omg chael crash posted:

I haven't read DC in about two years but I keep seeing all this stuff about stuff about N52 Superman dying and being replaced by old Superman. Can't anyone give me a wuick spoiler on the current story? This actually seems super interesting to me.

Mr Hootington posted:

If there is a superman who is pre-flashpoint running around, how hasn't he figured out the flashpoint junk and killed histories greatest monster Barry Allen?

AFoolAndHisMoney posted:

Superbro is a great character with a lot of unexplored potential and it's really boring that he's getting thrown out in favour of Superdad who's already had 25 years worth of stories especially with Dan Jurgens and Peter Tomasi writing, the former who's been really average at best and the latter who has been loving awful with the Superman character. Tomasi was easily the worst part of Truth and Last Days of Superman is decompressed with a really flimsy premise that's been dragged out to 8 issues and not nearly enough story going on to justify it.

Ideally Lois and Clark should've just been an outside continuity series that just continued to tell Post Crisis Superman stories as if a reboot didn't happen instead of the convoluted setup that it had while someone like Greg Pak or of a similar caliber continued to tell good New 52 Superman stories that aren't constantly dragged into crossovers.

CharlestheHammer posted:

Super bro may have great potential but if you have over 100 issues of stories without hitting anything interesting then I don't think it's gonna happen.

CharlestheHammer posted:

Super bro may have great potential but if you have over 100 issues of stories without hitting anything interesting then I don't think it's gonna happen.

Also i don't think Superdad has had that many stories unless you are counting else worlds?

CharlestheHammer posted:

Nope. Nothing particularly interesting that made Superman stand out. Some of those stories were fine, but I don't think they required SuperBro. But that is because SuperBro wasn't really a new character but more like a reset.

quote:

We want to start giving weekly updates on the progress of the Young Animal books. This is the first. In these updates you will see art and commentary from the collaborators, editorial, and myself.

Emerald City Con was wonderful—I met so many amazing artists, writers, colorists, letterers, and editors. The support we received across the board for Young Animal has been amazing, and it is fueling us through the next stages. Those stages include conceptualizing, storytelling, scripting, drawing, building, and a number of other processes to get these books ready to go.

Each week the team goes into Dan DiDio and Jim Lee’s offices to talk direction, ideas, art, and where we are heading. It is an amazing part of the process and gives us a chance to get on the same page and shape it together. That part is essential.

Today I want to share some art and talk a little bit about things, starting with DOOM PATROL.

Here are two pieces by DOOM PATROL artist Nick Derington. The first image is a shot of Cliff Steele, a.k.a. Robotman. This is the first image Nick created for fun, and we (myself and the editorial team) were so moved by it that I knew we needed to start working together immediately. There is something about Cliff sitting there and looking off, thinking to himself, that captures some of the energy we were going for. I’m also a sucker for Cliff’s costume from Grant Morrison and Richard Case’s run.



The next image is super exciting; we get a look inside the process of creating a new character. This is a concept for Casey Brinke, one of the newest members of the Doom Patrol, also drawn by Nick.



I don’t want to give away too much about her, but some of you might notice the costume was inspired by Black Sabbath (Black Sabbath has been really important to my personal creative process for DP), Sigourney Weaver in Alien, and other inspirations like Starlight Express (!). Some may also notice that the costume appeared on an image Becky Cloonan created for the original DC pitch years ago based on my initial designs (which I will share one day). The character has since changed drastically. My first stab at DOOM PATROL involved a very cynical character that I didn’t feel like writing anymore—the whole take was fun but it wasn’t what I had in mind years later. Casey Brinke is who I want to write—as you mature, you change as a person and as a writer. The ambulance from the original pitch remains, though. Nick and I spent a bit of time creating her and Nick spent a lot of time drawing her—shaping her—so that when the writer starts scripting, the artist can start to hear the character’s voice, and then the character develops even more once the artist brings them to life on the page.

