FROM THE VAULT: Phillip Kennedy Johnson

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Hey, this is Philip Kennedy Johnson, writer of Superman and Alien, and you're listening to the Oblivion Bar podcast.

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Welcome to the Oblivion Bar podcast with your host, Chris Hacker and Aaron Norris.

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us this week on the Oblivion Bar podcast for our landmark 25th episode.

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We have a gentleman here who has written for both DC Marvel.

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He's written for Boom Studios, IDW, Aftershock, Scout Comics, I'm sure many more.

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He's the heir apparent to the DC flagship Superman title and Marvel's brand new alien title.

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Eisner nominated writer and current United States Army member, Philip K.

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Johnson.

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Hey guys, thanks for having me.

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I don't know if you can hear it already, but there is an audible shutter, a quiver.

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in Chris's voice.

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I'm sweating.

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have two fans on me actually down here below.

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That's the reason I don't know if you guys can see it, but yeah, we really, we appreciate you so much for being on here on the Oblivion bar.

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And no, of course, man, especially with you guys being like veterans.

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That's absolutely man.

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You read my mind.

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That's exactly what I was about to say.

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It's, know, it, made sense.

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The fact that you were, you know, dipping your toe into the big two, which we'll talk about here in a minute.

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And the fact that you were, you know, currently in the military, obviously Aaron and I had met.

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while we were in the army down at Fort Stewart.

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So it made sense.

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So let's just go ahead and get right into it.

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Sounds good.

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As someone who loves the medium of comics like Aaron and I, I think you've probably got this question a hundred times now, but just for our sake, how did you get started in the industry and what was kind of your first steps and your strategy to be recognized by these, you know, giant publishers?

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When I first started writing for comics, wasn't actually with the, I didn't really expect to.

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to break in in a meaningful way.

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was kind of doing it to help my brother get his foot in the door.

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The way that all came about is like, mean, I had loved comics as a kid.

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grew up, I mean, I learned how to read off in comics, loved them.

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But when I finished high school and went to college, I, you know, I didn't do much reading for fun for a while.

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I kind of fell out of it.

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I wanted to be a comic artist myself as a kid, but I had, kind of gave up on that and pursued music as a career instead.

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And I had a younger brother who also did music and comics and drew a lot.

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And he ended up going the other way.

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He wanted to be an artist.

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But didn't really know how to get started.

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Didn't know anything about the industry.

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He just liked comics and drew really well.

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And that's kind of all he had.

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And he just kind of lost as far as what to do next.

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And so I was like, well, dude.

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And I was already in the army by then.

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I was in one of the military bands in DC.

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I was a Trump player.

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That's my day gig even now.

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I was like, well, dude, I'm in the army and they've got a job and they've got like 200 jobs.

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They've got this gig called multimedia illustrator where you can literally just draw and take photos and make stuff online for the military.

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Yeah, exactly.

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25 Mike.

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That's right.

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he, uh, for those who, those are not in the biz in the online, that's inside baseball here.

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say, right.

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That's, uh, that's the, the code for that particular job.

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That's his MOS.

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So.

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He wanted to do it.

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So he, I told him like, just come move in with me.

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Like we'll just, go to conventions.

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We'll read books about how to make comics.

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We'll just kind of educate ourselves together.

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I'll write stuff for you.

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Cause I love creative writing and hadn't done it in forever.

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Cause he didn't have any scripts.

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I mean, he didn't have any like pages of sequential art.

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He just had like pinups, you know, like a one sheet of like Wolverine looking cool or whatever, but he didn't have any like pages.

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So I just started writing for him and just kind of figured out how the, how the industry works.

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Started going to cons and.

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It was just, it just really fun, man.

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So that worked out.

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ended up joining the army.

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did six years.

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Like he just, moved in with me.

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We just worked out every day, got jacked for, and he just had to get ready for, for basics somewhat, lose some weight and all that.

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And he did all that.

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And he got ready for the ASVAB because there's like a, you know, it like a score you need to get 25 Mike.

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So he did all that, did six years and he just finished up at SCAD.

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He just did, he did a degree at Savannah College of Art and Design in comic art.

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Now we're about to make some books.

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And that folk is what we call an origin story.

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That's right.

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That's my origin story.

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I wrote stories for him to draw.

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Just a couple of short stories.

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We made a story for our sister as a gift.

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And then we did just another, a bit, basically a poem for him to illustrate.

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Well, black and white short.

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And then he got in the army and started getting really busy.

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And I started looking for other artists to work with.

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And that eventually turned into The Last Sons of America, which is now Boomb Studios.

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That was my first printed book.

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Yeah.

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And that the book led to the next and then it sort of worked out.

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What an entryway into the medium too.

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We're going to talk about that here in a bit, but Last Sons of America is a really great creator on book for sure.

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And thanks man.

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Scad, congratulations to your brother because that is the origin for a lot of great comic book writers and artists.

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mean, Donny Cates, Sean Gordon Murphy, Trad Moore, Jeff Shaw, you know that.

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that branch of Marvel and obviously Sean Gordon Murphy, those guys all started off in Savannah.

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So he's set up for, you know, a great learning experience to hopefully get into to get into comics.

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So, yeah, I agree.

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He's doing great work now.

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I'm excited to see what he does next.

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Chris, how wild is it that we as a as a friendship, as a duo started off in Savannah, Georgia, man?

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Yeah, we walk those streets every, you know, every weekend, just every open containers, the whole business and.

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We were surrounded by some of those talent people in the medium.

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I'm sure that's awesome.

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What years were you guys there?

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We were there from I was there from 2010 to 2014.

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OK, not long ago.

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That's cool.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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So yeah, because both Chris and I, we are together.

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We served Fort Stewart and we just like I owned it or I rented a house out in in Georgetown South Side.

