to the ECF?

I feel great about them, even though I know a title is a longshot. The East is only getting more and more competitive, and one could argue the Pacers were fortunate to get as far as they did. But I’m a believer in the journey being more important than the result, and this Pacers team is fun as hell. There are worse ways to spend your time than seeing Tyrese Haliburton lead your favorite team in an attack that makes the 7 Seconds or Less Suns look like a 1990s NBA offense.

Are there any other sports you are that dialed into?

Absolutely! Again, sports are probably my biggest thing. I’m a long-time fantasy baseball player, so I follow baseball statistics very closely. I’m also a Seattle Mariners fan, and it’s only the fact that they aren’t available to watch on YouTube TV and they’re blacked out in Alaska that prevents me from watching them regularly. I don’t watch as much football as I used to, but I am a New England Patriots fan (from my childhood) and Texas Longhorns supporter (through marriage). Son Heung-min is my guy, I’m Nico Hulkenberg’s biggest fan (my wife and I watch Formula 1 with a friend and have been each Monday after the race for 12 years now), and I even dabble in cricket on occasion. 

One of my favorite experiences involving sports was learning how cricket works from a trio of people in a pub in Sydney, Australia at 3 am. Sports can be a great way to meet people!

When it comes to video games... what consoles do you have and do you find yourself always playing the new and shiny or do you tend to go back to older games more often?

I have a Sony PlayStation 5 and a Nintendo Switch, and it really depends on what’s out. If there’s a new game that’s coming that I’m eager to play, then I will be all over the new and shiny. But I also have a long-standing love of the Overwatch franchise and will just pop on for a while when I have 45 minutes to kill. I’ve also replayed Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic and Horizon Zero Dawn in recent years. I even just bought Portal and Portal 2 to replay those games on my Switch. But as I noted before, time is the deciding factor for me and what games I play. It’s the definition of “it’s new to you” in terms of entertainment options (i.e. I am currently playing the Resident Evil 4 remake, a game I originally beat on the Nintendo Gamecube).

Out of the categories we've discussed (sports, video games, movies, and books) which medium do you prefer and where do you find yourself spending the most time (if they are different, why)?

Sports gets the priority from me, simply because time. Movies come in second, if only because they’re considerably shorter in length than video games. But if time was not a factor, video games really might take the lead! I went through a period where I didn’t play games often but picking up a PS4 and Horizon Zero Dawn as a treat yo’ self present reawakened something in me. The truth is, I love it all, and depending on my mood and what’s presented in front of, any one of those (and others) could take the lead.

Can you give us a couple recent favorites from those categories?

In comics, some of my 2024 delights have been Wyatt Kennedy and Luigi Formisano’s Nights, Jen Wang’s Ash’s Cabin, James Tynion IV and Fernando Blanco’s W0rldtr33, and Tom King and Bilquis Evely’s Helen of Wyndhorn. My most recent loves in video games have been Death Stranding: Director’s Cut, Alan Wake 2 (I still need to play the DLC), and The Outer Wilds. Movies…Furiosa, Godzilla Minus One, Civil War, and I’m not going to lie, I found The Fall Guy to be delightful. My 2024 obsession for books has been Martha Wells’ The Murderbot Diaries. It’s one of my favorite sci-fi reads in a long time.

Where/how do you discover new things across those categories?

Social media helps a bit, but it’s such a mess that it’s pretty inconsistent. Regardless of mechanic, though, it’s far and away word of mouth, whether it’s through friends, creator newsletters, critics, other trusted readers, or whomever. If someone who consistently leads me in the right direction says they’re into something, odds are I’ll check it out.

Do you use anything to keep track of what you are watching/reading/playing/etc. to?

Not really! My brain is my primary tracker, and if it’s something I like enough, I am hopeful to remember it. The closest I get is with music, which I do track using my long, long running Last.fm account. I’ve been using that since college, so it has a pretty comprehensive look at the music I listen to and how that has evolved of late (I listen to a lot more classical, movie scores, and instrumental music these days because of how much writing I do).

Are there any directors, writers, studios, etc. that you'd consider yourself a superfan of or done a deep dive into their discography/bibliography?

For video games, my biggest ride or die is probably Remedy Entertainment. It started with Max Payne, but my favorites are Control and Alan Wake 2. I’ll play anything they put out. Directors, it’s hard to pass up on new Denis Villeneuve, David Fincher, Wes Anderson, Richard Linklater, or Greta Gerwig. Comics is a much, much longer list, but guarantees are Kate Beaton, Faith Erin Hicks, Javier Rodriguez, Emily Carroll, Jonathan Hickman, and, if the occasion of a release arrives (it isn’t often), R. Kikuo Johnson and David Mazzucchelli.

What's something older than 10 years you think is worth people revisiting?

That is…an incredibly big question. I’d say almost anything, as the world has a very present-based view these days. You never know what you might discover from the before times. I’ll pick one for a bunch of mediums though to force some limits on myself. Video games, I’d go with Final Fantasy VI, the Super Nintendo game, which remains to this day my favorite game. My movie pick would be Amadeus, which won Best Picture but its viewership outside of people who were alive then feels limited. It’s a wildly entertaining movie. Second pick is Brewster’s Millions, though, which is a childhood favorite that has an incredible concept and Richard Pryor and John Candy going off. TV show, let’s say Wonderfalls, a short-lived delight that’s most lasting contribution may have been revealing Lee Pace to audiences. The Apples in Stereo’s New Magnetic Wonder or Anathallo’s Floating World would be the album I’d pick. For a book, let’s go with David Mitchell’s The Bone Clocks, which is slightly a cheat, as it’s just under 10 years old, but whatever, I do what I want!

Anyone you think has good taste we should interview next?

I’ll give you a few options from some of my interests. Comics, I’d go with Zainab Akhtar from ShortBox Comics Fair. The tastemaker of comics tastemakers, Zainab’s an interesting person with excellent taste that’s a great interview as well. Backup would be John Allison, a cartoonist who loves a lot of things in interesting ways. Sports, I’d go with Mina Kimes, although that might be a big ask, so my backup would be Caitlin Cooper, the greatest analyst of basketball (and the Indiana Pacers) working today. Video games, I’d talk to whoever runs the magazine A Profound Waste of Time, because that magazine rocks.

Any last words about your media consumption or the state of entertainment?

There’s a lot of focus on all the bad movies and shows and books and comics and video games and sports topics and everything else, but my number one issue with the greater entertainment space is that there are too many great things to enjoy for the amount of time I have available. There are plenty of flaws to that broader space — it’s hard for creators to make money, the focus on profit above all has nuked creativity and stories of certain varieties, streaming has seemingly homogenized a lot of movies and shows — but it’s still a pretty amazing time to love great things. I’m not saying we shouldn’t talk about the bad things, but we’re lucky too. I’d just love to become terribly independently wealthy so I could spend more time enjoying things rather than working. Alas.