Once we started to get a footing on Casey and other members of Doom Patrol, we then moved on to SHADE, THE CHANGING GIRL.

I thought about the legacy of Shade a lot in the initial concepts/feelings/impressions. They are a character that goes through incredible change (hence the name), and is such an interesting character from the first incarnation, as created by the legendary Steve Ditko, and on to their experimental incarnation brought to us by Peter Milligan and Chris Bachalo. The character has a special place in my heart.

Cecil Castellucci and I started working together very early, and we shaped Shade, with Cecil doing most of the heavy lifting after I told her my initial concept. I fell in love with Cecil’s writing immediately—it has a visceral and dangerous quality to it—very raw, emotional, and wildly imaginative. Her first issue of SHADE is a knockout.

Putting teams together is half the fun, and the editors did an incredible job with this—bringing me lots of art to see—and we chose the teams together.

Which brings us to the amazingly talented Marley Zarcone—someone whose art Cecil and I fell in love with.

Here is an image, much like Nick’s take on Cliff that captured the energy of the character while bringing an alien couture to the table. The Young Animal team is very big on fashion—the perfect thing to juxtapose the wild and uncontrollable nature of the madness itself, and the darkness of the story.

Here is Marley’s Shade!



MOTHER PANIC!

Tommy Lee Edwards and I have been wanting to work together for some time. In 2015, Tommy and his partners flew me out to be a guest at their NC Comicon—it was an incredible experience and we bonded right away—I had been a fan of Tommy’s ever since my brother Mikey gave me a copy of Marvel 1985, and Jon Rivera (who I will get to more later) sent me a bunch of Tommy’s Star Wars art. Tommy and I talked about doing a Batman project together, but as I tried to get in the headspace of Batman, I realized I wasn’t ready to take that on—I felt like I wasn’t in a dark enough place, to be honest! Maybe one day.

But MOTHER PANIC is something different altogether. Even though Bruce Wayne is a famous person, I could bring things from my personal experience as a musician into the character of Violet Paige, a.k.a. Mother Panic, filtering these elements through a different lens: the red carpets, the galas, the weirdos you meet, the fame and the negativity, addiction, misery, combat. Tommy and I created a character that saw a very different Gotham, and we found a whole other world to explore in Gotham—the underbelly of Gotham’s wealthy and famous, the secret things that happen, the secret world. Tommy began designing the character using only some of my crude ballpoint pen notebook scribbles of the character. Mother is still a work in progress, but Tommy blows me away with every design.

Getting Jody Houser on board as writer is the part that glues everything together, and she puts her heart into making Violet come alive. She understood the character right away and immediately found Mother’s voice. Jody is one of my top favorite writers, and I expect to see her writing many different characters in many different genres over the course of her career—she is one of the most versatile writers I have ever met. She took to crime drama immediately. She’s having fun with this and you can tell. We are learning about Violet (and Mother) together. I’m overjoyed that Jody is part of this.

Another exciting announcement is the addition of artist Shawn Crystal to the MOTHER PANIC team! Shawn will be rotating as part of the art team with Tommy Lee Edwards and John Paul Leon, and we are all extremely happy to have his talents on board.

Here is one of my favorite images that Tommy created to get the initial vibe—simple and elegant, like a witch or a ghost walking the streets in downtown Gotham. This captured the energy to me.



Collaborating has been the best part about working on Young Animal. Projects are so much better to go at as a team, and you develop bonds. I feel like the entire team of Young Animal is like a band, every piece supporting the other and bringing in new ideas all the time.

Which brings us to CAVE CARSON HAS A CYBERNETIC EYE.

Writer Jon Rivera and I go way back. We met in art school and stayed very close, working on developing television and film projects together throughout the years. Whenever I needed to bounce an idea off of someone or gain some insight, I went to Jon. When I thought about Cave Carson (and his cybernetic eye) in my head, I knew Jon would be thinking the same thing—so much potential here for humor and drama and…well, caves.