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And so that's where he would he would just leave the barracks and come chill at my place over the weekend.

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And that's how we kind of.

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brew and became long term friends.

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Yeah.

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Which is funny because like, it's weird how you just come across people that you have, like such similarities to like even you and I, we I played brass, I played trumpet for about seven years.

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my dad was a brass player.

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So that's how I got my my gig into it.

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And I'm currently serving I just today is actually my 17 year 17 year anniversary in the army.

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Dude, you're like right there.

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Congrats.

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Yeah.

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I didn't know that.

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That's awesome.

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Congratulations, Aaron.

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Yeah, thank you.

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I'm, it's, it's a, it's a good feeling.

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What I wanted, if you don't mind, I wanted to ask, like, what are some of the challenges that come, obviously being a full-time soldier, you know, full-time service member that has its own hurdles, its own obstacles, but like, what challenges do you, do you come across, you know, being a full-time scribe for the comic book world and, and how, I don't know there's an opportunity for it, but how does your military training, how does any of that kind of.

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fit into the comic book industry for you?

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It's I mean, as you guys know, the big thing that the army pushes constantly, but especially at the beginning is the notion of teamwork, right?

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Like there's now you lose your individuality and just like the biggest slam they can hit you with and basically is calling an individual.

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Right.

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Right.

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Or a hero.

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They used to use the hero like a blue falcon.

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Hey, hero.

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Exactly.

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Yeah.

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So that that concept of just everything you do being for the good of the team is something that they push in you from the very beginning.

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And honestly, that's kind of not in the same way, not as aggressively, but there's a similar kind of thing in music, too, where you have to constantly just have your ears way open and be aware of everything of everything around you that's happening.

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It's aware of everything that's.

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All the sounds coming out from everyone's horn around you, you need to be aware of all that and be reacting to everyone else's contributions constantly just to make a, you know, the one unified product.

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Right.

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And, when I got into the army, that was very, very similar.

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get some mindset I just fell right into.

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So yeah, the concept of, of team is really a valuable one.

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I mean, in any kind of creative pursuit, really any kind of collaboration, but in a, in small group in a, in a comic team.

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creative team that it's exactly the same thing.

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It's like small group jazz, right?

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Where you've got the pencil or ink or colorist, writer, letterer, post-production and editors as well.

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And everyone has to be just reacting to everyone else's work.

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The difference between live jazz and for any kind of mission that you do as a team.

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And then the comic thing is that in comics, your contributions happen one at a time, but you can kind of get around that by reacting to their work.

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So I turn in a script.

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That script is not done.

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I mean, it says it's done.

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I send it in and then it goes to the artist and then they draw.

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I'll get back the thumbnails, right?

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Like the sketches.

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Like here's what I had in mind and then I'll make changes based on what I'm seeing.

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Okay, well here's what I want to do to play to their strengths more.

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Like these pages kick ass.

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These ones need something.

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And I think we can make them pop a lot more if I just make these changes.

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That's really interesting.

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Yeah, I feel like you have to.

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If you just send it and never see it again, I feel like you're not really collaborating.

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Yeah.

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Well, I did my job and now it's on to the next thing.

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Those typically do not turn out to be the best books, in my opinion.

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Not a collaborative effort like that.

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Yeah.

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Like you said, you have to have all facets working to make a comic work.

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a lot of times, I'm glad you said that earlier, that it's the writer and artist a lot of time getting most of the bulk of the praise from the people reading it and that like.

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But honestly, like you said, it's Inker, Penciler, writer, editor, publicist, the whole business that make a comic.

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I like it because it's definitely a good metaphor for like what you said with the small group of jazz, the small jazz band.

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whenever I've watched some really good, I love music.

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So whenever I've seen a really good small, whether it's a quartet or a little jazz band, they feed off of each other.

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So it's like emotion.

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It's what you feel off of it.

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So it's like one guy can change a note in a moment.

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And then the guys who, know, got the melody or the tempo, everything can change in just a second.

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So it's just based on how everybody feels.

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That's awesome to hear that comic writing and artistry and all that stuff kind of, you know, is the same flow, ebb and flow.

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It should be.

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Yeah.

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I definitely know creators who don't feel that way and they hate getting notes.

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They hate getting feedback.

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They're like, you know, screw you.

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I did my job.

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This is perfect.

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But It's it's not not the people that you really look forward to working with, you know, like people that you really want to work with, those people who want to hear what you have to say that give you something reactive that you, you know, whenever.

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OK, so, for example, on The Last God that I am doing at DC Black Label, that artist for Carter Fiderici is amazing, just amazing.

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Amazing.

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He's just one of the best artists working in comics ever.

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And he would sometimes.

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often stray from the scripts kind of a lot.

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But almost would always come back stronger.

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so I would, I give him the script.

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first I kind of expected, I'll just give him looser scripts that leave a lot of room for interpretation.

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But in the end, the workflow that we settled on, because he also does not speak English as a first language, he does speak English and we can communicate.

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Every now and then there's detail that slips through.

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So instead of just giving him very vague scripts to let him fill in the details, we kind of figured out that the best way, the way they got the best product was to give him very detailed scripts with the understanding that he would just kind of do what he wanted with it.

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Like basically I'm telling him a very detailed story so that he can tell the story.

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Yeah.

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And so I'd give him the script, tons of detail.

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It would come back, lots of changes.

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And then I would give him another script with those changes incorporated and maybe more change on top of that.

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we'll have, you know, find us either find something like a middle path or a completely different path that really changes the story that comes forward.

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An example of that would be in the very first issue where, you know, the back of every issue has four pages of back matter where they would, they me just put additional stuff in the back that didn't have Ricardo's art with it.

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And the reason that was is because there's so much world building that they were like, we can't believe how much work you're doing.

