interview conducted September 2025
by Courtney Goodrum
edited for clarity by J. Schleusner
Michael Kingston’s journey is the kind of story that feels ripped from the pages of one of his own comics.
He started out hustling his handmade issues from a backpack at wrestling shows, driven by a passion for storytelling and the squared circle. Today, he’s the creative force behind Headlocked Comics—the definitive brand in wrestling-themed graphic novels and comics. With titles like Tales from the Road, Vampiro: Rockabilly Apocalypse, Friday Night Bigfoot, and even a licensed WWE comic under his belt, Kingston has built a universe where wrestling and story telling collide in spectacular fashion.
I sat down with him to talk about the the fans, the art, and the legends he would love to collaborate with for dream and future projects.
I know you started your comics out of your backpack at wrestling shows. Is there a wildest or most unexpected fan encounter back in those days that you had?
This always blows my mind, even now. I mean, I’ve been making comics for 15 years and people who recognize me occasionally, like, at an airport or.. out in public – somebody would be like, “Oh, hey, it’s a headlock guy, whatever.” And that that’s insane to me that I would register. Like, not to anybody, but there’s been a couple of those.. One of the funny things is I do so many shows now. I do about 30 conventions a year that like, all the people I fly in American, all the people at the American counter the airport, they know me, like, oh, where are you off to this week or whatever – it’s funny because, I mean, I didn’t get on a plane until I was in my mid late 20s, you know, on planes, on the weekend. Yeah. It’s been a cool little journey
Well, I really love your work. I love what you do. I love comics, I love wrestling, so just the hybrid, the joint love of it together is just amazing.
You would think it would be an easier thing, but, I mean, it was so hard for me when I started. Like, I was a lifelong fan of wrestling and of comics, and I just felt like nobody ever made wrestling comics. Yeah. So I just made the wrestling comics, then I thought wrestling fans would want to read, but then nobody in comics was receptive to it. I mean, like, somebody, a fairly large publisher, like, literally laughed in my face when I said the word wrestling. And it’s funny now, considering how much it’s permeated the culture, but, you know, to me, it always made sense, you know, peanut butter and jelly or whatever, so, and thankfully, it’s allowed me this crazy life where I’ve gotten to collaborate with all my heroes and got to see the world and do the things that I love.
Well you’re talking fan-wise, about comics and wrestling. So what do you think is more of a challenge, getting comic fans to get into wrestling or wrestling fans to get into comics?
I mean, I would say that outside of, like, I understand Scholastic is probably a ton of people’s first books, but I mean, in terms of, the side of the industry, like the sort of superhero convention side, I probably sell more comics to people. I’ve probably been more people’s first comic book.. When you pick up your first comic book, it’s usually because of the character and not because of the creator, right? You’re nine years old at the drugstore, you’re like, oh, is that a Brian Michael Mendez, Spider-Man, right? But, I mean, people buy Headlock or buy my book. It’s not branded, it’s just buying comics. So, like, that is definitely the thing that I’m most proud of. But I sell a ton of books. I think what it is, is I hit this sort of sweet spot because I think both wrestling and comics has extremely tribal sections of their fan bases. And those people aren’t necessarily going to buy my stuff, right? Like, they want WWE stuff, they want Marvel stuff, they want DC stuff. But then there’s obviously the people who are you know, fans of all wrestling or people who are fans of all sort of all types of comics forever open to the idea of independence. Like, those are the people more so, that are for me, I think, that are easier. I think it’s harder to sell to the super tribal fans. They just want the branded stuff. That’s my biggest challenge, but I could sell to anybody.
So if you could drop any current wrestler in a superhero universe, what universe and why?
I mean, if we’re ever gonna talk about wrestlers and putting them into a superhero universe – my answer would almost always have to be Hurricane, because he’s the original sort of wrestling superhero. I do think I think nowadays, Mr. Iguana would make a good sort of like, in that Rocket Raccoon sort of slot in like a weird thing, but if you’re talking superheroes and wrestler – you got to talk to Hurricane.
You’ve done indie comics, worked with WWE and told original stories. What is a dream project you haven’t gotten to touch yet?
Obviously, there’s a ton of wrestlers that I have yet to collaborate with on my stuff. I mean, as far as, like, bigger properties – I’d love to do, there’s two things that I would love to do. I would love to do a Thing wrestling comic, I actually had a pitch with one, but I’d begin back 20 years before the pandemic. And I would love to do a Crusher Hogan story because there’s been three Crusher Hogan stories and in all of them, he’s portrayed very differently. I sort of have this idea that, you know, like Spider-Man beats him, right – in the first issue – and I always sort of imagined Crusher Hogan was a smart wrestler that he would have allowed Spider Man to win, recognizing his sort of athleticism and thinking this guy could be the next star, so he’s putting him over, and then Spider Man bails. I feel like there’s a really fun story tying the three iterations of Crusher Hogan together and making them all make sense.
If you could create a one-shot comic of any wrestling storyline in history, what moment are you placing in comic book glory?
I feel like.. Randy Orton, Bray Wyatt feud, like, got so weird, and at one point, Randy Orton just shows up with some religious artifacts. I don’t remember who wrote the story and called it – he stabbed the sister Abigail, or whatever. I want the story. The Raiders of the Lost Ark story, Randy Orton going in deep into the jungle or whatever to find this like religious artifact to slay Sister Abigail, Yeah, that would be good.
If Friday Night Bigfoot were to be adapted into a live-action series, who’s playing Bigfoot and who is directing?
I feel like if you’re gonna do Bigfoot – you’re gonna want to want, like, Omos at least in the body. You could maybe get into a sweet tooth scenario where somebody else does the voice, maybe Omos as the body. Directing one – I don’t know, that’s tough. I like Vince Gilligan a lot. We have, like this comic ultimately put like a Bigfoot – but has a very sort of Breaking Bad, sort of like Ozark, sort of slant to it, where a lot of it is about the family and like sort of frequency impact on them. Then you also have Bigfoot hooked on cocaine, so I mean, I feel like somebody like that would be cool. I love Robert Rodriguez as a director. Like, he would be my Vampiro pick in a heartbeat – yeah, maybe a picture where somebody can handle more of the sort of character, the family movies, because that’s sort of the heart of the story.