I am also a fan of his writing, and always have been—Jon has published comics of his own as a writer and an artist. He took to Cave Carson right away, as I knew he would, and we started to develop a “season” of CAVE CARSON. We laugh a lot, just like we made each other laugh back when we met during a comedy writing course at the School of Visual Arts in NYC. CAVE creates a warm place in my heart—it is an adventure series, sure, but it is also very human.

And that brings us to one of my favorite artists, Michael Avon Oeming.

I had been reading Powers for years. I remember what an exciting time in comics it was when it first came out—it was a real game-changer for art, writing and storytelling. As we got deeper into developing Cave, Mike’s art began to line up with what we had in mind, plus we know he is so great at delivering complete characters and capturing mood.

A little-known fact: Mike inked 4 of my pages many years ago, when I was trying to break into comics as an artist. Jim Krueger was one of the first people to commission me to do professional work for his comic The Footsoldiers, as well as a backup story involving a young girl Frankenstein.

So we have this interesting history together and Mike is phenomenal, but I’m sure you already feel that way. Here is his take on Cave, which I feel captures the character perfectly as a one-time action hero turned dad, exploring the unknown and answering the call to adventure.



This has been a lengthy update! I don’t know if they will always be this long, but it is nice to finally be able to share these characters with you and share some of our process. Expect many updates and images leading up to our launch in September.

Be seeing you,
G

Mr Hootington posted:

If there is a superman who is pre-flashpoint running around, how hasn't he figured out the flashpoint junk and killed histories greatest monster Barry Allen?

Two Tone Shoes posted:

I think, as far as he's aware, this is just a new universe that's different from his and not his old universe that got hosed up because Barry wanted to hug his mom.

Dark_Tzitzimine posted:

That being said, I appreciate DC got a pretty decent artist to finish the series

Jack of Hearts posted:

I've only read N52 super sparsely, what happened to Rip Hunter? Has he been around? Seems like he fell down on the job hard.

X-O posted:

I don't think he's dying, I think he's losing his powers and just becoming Clark Kent while the Pre-N52 Superman who has been living on N52 Earth since Convergence becomes the actual Superman.

Mr Hootington posted:

He was erased from existence and Booster Gold was rebooted into generic Canadian.

Dark_Tzitzimine posted:

Alhazred posted:

A man who guns down a mental patient have no right to criticize others for having "homicidal impulses".

Alhazred posted:

A man who guns down a mental patient have no right to criticize others for having "homicidal impulses".

Norns posted:

Lol wait. Did he end up killing Jokers Daughter?

Dark_Tzitzimine posted:

She's alive

quote:

Newsarama: Greg, what can you say about the unspecified “unimaginable loss” that kick starts this new volume of Wonder Woman?

Greg Rucka: It’s the solicits text. [laughs]

I don’t want to spoil anything, and it matters a great deal to me that people be able to pick up Liam’s Wonder Woman #1 fresh after Wonder Woman: Rebirth #1 by Liam and Matt Clark. I don’t want a trail of breadcrumbs.

Solicits are meant to hype books, but I believe that was written before I actually completed the first script. I know exactly what they were referring to however, and now I can say that Diana has lost a couple of things.

Nrama: Greg, this is your second major run with the Wonder Woman character, and I know fans don’t want to forget it – and don’t want you to, either. But how has the character changed for you, and how have you changed?

Rucka: It’s been well over a decade since I’ve written Diana consistently. A lot has happened in the interim, and it would be rude to say they didn’t happen. It’s crucial that we want to honor what we’re working with, and what has been done before, and use it where we can to the best of our abilities.

And speaking personally, I am a very different person than I was then. So the kind of stories that I believe would honor and serve Diana best are different than when I was writing her in 2005, and I think that’s crucial.