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You want to some of this in the back?

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And that's what we ended up doing.

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So we have all these like songs and ancient poems and journal entries and religious texts and stuff like in foreign languages that the reader can't even read in some cases.

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And, you know, so we had room for all that.

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At the end of the first issue, you see this palace on fire and Ricardo drew this woman in armor with a shield and I think a spear.

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And It just looked badass.

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I didn't ask for that in the script.

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He just put it in there and it looked awesome, but it kind of didn't make sense because the culture that, the culture of this, it's like this ancient Rome version of this world that is very patriarchal.

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there's no, there's not, like women are not badasses in their mindset, you know, the way they, like it's all about the men and that culture.

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And it didn't make sense that they would celebrate this woman like that.

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If it was an Elvin woman, that would make a lot more sense.

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Because in the, the Elven culture, mean, women are like, they're all equal, but that's not how humans were in this particular place.

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I was like, well, okay.

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So how we, what do do now?

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I didn't want to ask them to take it away because it looked awesome.

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And so I started this idea of, um, this bad-ass human woman from the river lands, the North, the northerners who kind of ran away from home kind of took place.

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anyway, I kind of developed this whole mythology around this woman called Cule, Queen of rivers.

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And that became a big centerpiece of all the, not all the back matter, lot of back matter of many issues that followed.

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This human woman who kind of took this Joan of Arc kind of place in their culture, someone who didn't really have the standing to become a warrior, but did anyway, became a slave of the Elva and then a great war priest of the Elva, actually fought the humans herself.

00:15:02.701 --> 00:15:06.642
And then like centuries later, she's claimed as a great hero by both cultures.

00:15:06.642 --> 00:15:07.042
Yeah.

00:15:07.042 --> 00:15:07.621
Oh, wow.

00:15:07.621 --> 00:15:08.042
Yeah.

00:15:08.042 --> 00:15:12.341
And they both have very different stories about how she came to be this amazing person and who she really was.

00:15:12.341 --> 00:15:13.402
You know.

00:15:13.761 --> 00:15:16.201
So anyway, it just helped flesh out the story a lot.

00:15:16.201 --> 00:15:18.921
I could have just been like, no, that's not right.

00:15:18.921 --> 00:15:19.961
You know, this doesn't work.

00:15:19.961 --> 00:15:22.601
You should take it out or, you know, make it a dude.

00:15:22.961 --> 00:15:28.322
But I feel like reacting to what he did instead made it a much richer story.

00:15:28.322 --> 00:15:30.508
Kind of draws that creativity out a little bit.

00:15:30.508 --> 00:15:31.388
Yeah, exactly.

00:15:31.388 --> 00:15:39.105
And there's even like in issue three, there's this thing where you see spoilers in the first issue, you see the king as this monster thing.

00:15:39.105 --> 00:15:40.726
He's been transformed.

00:15:40.726 --> 00:15:49.955
And I was going to show him again in issue three and the monster that Ricardo drew instead was completely different and way more badass.

00:15:49.955 --> 00:15:54.878
It was just, it looked incredible and it looked too good not to use.

00:15:55.078 --> 00:15:58.734
so I changed, like that affected everything that came later, like the whole.

00:15:58.734 --> 00:16:00.813
arc of the story changed completely.

00:16:00.813 --> 00:16:02.214
That's a good problem to have.

00:16:02.293 --> 00:16:04.734
Yeah, it's an important, I think it's an important thing to do.

00:16:04.734 --> 00:16:16.033
guess really you need to, you need to respect your artists and let them do their, know, let them be your collaborator, not your, they don't work for you just because their step comes later doesn't mean they work for you, but you work together.

00:16:16.033 --> 00:16:16.313
Yeah.

00:16:16.313 --> 00:16:19.514
That reminds me, I was reading the back of Saga Book One.

00:16:19.514 --> 00:16:24.614
They talked about how Fiona created the character Ghost, the little otter character.

00:16:25.254 --> 00:16:25.774
Brian K.

00:16:25.774 --> 00:16:30.091
Vaughan had absolutely no, he had no plans for Gus at all.

00:16:30.091 --> 00:16:32.932
was just supposed to be like a background character that Fiona included.

00:16:32.932 --> 00:16:37.703
And when he saw that character, he's like, this is going to be an important character going forward from now on.

00:16:37.703 --> 00:16:39.184
And he is from there on.

00:16:39.184 --> 00:16:45.076
So you love to hear those stories of artists really, like you said, being creative.

00:16:45.076 --> 00:16:49.248
And then you can figure out a way to be adjustable and put them in the story somehow.

00:16:49.408 --> 00:16:50.768
Yeah, that's important.

00:16:50.768 --> 00:16:57.590
So to quickly go back to talk about Last Sons of America, it's such a unique and really interesting story.

00:16:57.611 --> 00:17:00.024
This is the very first work that I ever read by you.

00:17:00.024 --> 00:17:03.466
And I'm just curious, where does something like that come from?

00:17:03.466 --> 00:17:11.481
And then also with that, is there any truth to the Peter Dinklage as Julian rumors with Matt Reese producing a Netflix film?

00:17:11.481 --> 00:17:14.173
Have you heard these rumors or is this confirmed?

00:17:14.334 --> 00:17:16.535
Yeah, that's well, Netflix.

00:17:16.535 --> 00:17:17.474
OK.

00:17:18.596 --> 00:17:26.340
Yeah, I mean, I mean, Dinklage is going to be in it if it gets made for sure.

00:17:26.733 --> 00:17:30.933
and Matt Reeves company is making it, which is pretty rad.

00:17:30.933 --> 00:17:32.213
Yeah, that's amazing.

00:17:32.473 --> 00:17:33.973
Netflix did option it.

