I can't run.

+ 2025 Comics Industry Person of the Year & more!

I can’t run.

I lost my ability to run when I was 21 years old. I fell off a 3-story building; the library roof at SUNY Purchase that broke both my legs (right knee and left ankle/heel), my right hand, and lower back. I was only in mid-air for one flight of that fall (part of the roof was designed at a 45-degree angle — like a slide), but I was dealing with momentum, slippery rain, and a hard landing that changed my life.

I was in my physical prime and I had just finished penciling a Blue Beetle and Booster Gold “Bonus Book” for DC comics. Upon initial recovery, I inked said story in a wheelchair with a brace around my drawing hand (and legs wrapped up in bandages and braces). Suffice it to say, I botched the job and felt my comics career was over. Fortunately, I lived long enough to disprove those fears. But I sometimes wonder what kind of life I would’ve had if I hadn’t pursued drawing stories.

Mailman? Cook? Paramedic?

I remember getting into a few fights while hobbling around with crutches. I never let my physical limitations get in the way of my mouth — or my mind.

See, I grew up with a father who wasn’t afraid of confrontation or conflict. In fact, he was drawn to it like a magnet. He’d weaponize his voice. Punch punks out. Spook crooks in Riverside Park. My father was a cop in my own home. I have a mother who has the brains, brawn, and balls of a world leader. Every room she enters she finds common ground while, concurrently, being a staunch activist. I loosely based The Coney, The Red Hook’s psychotic vigilante mother bent on extreme justice, on my mother. A tongue-in-cheek homage to my fair yet righteous mom.

Growing up, I was a thin-skinned twerp who loved Marvel Comics, original Star Trek, Batman ‘66, The Yankees, Prince, Run-DMC, Atari video games, The 4:30 movie, and a good dare. I wasn’t afraid to take on most challenges. Especially when provoked. If doing something stupid caused howling laughter among my chums, I was down to clown. I often felt like I was my peers id to their ego. I was Lennie to their George. “Of Mice And Men.”

Whenever I watch a horror movie and the victims have an opportunity to get away, I shout “Run!” and I’m instantly reminded that I can’t run. I can’t get away.

I understand a lot of people can’t get away from a dire situation even if they have the legs to run away with. But some, if not most, people are trapped economically, emotionally and existentially. We all have our hills to climb. One battle after another.

As I enter my senior years it hurts to walk. Hurts to draw. It’s hard to see.

Hard to see how someone’s death can be broadcast from many different angles and some people see it as justified while others see it for what it was, a cold blooded murder. A murder that showed me, nay, broke me into understanding that I am living in a different reality from others. Full stop.

Makes me wanna run.

But I can’t run. And if I had the legs to do it, I wouldn’t run. Besides screaming online and protesting injustices in person, I try to reconcile the world in my comix and plays. And hope it communicates the complications of society while making human connections that brings us closer together.

Closer to reality.

Recently, Heidi MacDonald of The Comics Beat published her annual year end survey where she asked a bunch of comix industry folks some questions. Here is an excerpt of a couple of my answers:

What will be the biggest comics industry story in 2026?

Auteur autonomy. The expanding culture of indie/alt creators and the downsizing of corporate produced comic books. When the pandemic forced a remote lifestyle, it helped shave overhead costs but it also galvanized freelance cartoonists to take more self-publishing risks and find new ways of distribution (see: Power Pulp for a curated group of independent creators and distribution). A hearty deluge of autonomous, albeit, target-based newsletters, podcasts, and YouTube channels has become necessary as Patreon and crowdfunding platforms continue to help underwrite our efforts between creator and customer. The comic shop remains a crucial intersection for cultural optics and book sales, but it will have to bend some of the rules when it comes to alternative comix. And, unless the world renegotiates its relationship with money, readers will have to pay more for the privilege of truly alternative fare. I have made a Marvel comic book but my self-published “Deep Cuts” aren’t Marvel Comics. If you’re looking for new ideas and characters not beholden to popular trends, corporate mandates and Hollywood streaming, follow the footsteps of Michel Fiffe, who self-published 50+ issues of his creator-owned series, COPRA. And look no further than the likes of Russ Kazmierczak, Nicholas Forker, Dan Goldman, and Mahdi Khene, for regular grass roots efforts. I predict anthologies will make a comeback, too. Bring back DC Comics Presents, Marvel Team-Up, Marvel Two-In-One, Dark Horse Presents, and Joe Pruett’s Negative Burn already! (Editor’s Note: that last one is happening.)