My relationship to Wonder Woman has changed. If anything, I adore her even more. She’s still my favorite of all the superheroes, hands down. She’s the winner for me: from what she represents, to the nature of her heroism, and the kind of stories she can tell. She has an aspirational nature that I found when I was given the privilege of writing her the first time. And in that sense, I’m doubling down here on the things I believe make her so great.

Nrama: Liam, your storyline, “The Lies,” is set in the modern day. What about the story made it something you wanted it to be, beyond just Greg’s name and the character involved?

Liam Sharp: Actually, I’ve been associated to this project for the longest, even before Greg and Nicola came on board. Which was a funny situation, because obviously there can be different views on the characters involved. But as soon as Greg became attached, we jumped on the phone for an hour and a half and both were very happy by the end of the call.

I always told Greg that I get nervous working with new people, but it was exciting to find out how much he and I had in common. My wife was listening in casually to our conversation, and after about two minutes she said “Don’t worry, Liam. It’ll be fine!”

Then we didn’t stop talking for an hour and a half. The great thing about being paired up with Greg is that we get along on so many levels – politically, philosophically, and more. There’s an awful lot of crossover.

And when he told me the story, I was excited. It’s nice when you go into a story and fundamentally care about it, as I do. Yes, it’s fantasy. Yes, it’s a comic book, but telling stories matters to us; it’s a reflection of ourselves. Inherently, we’re going to do a better job if we’re telling a story we care about and believe in ourselves.

Nrama: And for you, Nicola?

Nicola Scott: Ever since I’ve been on the more professional side of the business, every time I’m asked about what my dream project would be I’ve said: “Doing a Wonder Woman origin story with Greg Rucka.” But I’ve always presumed that would never happen. So to find ourselves in a position where it’s actually happening, it’s a bit overwhelming.

Greg and I have had conversations about this for years, and we have had several ideas. Now, the hard part is boiling it down to 20 pages per issue. You know, we have to make it real and not just this ephemeral group of ideas. In the process of that, it requires us to make some decisions on how things happen, what things happen, and how things are taken. It’s become, by necessity, an incredibly decisive process, and that in itself is quite tricky.

Greg and I are lucky we have so much history between us, because it means we have faith in each other to deliver on our intentions. But there’s a trickiness of finite decisions on all of ten years of talk.

Nrama: How are you approaching defining a young Diana Prince as opposed to the modern-day version?

Scott: We’re kind of using the best ideas of what has come before, certainly visually. We’re trying to use a lot of in-continuity history, but refocusing it for the story we’re trying to tell.

One of the initial ‘locked in’ decisions was how old she was, visually, in our first story. And she’ll look different than in Liam’s story, as that’s set ten years down the road. There, she’s been out in Man’s World for 10 years. Those ten years affect her in a way that the thousands of years leading up to this point hadn’t really. She’s been living a really sheltered life up until this point in our “Year One” story.

Nrama: Liam, what do you hope to evoke with readers in how you draw Wonder Woman?

Sharp: When I came onto this book, the thing that really surprised me was how much thrilling action there would be. Of every book I’ve ever drawn, Wonder Woman has the most to offer. Here’s so many angles to it. Whether it be the magical, the mythological, or even the modern aspects inherent to our story, there’s a lot there. And also the superhero aspect, but that’s quite a ways off.

Looking at previous work, I’m coming into this off of Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang’s European, vaguely “real world” feel. It’s the real world rather than a stylized version of it, so I’ve been doing a lot of detail – and a lot of crosshatching. Its mid-Atlantic, European, more inspired by old school Barry Windsor-Smith. It’ll definitely feel like a “lived in,” believable world.

As Nicola said, our version of her in “The Lies” is ten years older than the one she and Greg are doing in “year One,” so she’s been touched by this world and its affected her. You’ll see it in her face and in her armor that she’s not as invulnerable as she might always seem to be. She has a humanity, and we imbue her with that.