00:17:33.973 --> 00:17:34.453
OK.

00:17:34.453 --> 00:17:35.713
I mean, that's not a rumor.

00:17:35.713 --> 00:17:36.634
That's like that's out there.

00:17:36.634 --> 00:17:37.753
They did.

00:17:37.834 --> 00:17:40.453
And eventually they did pass on it.

00:17:40.453 --> 00:17:46.413
So now it's out there, but there are still plans to develop it and there are still big people attached.

00:17:47.094 --> 00:17:49.374
So that movie could still very, very much happen.

00:17:49.374 --> 00:17:53.034
And I'm pretty optimistic about his chances in the long run.

00:17:53.034 --> 00:17:53.741
Sure.

00:17:53.741 --> 00:18:13.221
So where does that where does that idea come from this you know this future where you have to essentially you know kids cannot be born anymore in America so basically you have these two brothers who are down in I think they're in South America correct and they're yeah they're essentially trying to buy these kids to ship them back to America for these wealthy white families essentially.

00:18:13.481 --> 00:18:25.102
Yeah yeah so at the time okay I had the idea for that book probably around 2010 I it was 2010 because that's that's when these Um, this massive earthquake hit Haiti around that time.

00:18:25.862 --> 00:18:30.842
And, um, at that time, my wife and I were trying to get pregnant.

00:18:30.842 --> 00:18:33.721
It looks like it looked at the time, like it was not going to happen.

00:18:33.882 --> 00:18:41.582
Um, and so infertility was kind of just already on my mind kind of, and then this thing in Haiti happened.

00:18:41.582 --> 00:18:44.842
became this big humanitarian crisis.

00:18:45.622 --> 00:18:51.049
Um, so I heard this radio piece about this group of.

00:18:51.049 --> 00:19:01.557
Americans, like an American church sent a mission group down there to ostensibly rescue kids who had been orphaned to help find them homes.

00:19:01.958 --> 00:19:07.101
But they end up grabbing a bunch of kids that still had families and trying to get them out of the country.

00:19:07.221 --> 00:19:13.164
And like, like literally trying to smuggle children out of Haiti during in the middle of all this crap that's happening.

00:19:13.465 --> 00:19:17.848
And The problem down there is that they didn't have the one problem.

00:19:17.848 --> 00:19:24.114
mean, one of many things that made it more complicated was that they didn't have the infrastructure that we would have here.

00:19:24.114 --> 00:19:43.327
Like if there was a big earthquake here, like in my hometown, and there were kids running around, like their homes are destroyed or whatever, you know, people have phones, people have addresses, there's cops everywhere, there's emergency services, there are things in place that will help reunite the survivors, right?

00:19:43.327 --> 00:19:44.228
Right.

00:19:44.321 --> 00:19:46.962
There were places in Haiti where that was not happening.

00:19:47.623 --> 00:19:53.125
So it was becoming very difficult for some people to find each other down there and then in the wake of all this destruction.

00:19:53.766 --> 00:19:57.396
So it's kind of gray about how it went down after that.

00:19:57.396 --> 00:20:03.950
If they, if they did it on purpose, like everyone's kind of saying different things, but it was super, super shady.

00:20:03.950 --> 00:20:08.471
And that kind of, around the same time I was also doing a lot of anti-human trafficking work in Baltimore.

00:20:08.711 --> 00:20:09.692
Wow.

00:20:10.093 --> 00:20:14.294
And that was a huge thing in my mind constantly.

00:20:14.493 --> 00:20:53.816
and this thing in Haiti, it got me reading about the for-profit adoption industry and a lot of problems with it and ways in which it is unethical.

00:20:54.037 --> 00:21:02.618
How there are kids overseas who are, in some cases, just sold by their parents to orphanages because they just can't afford to have them.

00:21:04.038 --> 00:21:08.701
And so they make, you know, like a little like just chump change from a local orphanage.

00:21:08.701 --> 00:21:18.304
And those orphanages will in turn sell those kids like retailers to to adoption agencies here or wherever in places where there's money, you know?

00:21:18.704 --> 00:21:29.640
So you've got, and sometimes they have these sob stories where, yeah, this poor child, their parents died from whatever, like displaced by this civil war, you know, it's not always true.

00:21:29.640 --> 00:21:33.372
Very often that kid still has a family back home that just gave them up.

00:21:33.512 --> 00:21:37.781
And, you know, it's just a different scene that I didn't know anything about.

00:21:38.234 --> 00:21:39.695
And then that sort of consumed me too.

00:21:39.695 --> 00:21:48.688
So now I've got all these kind of disparate ideas in my head of, you know, infertility and human trafficking and adoption and, you know, third world countries.

00:21:50.229 --> 00:21:54.932
And they all kind of coalesced around this idea of a world in which Americans couldn't have kids anymore.

00:21:54.932 --> 00:21:55.451
What was it?

00:21:55.451 --> 00:21:56.053
What if it was us?

00:21:56.053 --> 00:21:58.394
And then human trafficking became legit.

00:21:58.394 --> 00:22:01.204
And then that's just the way that we make families after that.

00:22:01.204 --> 00:22:04.916
What if buying these kids the way that we really do in real life?

00:22:04.916 --> 00:22:07.179
What if that became the only way that we could have families?

00:22:07.179 --> 00:22:07.598
Yeah.

00:22:07.598 --> 00:22:11.181
And that became the the beginning of last sons of America.

00:22:11.181 --> 00:22:11.510
Wow.

00:22:11.510 --> 00:22:17.710
Did that happen to at all kind of help you get over some of those feelings that you had?

00:22:17.710 --> 00:22:21.950
Like was, was writing this story kind of almost therapeutic for you or I mean?

00:22:21.950 --> 00:22:22.750
Yeah, sure.

