Saga , by writer Brian K. Vaughan and artist Fiona Staples, is a bit of a phenomenon in the world of comics. It effortlessly blends sci-fi and fantasy to create a bizarre yet wondrous world where two aliens from warring planets, Marko and Alana, go on the run in order to care for their newborn baby, Hazel.

But there's so much more that makes Saga great -- there's the family-centric stories, the emotive and stylish artwork, and the heartfelt moments of humor. There's also these giant, surprise splash pages that are so obscene, depraved, and sexual that we'd have to age restrict this page to show them.It's also a sales titan as far as creator-owned comics go. Like clockwork, most comics debut with big numbers, take a sharp dive, and never recover. Saga has only gone up since its debut, and stayed there.With Saga #31 not hitting shelves until November 25, we figured the only way to get our fix before then was to call up Vaughan and Staples to talk to them about their hit series. While they were especially tight-lipped on what's coming next (we wouldn't have it any other way), they did talk about their creative process, how other creators are adopting the "Saga business model," how libraries and stores have tried to ban Saga, and, yup, those splash pages.

[Laughs] Well, I used up my break to do Archie. I managed to get away for a couple of weeks and have a real vacation. My boyfriend and I went out to the West Coast, so that was nice. Other than that, it was kind of over in a flash, and now we're both back working on Saga, Volume 6.Yeah, and I'm slow, so it's always I have to get started on the next arc as soon as the next one ends. So it never feels like a break. We apologize for being absent from the stands, but we're still working, we promise.Yeah, but it's a schedule of expected uproar. [Laughs] I think people have learned to live with it.Yeah, when I was growing up there were a lot of books where you wouldn't know when they were going to stop, so, yes, Fiona's right; it is an expected outrage, a planned one.Well, I hope it works for them as well as it's worked for us. We started doing it out of necessity at the beginning. I think we intended for it to be a monthly series, but once we started putting the issues out and I was getting behind, it became obvious pretty quickly that we weren't going to be able to keep up that schedule. So we built in this break as a kind of experiment.It's a pipe dream for any artist to draw 12 issues of something in a year and to color it like Fiona does, because that will murder you over time.I always thought maybe we could get fill-in artists or something, but it was just so clear from the first issue that this book would never be Saga without Fiona. A fill-in artist just felt gross and wrong, so we knew we had to do a different model.It's not that we were business geniuses; it was just the only choice we had to keep doing Saga. But I'm glad to see that worked in the same way people are able to binge-watch seasons of TV and sort of join in whenever it returns to a weekly schedule. I hope that's what people are doing with our book now.Yeah, and to Image's credit, even though they thought it was a terrible idea, they still let us go ahead and do it. They let us be the boss of our own book.Yeah, and then they were like, "Hey, it worked for you guys." I think it's true. Image, at every turn, have been such great partners. They've steered us away from making mistakes in the past, but also when they think that we're about to do something they say, "Look, we're your partners, not your bosses, so let's do it." So yeah, all credit to Image. There's never really been a publisher like them.As far as I know, I don't think we've actually been banned anywhere. There have been complaints about it. It's been "challenged," is the word I think they use for it. We're on the "most challenged books" list, which means we're the most requested to remove it from the public, by libraries or schools. I think it's a shame, but I understand why people don't want it in the kid's section, which is where most graphic novels and comics end up in many libraries or stores. But I think the real problem is just the way comics and graphic novels are organized and presented in these spaces.It makes me really thankful for librarians. As Fiona pointed out, the book gets challenged a lot, but "banned" is a pretty strong word, and I think that almost never happens. That's because librarians have so often been at the forefront of this. The good ones have said, "Look, Saga shouldn't be shelved in the kid's section." I benefited as a writer for having a Porter Public Library in Westlake, Ohio that would let me check out whatever I wanted to whenever I wanted to. That comic books are in libraries at all now feels insane. That wasn't happening when we were kids, so I'm grateful that they're there at all.I think it should be available in public libraries, the adult section probably. High school... I don't know. I think teenagers should be reading it, but maybe on the sly. [Laughs]Yeah, Fiona's right. There's nothing better for business than a panic. So yeah, I think Saga should be forbidden from any high school library. That will make it the most desirable book in the country. So absolutely, no more Saga in high school libraries.Well, I think you always want people to have a reaction, but I never like things that are just shocking for shock's sake.Like we had a giant testicle monster named Thard, and that wasn't just about "This will be an awful thing to make Fiona draw." I sort of wanted Marko, at this stage of his life, to reconnect with his mom and just be confronted with the worst things you don't want to experience with your parents. So there's always some thinking that goes into the awful imagery.Discussions, usually, with Fiona, she's great about it. But I don't know, Fiona, what's your perspective on having to draw this horrible shit?I don't mind. I usually think it's pretty funny. [Laughs] And cathartic. I don't know, I sort of grew up, when I was a teenager, reading the filthiest comics available. Before I even set foot in a comic book store, I was reading like Sexy Losers and stuff like that. So it feels right to me. [Laughs] Like, seeing a flash of a dragon boner.It's interesting, because we have moments of horrific violence, too. That to me is the more offensive, harder to look at stuff -- especially in North America. The sexual stuff seem to drive a certain segment of the audience nuts I guess.I think the context is always different, so the shocking moment is always going to be something different. It's always unexpected, because they arrive in such different situations, like Marko exploring a planet with his mom or Gwendolyn and Sophie on a quest. It could happen anywhere.Yeah, by the time we had our hardcover collecting 18 issues, it felt like, well, we've opened on a splash page so many times that you don't want to become a parody of yourself. So even with this last arc, I think we started opening in a much more restrained fashion than just the "here, pay attention to me" splash. So I think the book will continue to grow up as Hazel grows up, but it's always going to be filthy -- hopefully in evolving, ever-different way.We say "Goose." [Laughs]That is 100-percent Fiona. I knew that we would be meeting a character that was going to become part of this journey, but it was only ever a small part. But it was when Fiona -- this was just her creation entirely -- sent over this drawing of a seal wearing overalls and was like, "Could this fit in the book?" I was like, "Oh, yeah. It's not just fitting in the book. Like, the whole book is going to become about this guy." So yeah, that was definitely 100-percent Fiona.[Laughs] And I think you've caught on, so... we're going to continue to pander.Until he gets brutally murdered.He's certainly become -- surpassing only Lying Cat -- the character where fans are like, "I promise I will stop buying the book if anything happens to this character." But we're pretty ruthless, so never say never.