We’ve also talked about her size. She’s 6’2” and strong. She’s going to be striking when she walks into the room. She’s big – not ‘model’ thin. She’s powerful, but not ripped like a bodybuilder.

She’s a powerful woman. ‘Woman’ became a big part of it; she’s Wonder Woman, not ‘Wonder Teenager.’

Nrama: I have to ask about the format of the book: two concurrent storylines, running in alternating issues, one drawn by Liam, one by Nicola. How did that idea come about, and how do you think it’ll affect readership of the book in serialized format?

Sharp: That’s Greg. [Laughs]

Rucka: My fault. [Laughs] If it fails dismally, everyone can point at me and laugh.

But it matters enormously to me that, given the nature of the schedule, that Liam and Nicola get the time needed to draw these stories.

In my initial conversations about doing Wonder Woman again for DC, I talked about how Liam needed to be given the time to “own” the book; you have to be able to grant that to your collaborators. One of the dangers of a pressing schedule is that it can potentially alienate an artist; as invested as they might wish to be, a harsh schedule could disallow them from doing that and force them to step away. I really wanted to prevent that, and not have Liam finding himself on a series of late nights working until 3am under looming deadlines.

And looking at the story we wanted to tell, this format was perfect. Do this “Year One” story, and let that run pretty much contemporaneously with “The Lies,” which is a “Year Ten” story. As soon as I had that, Nicola was our first call. Our creator-owned series Black Magick was in a place where she could step away from it long enough to do this.

These stories are very distinct from one another, but they are also intrinsically linked to one another. The cliffhanger at the end of Wonder Woman #1 isn’t answered in #2 however, so you’ll need to wait until #3 when Liam returns to see that story. But what happens in #1 and #2 feed into things and set up questions for later. There’s questions presented in Wonder Woman #1 that you won’t really see the full shape of the answer until you get to Wonder Woman #6, “Year One” part three. And I think that creates lovely dramatic tension.

I didn’t want Liam and Nicola to be off in separate corners not talking to each other and not having their stories affect one another. We’re all in this together.

This phone call with the three of us and you wasn’t a difficult one to arrange, except for schedule. We all get along, and we’re all in communication – and I think ‘communication’ is the key to getting the best out of comics collaboration. Creating something more than the sum of the parts.

Sharp: I have a panel of Nic’s art in Wonder Woman #1. I won’t say how or why, but it will all make sense, and I think there are a few moments like that.

Scott: I’m looking forward to the three of us doing panels at conventions. We’ve been talking to each other so much about the project by phone and online, but it would be very nice to get in the same room together with an audience.

Nrama: And have you three compared schedules for what convention that might be?

Rucka: Rose City, this September. We’ll all be in Portland.

quote:

Newsarama: Josh, we've been told that Rebirth gets the DC characters back to their core. What would you say is the most important part of Barry Allen that you're hoping to highlight as you kick off your run with a new #1?

Joshua Williamson: His passion for doing the right thing, for finding truth and justice. But also — you know me and the kind of writing I do — I think there's a part of Barry who does too much, and he knows he does too much, but he continues to do it and to push himself too hard.

Nrama: Is his passion for doing the right thing what makes him overextend himself?

Williamson: Yeah, he can't help himself. He wants to save everyone. He wants to do everything he can. He has these powers, so he wants to go out and save everyone.

Eventually, he's going to find himself overwhelmed.

And that's a big part of the story we're telling, is how Barry just can't be in two places at once. He has this speed, but he can't do everything.

But he's still going to try. He's never going to quit.

Nrama: What I hear is, "I need a sidekick!"

Williamson: That is definitely part of it. He needs help, right? He needs help.

But sometimes, like the monkey's paw, it'll mess you up.

He needs help. He needs someone to come in and help him out. And he gets a little bit too much help.

It ends up becoming another thing for him to deal with, another thing for him to have to deal with.

Nrama: No good in there?

Williamson: Sometimes it's good. Sometimes they can help. But sometimes, it's too much.