00:22:22.750 --> 00:22:23.549
No, it definitely was.

00:22:23.549 --> 00:22:26.509
mean, honestly, these days I don't do as much human trafficking work as I did.

00:22:26.509 --> 00:22:30.950
And it's like, I feel kind of bad about it, but you know, I'm just trying to keep up with my current workload.

00:22:30.950 --> 00:22:39.549
I need to find a way to do more again, but it's, mean, there was a time when I had to just distance myself from it because it was just like killing me.

00:22:39.549 --> 00:22:40.309
Yeah.

00:22:40.309 --> 00:22:41.650
Just completely consuming me.

00:22:41.650 --> 00:22:44.266
And I had like no joy in my life because I was just.

00:22:44.266 --> 00:22:47.228
so enraged all the time, you know?

00:22:47.228 --> 00:22:48.648
Yeah.

00:22:48.648 --> 00:22:50.770
So there was a time when I had to take distance from it.

00:22:50.770 --> 00:23:06.381
But that aside, and yeah, this book was very helpful in just getting that stuff out, just putting out messages that I care about a lot, kind of dressing it up in the comic booky way and making it kind of so it's not just an emotional beating, or you can just read it and have fun reading it.

00:23:06.381 --> 00:23:17.308
I wanted the banter between the brothers to be, you know, kind of upbeat and just fun to read and cool to read and not just you know, just wall or in the bleakness of it.

00:23:17.308 --> 00:23:17.906
Yeah.

00:23:17.906 --> 00:23:32.970
It's packaging, you know, it's patching packaging, something not so pretty, but still informing people about what's going on and also kind of using real world experiences to not only help you get over what you've experienced, but helping people learn about what's actually going on.

00:23:32.970 --> 00:23:35.000
Because, I mean, that's that's crazy.

00:23:35.000 --> 00:23:40.664
Like, I mean, I, you know, we all know that in the military, we get a lot of human trafficking education and things like that.

00:23:40.664 --> 00:23:45.298
But there's certain things like this that they just You learn like this is this this is human trafficking.

00:23:45.298 --> 00:23:49.877
You're like, I've never even, you know, considered that that's that's insane.

00:23:49.877 --> 00:23:52.817
So it's different to hear it and see it, you know?

00:23:52.817 --> 00:23:53.397
Yeah.

00:23:53.397 --> 00:23:53.837
Yeah.

00:23:53.837 --> 00:23:54.657
And what for sure.

00:23:54.657 --> 00:24:02.557
What I think the benefit I think of of writing and you know, that's probably better than anyone and especially in comics is that it's a power fantasy all the time.

00:24:02.557 --> 00:24:16.017
So you have this ability, like in your story with, you know, Jackie and Julian, where you can essentially they not sorry spoilers for The Last Sons of America, but they They end up saving the girl from the overlord there in South America.

00:24:16.017 --> 00:24:17.298
So yeah.

00:24:17.298 --> 00:24:21.982
Do you have a you know, sorry not to break it into something not you know, from what we're just talking about.

00:24:21.982 --> 00:24:25.904
But do you have a fan cast for Jackie since we have as we have Julian?

00:24:27.287 --> 00:24:28.769
That's actually been cast to.

00:24:28.769 --> 00:24:29.354
really?

00:24:29.354 --> 00:24:29.848
By who?

00:24:29.848 --> 00:24:30.730
Yeah.

00:24:30.730 --> 00:24:33.372
I can't tell you.

00:24:33.372 --> 00:24:34.252
I shouldn't say it.

00:24:34.252 --> 00:24:34.633
Okay.

00:24:34.633 --> 00:24:38.826
Even I mean the information you guys already have was out there because it got leaked.

00:24:38.826 --> 00:24:39.757
okay.

00:24:40.076 --> 00:24:43.409
So I don't want to be that guy that leaks more.

00:24:43.409 --> 00:24:46.191
there is a cast and it's perfect.

00:24:46.310 --> 00:24:46.691
man.

00:24:46.691 --> 00:24:47.692
That's exciting.

00:24:47.692 --> 00:24:54.498
Speaking of more information on something that you may or may not be able to talk about, this is something that I'm kind of like personally invested in.

00:24:54.498 --> 00:24:55.127
I got to ask.

00:24:55.127 --> 00:24:56.919
I'm a huge aliens fan.

00:24:57.009 --> 00:24:57.570
my God.

00:24:57.570 --> 00:24:58.601
Me too.

00:24:59.442 --> 00:25:01.663
I have like I have just books.

00:25:01.663 --> 00:25:05.416
I've been reading the novels, everything from Alien vs.

00:25:05.416 --> 00:25:07.949
Predator to Predator to just aliens.

00:25:07.949 --> 00:25:09.326
The books, everything.

00:25:09.326 --> 00:25:14.685
So I have to ask, what was your like major inspiration for taking it on?

00:25:14.685 --> 00:25:20.306
Because I mean, come on, we all know that this is this is a heavy, heavy workload.

00:25:20.546 --> 00:25:21.905
It's heavy, heavy lore.

00:25:21.905 --> 00:25:26.685
And then what's your what's your favorite aliens run?

00:25:26.685 --> 00:25:33.726
And then if you have any info you can give us about the comics, because I know I'm to be definitely invested in that one.

00:25:33.726 --> 00:25:34.385
Oh, thanks, dude.

00:25:34.385 --> 00:25:35.046
I'm glad to hear that.

00:25:35.046 --> 00:25:35.226
Yeah.

00:25:35.226 --> 00:25:36.145
Well, I mean, me too.

00:25:36.145 --> 00:25:41.281
I found out that I mean, you've heard my other You said you heard my other show with word balloon.