What guilty pleasure (of any kind) are you looking forward to in 2026?

I’d love to see Mark Chiarello draw more but also bring back projects like Solo and Wednesday Comics under his guidance and his own imprint (or spark a double threat of high art comix and hitch his wagon to Scott Dunbier’s Act 4 Publishing). And, I swear to god, if Vito Delsante doesn’t publish at least three comix in 2026, I’m gonna deck him!

Heidi also asked everyone to anonymously nominate the 2025 Comics Industry Person of the Year (of which DC Comics’ Editor-In-Chief Marie Javins got the most votes. Cheers, Marie! You earned it. You deserve it.).

I nominated:

Michel Fiffe debuted COPRA in Fall of 2012. A Suicide Squad-inspired revenge comic book series with an Al B. Sure soundtrack that became a cult hit through sheer will, passion and grit. After taking a swing at webcomics with PANORAMA, Fiffe chose to veer away from pixels to keep it real with pulp and, in the spirit of Dave Sim’s CEREBUS THE AARDVARK, and Erik Larsen’s SAVAGE DRAGON, he carved his own path. When he wasn’t killing it monthly with COPRA, and rocking other creator-owned concepts like ZEGAS and NEGATIVELAND, he was tackling sacred cows the likes of GI JOE, BLOODSTRIKE, SUPERMAN and more. Big Ups to Fiffe for sticking to his guns and for sticking the landing.

Someone was kind enough to anonymously nominate me (I believe that “someone” to be Russ Kazmierczak — thanks, buddy):

”Dean Haspiel remains a pioneer in self-publisher comics. He was a forefather in webcomics with his Act-i-vate co-op, and his crowdfunded projects demonstrate his momentum and commitment to direct-to-reader content (in PRINT). Dean is constantly mentoring new and established cartoonists, and his podcast Vito x Dino offers invaluable insight to the processes and lifestyle of the working comics-maker. As long as he’s working, Dean will be a force in comics.”

Bill Anderson invited me to participate in Orphan Works. Years ago I got hired to illustrate a short story called “Snow Angel” written by a comix student named Brandon White that never got properly published. Now we can share it in this lovely collection.

Here’s the pitch and Kickstarter link:

Cartoonists so often have unpublished stories sitting in their files. Now, at last, you’ll get to see them too!

Orphan Works is a 250-plus page volume of new or little-seen comics from a variety of incredible creators, including mainstream titans Rudy Nebres, Luke McDonnell, and Trevor Von Eeden, who provides us with his first new sequential work in 6 years! In addition to that, we’ve got current stars like Matt Haley & Tom Simmons, Christopher Schenk, Stefano Cardoselli, and Brandon McKinney!

On the alternative side, look for new work by one-of-a-kind talents Roberta Gregory, Jeff Bonivert, and Tom Stazer, as well as master satirists Dean Haspiel, Kerry Callen, Don Simpson, Michael T. Gilbert, Rob Walton, and Fred Hembeck!

And hey, let’s not forget to mention some stellar contributions from Joe Pruett & Ken Meyer Jr, Greg Giordano, Mark Weber, Bill Anderson & Rick McCollum, and some of the final work from the late Franco-Belgian comics maestro Gérald Forton!

Plus, as an added bonus, there will be short text pieces by Steve Leialoha, Bill Reinhold, Khoi Pham, Ray Lago, Al Milgrom, Dan Panosian, Geof Isherwood, Zach Howard, and P. Craig Russell among others, on a special, secret topic!

And it’s all wrapped up in a pair of covers by the aforementioned Rudy Nebres and Fred Hembeck!

Check out this new, cool collection of orphaned comix. Click HERE

After talking about burn out in episode #51, Vito Delsante and I celebrated our one year anniversary doing the VITO x DINO podcast and we ended strong talking “economy of words and wealth of information” with my favorite human/studio mate, writer/cartoonist/playwright, Whitney Matheson, in episode #52.

Then we started off VxD year two with a bang in episode #53 talking to our friend/mentor and comix legend, Mark Waid, who GUARANTEED has written some of your favorite comic books of all time.

Happy Martin Luther King Jr. Day!

See you in the gutters—

—Dean


Instagram / Etsy / VITO x DINO