Nrama: It depends on who's helping, right? As you start your story, he's got several people helping out — people who have obtained powers and are now being mentored by Barry?

Williamson: Yeah, when the Speed Force storm hits, it hits kind of small at first and then it gets bigger.

So at first he feels like, "Oh, I can do this. I can do this. I can have a partner. I can train somebody."

But then it there are more and more — and it's a lot of responsibility to take on. It's a lot to deal with. And now he feels responsible for all these people.

Nrama: When you say "all these people," is Wally part of the people that Barry is mentoring?

Williamson: You have to wait and see.

There's an interesting twist coming with that.

I mean, it's obvious that Wally is going to become Kid Flash. I mean, he's all over the promo stuff. He's on the cover of Teen Titans #1, so that's out there.

But there's going to definitely be a twist when it comes to Wally's evolution to becoming a superhero. There's going to be something I think people will be surprised by — what leads to him doing that.

And is Barry the one training him? I don't know. We'll have to see.

Nrama: But is The Flash title where we learn about Wally's evolution into Kid Flash?

Williamson: Yes.

Nrama: You just told me the core of Barry Allen as the Flash. Can you talk about the differences between him and Wally?

Williamson: Their motivations are different. I think that Barry comes from a place of tragedy. He's searching for truth and justice. That is where Barry comes from. Barry comes from this place of, "This is my responsibility."

But Wally, he's hesitant to be a hero and to use the powers. He's not going to dive right in. His motivation is very different.

He's a kid. He thinks it's fun — I guess that's the best way to put it. He thinks it's fun to go out there and use them.

He idolizes the Flash. He wants to be like the Flash. He really idolizes him. But as the story goes on, things…. you know that saying about "never meet your idol?" He's going to kind of see that the Flash is not exactly what he thought. Because Barry is a flawed person. He wants to do everything he can and be a great hero, but sometimes Barry can't see the forest for the trees, because he's trying to be so much. He can't always focus and see.

Whereas Wally, I think Wally's perspective is a little more grounded than Barry's. I think that he is able to take it all in in a different way than Barry can. He can see the Force, whereas I don't think Barry can, right now at least. That's part of the story, is showing that and then showing how we move forward from that.

Nrama: You've mentioned Godspeed and how he becomes a nemesis for Barry. Why this character? Is there something you're trying to say about Barry by pitting him against this individual?

Williamson: I wanted a character who questioned Barry. There's a saying about bad guys that the best bad guys are either opposite of the hero, or they're a mirror. And I think with Barry, when it came to characters like Zoom or Reverse Flash, they were the opposite. Right? They were the reverse. But Godspeed, I wanted to show someone who is closer to a mirror, to show a different path than Barry would have taken.

This is someone who has similar ideas to Barry about justice, but with a different perspective.

It's hard to talk about without spoiling anything.

But I wanted this character, Godspeed, to be someone that worked as a mirror, to show Barry a side of himself that he didn't know was there, that he was sort of hiding. That's what Godspeed represents. He represents the version of justice that's really just revenge.

But I love writing Godspeed. He's a great character to work with. He uses the speed powers in very different ways. Whereas Barry is very scientific and thoughtful, I think Godspeed is much more of a blunt instrument, and much more violent, and much more twisted with speed in ways that Barry would never use the speed.

There's a scene in one of the issues where the two of them are arguing, and it's one of my favorite scenes I've written in the book so far, and I think Godspeed points things out to Barry that, as readers, we've probably thought about. But he's getting to say it right to Barry's face. And I'm really excited for readers to get to that scene.

Nrama: You mentioned before that I know the way you write. But can you describe your approach to the structure of the Flash series? Longer story arcs? Shorter? Is there a bigger picture that you have in mind for your run?

Williamson: I have things planned out pretty far out. It just depends on if they let me do it all. But I have this big plan for things that I want to do.