00:25:41.281 --> 00:25:47.602
So you probably know some of this, but I, I found out with everyone else that Marvel had gotten the license for that.

00:25:47.602 --> 00:25:50.922
And I was just like, just like flipping the table.

00:25:50.922 --> 00:25:53.221
Like, yes, it's going to be awesome.

00:25:53.221 --> 00:25:55.721
And I reached out to my editor, like, give me this book.

00:25:55.721 --> 00:25:58.481
You know, like I'm, you don't know anyone who loves it like I do.

00:25:59.221 --> 00:26:00.842
And, and they fucking did it, man.

00:26:00.842 --> 00:26:03.382
I was, I was so stoked about that.

00:26:03.382 --> 00:26:08.501
I, I was like, oh man, I don't even know what, even now I'm so just like energized.

00:26:08.650 --> 00:26:18.797
If OK, if we're talking about my favorite Dark Horse runs, I really liked Alien Salvation that Gibbons and Mignola did.

00:26:18.797 --> 00:26:19.106
yeah.

00:26:19.106 --> 00:26:19.617
That book.

00:26:19.617 --> 00:26:21.169
Yeah, it was really beautifully done.

00:26:21.169 --> 00:26:23.480
One of the more iconic.

00:26:23.539 --> 00:26:24.621
Yeah, it's a great one.

00:26:24.621 --> 00:26:27.603
James Tocco won Dead Orbit and also was also really fun.

00:26:27.603 --> 00:26:30.674
It's like it's so stylish, like visually is just just works.

00:26:30.674 --> 00:26:35.417
know, I was the first one that I read and I, Dead Orbit was just so intense and beautiful.

00:26:35.417 --> 00:26:36.009
Yeah.

00:26:36.009 --> 00:26:36.729
Yeah, exactly.

00:26:36.729 --> 00:26:38.250
I love the art for it.

00:26:38.253 --> 00:26:44.374
I love the contrast, visual contrast of the Giger alien.

00:26:44.733 --> 00:26:46.114
For listeners who don't know, H.R.

00:26:46.114 --> 00:26:50.394
Giger being the artist who designed the concept look of the Xenomorph.

00:26:50.394 --> 00:26:58.894
That and then with the super busy, almost Jeff Darrow approach to the, to our ships.

00:26:58.894 --> 00:27:04.953
You know, like the way that our structures look so busy and blocky and just very different in contrast.

00:27:04.953 --> 00:27:06.193
It's always really fun for me to see that.

00:27:06.193 --> 00:27:08.394
That was something from the original film that I really liked.

00:27:08.586 --> 00:27:15.471
And when the second film to actually where you see the, you know, that, then a stroma was so not aesthetically pretty.

00:27:15.471 --> 00:27:18.271
It's like this blocky, ugly thing.

00:27:18.932 --> 00:27:22.185
And, you got these, you know, construction workers working on it.

00:27:22.185 --> 00:27:22.881
It's just a workplace.

00:27:22.881 --> 00:27:25.136
It's nothing, it's nothing pretty at all.

00:27:25.798 --> 00:27:26.238
Yeah.

00:27:26.238 --> 00:27:34.344
And then you see the derelict that is like, suddenly you see the derelict ship and it's this crazy, almost organic looking thing.

00:27:34.344 --> 00:27:38.155
And then you see, Giger's work superimposed with.

00:27:38.188 --> 00:27:40.239
this ugly chunky thing.

00:27:40.239 --> 00:27:43.440
And that's how Stakoe did that book.

00:27:43.440 --> 00:27:46.862
I thought it was really great to see that same kind of contrast.

00:27:46.862 --> 00:27:49.561
He just did a kickass job with that book.

00:27:50.182 --> 00:27:56.404
I admit it's the visuals that really strike me in that one and the storytelling in the Dave Gibbons one.

00:27:56.404 --> 00:27:57.996
yeah, I love both of those books.

00:27:57.996 --> 00:27:59.067
There's so many, though.

00:27:59.067 --> 00:28:01.327
There's so many great runs that they did.

00:28:01.327 --> 00:28:03.749
It's almost hard to keep them all straight.

00:28:03.749 --> 00:28:05.318
So I got a recommendation for you, though.

00:28:05.318 --> 00:28:08.405
If you ever get a chance, I actually just came here.

00:28:08.405 --> 00:28:17.032
I was stationed over in Germany and I took a trip to Switzerland and there's actually a Giger museum.

00:28:17.394 --> 00:28:30.984
I know I I'm dying to get over there and then and then right next door to it in this because it's it's basically a small little mountain town and there's the museum there and then right next door to it is an alien themed bar restaurant.

00:28:30.984 --> 00:28:32.066
Yeah, I've seen it.

00:28:32.066 --> 00:28:32.576
You seen it.

00:28:32.576 --> 00:28:33.727
Yeah.

00:28:33.727 --> 00:28:40.054
All the food is alien themed like the like the some of the shots are like green like it's blood, it's beautiful.

00:28:40.054 --> 00:28:41.874
Oh, I got to go see it.

00:28:41.874 --> 00:28:42.314
I will.

00:28:42.314 --> 00:28:42.834
I definitely will.

00:28:42.834 --> 00:28:43.753
It's on the list.

00:28:43.753 --> 00:28:47.634
Even the chairs are like the same as the as the pilot from.

00:28:47.634 --> 00:28:48.173
know.

00:28:48.173 --> 00:28:48.574
Yeah.

00:28:48.574 --> 00:28:49.074
Yeah.

00:28:49.074 --> 00:28:49.354
I've seen it.

00:28:49.354 --> 00:28:50.473
I've seen every photo there is.

00:28:50.473 --> 00:28:51.953
I can't wait to get over there.

00:28:52.134 --> 00:28:53.513
So is your alien run?