The first arc, after the Rebirth issue, is eight issues long. And then there will be shorter arcs. But I definitely have plans for it.

And in the Rebirth issue, you'll see seeds for things that are planned out for a long time.

Nrama: There were a lot of things established about Barry and his world in the "New 52." Is this going to diverge from that? Or are you keeping that stuff intact?

Williamson: I'm keeping things as intact as I can. I like to build on story and find new avenues and new ways to use what's come before rather than ignore. I'm a big continuity junkie. I've been reading comics my whole life.

I'd rather take everything that's been there and find ways to keep moving forward with it. And you know, that was part of the theme behind that first story arc in Brian Buccellato and Francis Manapul's run. It's actually called "Move Forward." And I just want to keep that idea going, moving forward from what's been set up behind me.

And there are pieces of it I want to use. So I plan to keep building and moving forward with Rebirth.

Nrama: Let's talk about your artists. How are you utilizing them both as the series becomes a twice-monthly book. And what are they bringing to the visuals of the book?

Williamson: Carmine DiGiandomenico, whose name I always say wrong, will come on and do a few issues, then Neil Googe will do a few issues.

But man, Carmine brings so much energy to the story. And he finds ways to be inventive with the story. That was something in issue #1 that he did that was really, really minor, but I was so happy — this small, subtle touch that I think helps tell the story. When you find an artist who can help you visualize little bits and pieces of the story and reveal character and show bits and pieces of character through the art — even if it's subtle little things — those are the artists that you want to work with. And Carmine is one of those artists.

And man, he draws lightning really well. And the action sequences are amazing. There's an action sequence in #2 that's really cool. It feels kinetic. It feels like it's moving along really quickly, which works so well on the Flash. And Ivan Plascencia really sets the mood with the colors. It's all able to lead you through the issue, and each scene has its own tone, using the colors.

And Neil — I've been wanting to work with Neil for years. When his name came up, I was like, yes, let's do that.

I've been very lucky to be working with them.

Nrama: What about the Rebirth issue of The Flash? Anything you can say about that?

Williamson: It opens on a case that Barry is working that will have long-lasting effects on the book, and for the Flash. I think people will be surprised, but also intrigued by this big mystery we're building.

Nrama: And you worked with Geoff Johns a little on this, putting together ideas? I've heard there's a room with a big white board where he met with writers on Rebirth series. With him being so close to the Flash for so long — even involved with the TV show — what was it like to have him involved in your formation of the story and this series?

Williamson: Oh man, I've known Geoff for awhile, so we've known each other for years. I mean, you know. I'm a big DC fan, and I've always been a fan of his. And I met Geoff when I wanted his autograph as a kid. And we've kept in contact.

I talked with Dan about the story and what I want to do, and Dan told Geoff. I had turned in some paperwork with my thoughts about the big story I wanted to tell.

The first time I sat down with Geoff, I didn't know that's what we were doing at first. I thought it was going to be me pitching it to him. But he already knew what I had planned. And that was great. We got to sit down and we just started talking about character, and what Barry wants. And Barry's motivations.

We talked about the story, going back and forth on it. It was a really great experience. It's probably one of my favorite experiences I've ever had in comics, working on this book with him, sharing my thoughts on Barry Allen, my thoughts on the Flash and things I wanted to do. He's been working on these things so long — I don't know if there's anybody who knows that universe as well as Geoff — to sit there with him and just go back and forth was an amazing experience.

And I got to do it a couple other times since then. It's been awesome. It's part of the reason I decided to go exclusive, was because of that. It's been really great.

Jiro posted:

Barry is dragging a lot of silly string and or webbing with him it seems.

Also turn Barry into a new Parallax and have him try Zero Hour again. If he's gonna be trying to be everywhere trying to do EVERYTHING, which wasn't that Superman's thing, you might as well slowly turn him into Parallax and have Hal Parallax team up with him. Then they can attempt Zero Hour^2!