00:28:53.513 --> 00:28:58.773
Is that that going to be is that going to be ongoing or do you have a set amount of issues that you're planning on doing?

00:28:58.953 --> 00:29:00.493
The series is ongoing.

00:29:00.493 --> 00:29:01.334
OK.

00:29:01.894 --> 00:29:04.294
Now the but this first arc.

00:29:04.294 --> 00:29:07.890
OK, so we I was mostly inspired by the first two films.

00:29:07.890 --> 00:29:09.871
for this particular arc.

00:29:10.550 --> 00:29:16.093
think there's things from the other subsequent movies that are also really great, but those first two movies are like the shit, right?

00:29:16.093 --> 00:29:17.763
Like everyone knows about those first two movies.

00:29:17.763 --> 00:29:18.634
Yeah.

00:29:18.795 --> 00:29:19.785
And they're very different.

00:29:19.785 --> 00:29:22.855
I love how different they are, but also how great they are on their own.

00:29:22.855 --> 00:29:26.897
There's aspects of both that I really had to have in this run.

00:29:27.018 --> 00:29:33.400
I love the claustrophobia, the first one, the idea of the like just the blue collar workers trapped with this thing.

00:29:33.461 --> 00:29:34.980
This is one thing that's hunting them.

00:29:34.980 --> 00:29:44.190
I think that's just so it's like this perfect horror film, which was the biggest inspiration for my first book, like the Lost Boys of the U-Boat Bremen.

00:29:44.190 --> 00:29:47.703
It's this webcomic that is still on my site.

00:29:47.703 --> 00:29:51.644
Ended up getting printed with IDW's Full Bleed anthology as well.

00:29:51.685 --> 00:29:59.528
But that was all about, like the elevator pitch for that was Ridley Scott's Alien meets Lord of the Flies on a U-Boat.

00:30:01.211 --> 00:30:04.491
That Ridley Scott film was just so a part of me.

00:30:05.133 --> 00:30:06.653
So I had to have that.

00:30:06.713 --> 00:30:12.053
But then The second movie, the James Cameron Aliens cast such a long shadow.

00:30:12.053 --> 00:30:14.544
I mean, everyone just loves that movie.

00:30:14.544 --> 00:30:16.957
When I was a kid, I was on TV every day.

00:30:16.957 --> 00:30:19.499
Seemed like, you know, away from her, you bitch.

00:30:19.499 --> 00:30:20.278
Yeah.

00:30:20.278 --> 00:30:20.669
Yeah.

00:30:20.669 --> 00:30:22.230
And this is so it's so quotable.

00:30:22.230 --> 00:30:23.221
The whole movie.

00:30:23.221 --> 00:30:25.142
mean, Bill Paxton is fire that.

00:30:25.142 --> 00:30:25.507
yeah.

00:30:25.507 --> 00:30:25.842
All right.

00:30:25.842 --> 00:30:27.042
You get the morbid.

00:30:27.042 --> 00:30:28.022
Yeah.

00:30:28.022 --> 00:30:32.045
It's so so I mean, I couldn't not acknowledge that movie, too.

00:30:32.965 --> 00:30:34.061
So this.

00:30:34.061 --> 00:30:42.642
This arc was meant to take my favorite pieces of both of those runs and make this one thing that felt like it belongs on the shelf with those films.

00:30:42.682 --> 00:30:54.442
The one failing that I feel like the Dark Horse books had as a whole, if you were to have the entire compendium of all the alien stuff they ever did, I feel like you wouldn't read those and necessarily think of the films.

00:30:54.561 --> 00:31:03.142
It got so far from the source material, got so creative, which is awesome, but also didn't feel like the same thing at a certain point.

00:31:04.077 --> 00:31:06.739
So you're saying you didn't like resurrection.

00:31:07.140 --> 00:31:08.480
That's what I'm saying.

00:31:09.520 --> 00:31:12.622
I also put a resurrection in that same pile.

00:31:13.083 --> 00:31:17.590
This stuff that didn't make sense to me as far as belonging in the same can everything else.

00:31:17.590 --> 00:31:21.788
It just felt like it's hard, hard left turn into stuff.

00:31:21.788 --> 00:31:23.288
To me, seemed kind of silly.

00:31:23.288 --> 00:31:25.509
So I was always a huge fan of the the novels.

00:31:25.509 --> 00:31:28.351
Like I said, they a lot of them take place on Earth.

00:31:28.351 --> 00:31:35.550
You know, there's a lot of high alien hides, a lot of alien queens that have taken hold of Earth.

00:31:35.550 --> 00:31:39.604
The colonial Marines are trying to get into the hives and nuke them out.

00:31:39.604 --> 00:31:45.317
One of my favorites is about the alien queen's jelly.

00:31:45.317 --> 00:31:47.338
It's actually like a narcotic.

00:31:47.460 --> 00:31:48.115
jelly, yeah.

00:31:48.115 --> 00:31:58.107
Royal jelly, which is awesome because there's like a scene in one of the books where this Olympic runner is like juicing with the alien juice, whatever, and just basically runs straight into a wall and disintegrates.

00:31:58.107 --> 00:31:59.438
It's intense.

00:31:59.438 --> 00:32:00.209
I love the book.

00:32:00.209 --> 00:32:01.806
I just love the whole lore.

00:32:01.806 --> 00:32:03.945
Yeah, I'm excited to see what you do with it.

00:32:03.945 --> 00:32:05.986
I got high hopes for you, man.

00:32:05.986 --> 00:32:06.445
Thank you, man.

00:32:06.445 --> 00:32:07.205
I appreciate it.

00:32:07.205 --> 00:32:08.685
Yeah, it's I am.

00:32:08.685 --> 00:32:10.365
It's mostly inspired by the first two movies.

00:32:10.365 --> 00:32:14.846
So there's a lot of stuff that you've seen in Dark Horse books and the novels and all that that will not appear here.

00:32:14.846 --> 00:32:21.586
Because honestly, I feel like at some point they're going to do what they did with Star Wars, where there's going to be because, you know, the aliens are that's like their Disney princess now.

00:32:21.586 --> 00:32:22.685
It's all Disney.

00:32:23.605 --> 00:32:24.425
Yeah.

00:32:24.846 --> 00:32:31.910
So I feel like at some point there's going to be like alien legends where there's going to all this stuff that is like subtext for bullshit and then it doesn't count anymore.

00:32:32.541 --> 00:32:36.785
And just take all the things that work from the legend and bring it into canon.

00:32:36.786 --> 00:32:37.395
Exactly.

00:32:37.395 --> 00:32:38.656
I don't want that to happen here.

00:32:38.656 --> 00:32:49.075
So and even though I really like the third film, I feel like that is that one is ripe for retconning because of the way they got rid of Hicks and Newt.

00:32:49.075 --> 00:32:49.846
Yeah, right.

00:32:49.846 --> 00:32:50.557
Right.

00:32:50.557 --> 00:32:52.076
Died off screen.

00:32:52.258 --> 00:32:52.700
Yeah.

00:32:52.700 --> 00:32:53.909
I mean, that kind of sucks, right?

00:32:53.909 --> 00:32:58.122
I thought the movie was really good, but it sucks to lose those characters for nothing.

00:32:59.384 --> 00:33:02.695
And I feel like that James Franco and and covenant.

00:33:02.707 --> 00:33:03.708
Yeah.

00:33:03.708 --> 00:33:04.938
Yeah, that was weird.

00:33:05.618 --> 00:33:06.750
I did like covenant lot though.

00:33:06.750 --> 00:33:08.780
I like the prequels more than most people to the one.

00:33:08.780 --> 00:33:10.442
The one I can't stand by resurrection.

00:33:10.442 --> 00:33:11.702
I love all the others.

00:33:12.223 --> 00:33:15.346
I'm sure like he refuses to claim resurrection.

00:33:15.346 --> 00:33:19.689
He's like after that movie, I will never ever let a production company tell me what to do with my film.

00:33:19.689 --> 00:33:21.170
He did three, right?

00:33:21.570 --> 00:33:22.000
I'm sorry.

00:33:22.000 --> 00:33:22.304
Yes.

00:33:22.304 --> 00:33:22.554
Yeah.

00:33:22.554 --> 00:33:23.132
Not resurrection.

00:33:23.132 --> 00:33:23.592
Yeah.

00:33:23.592 --> 00:33:23.942
Yeah.

00:33:23.942 --> 00:33:24.152
Sorry.

00:33:24.152 --> 00:33:24.972
Yeah.

00:33:24.972 --> 00:33:25.512
I get it.

00:33:25.512 --> 00:33:26.114
I get it.

00:33:26.114 --> 00:33:27.285
I understand why he feels that way.

00:33:27.285 --> 00:33:30.896
I know that he's got jerk around a lot on that on that production.

00:33:30.997 --> 00:33:33.319
But Honestly, I liked it.

00:33:33.319 --> 00:33:34.080
liked the ass.

00:33:34.080 --> 00:33:44.916
Well, the things I liked about it most were the ceiling and seeing the quadruped alien, like seeing it come from something that wasn't human was really rad.

00:33:44.916 --> 00:33:55.393
Seeing the different, like seeing the off world, like a little more world building, see another, not without seeing earth, you get to see another culture of humans, which is really rad.

00:33:55.393 --> 00:33:57.403
I like the religious aspect of it.

00:33:58.344 --> 00:34:00.227
I thought it was a perfect ending for Ripley.

00:34:00.227 --> 00:34:02.205
That's where I should have ended for her in my opinion.

00:34:02.971 --> 00:34:07.844
So there things I really liked, but the first two films are the ones that inspired this book.

00:34:07.844 --> 00:34:11.456
And for people who love those two films, they're going to be well-served with this run.

00:34:11.456 --> 00:34:13.998
So that's the first arc I'm talking about.

00:34:14.498 --> 00:34:27.039
do want to, if I get to stay around and write more Alien, which I would love to do, there are other arcs in mind that are going to start to develop those themes and keep going down the road.

00:34:27.039 --> 00:34:32.255
We're inspired by the films also, and that each one is its own special thing that belong as alone.

00:34:32.255 --> 00:34:44.777
And then they're also tied to the others through like little like through lines and subplots and all that, like the androids and the seeing like visually seeing the aliens get more interesting as you go.

00:34:44.777 --> 00:34:57.905
It's like this baby steps like aliens and then the queen and then the dog one or the ox one, whichever one you've So we're going to keep building on that, too, as if as if this is the third movie, basically.

00:34:57.905 --> 00:34:58.244
Yeah.

00:34:58.244 --> 00:35:01.905
Is there any involvement with Predators.

00:35:02.746 --> 00:35:04.788
Not in my first, not in this arc.

00:35:04.788 --> 00:35:05.208
No.

00:35:05.208 --> 00:35:06.148
Okay.

00:35:06.148 --> 00:35:08.230
And I know you maybe in the future.

00:35:08.230 --> 00:35:08.681
Yeah.

00:35:08.681 --> 00:35:10.641
I don't want to say never, but yeah.

00:35:10.641 --> 00:35:11.442
Not again.

00:35:11.442 --> 00:35:15.735
I'm trying to start simple and like give people like another pure another power alien film, you know?

00:35:15.735 --> 00:35:16.079
Yeah.

00:35:16.079 --> 00:35:26.030
And that's, and that's what, yeah, I think that was the beauty of the first and the second one because the third one obviously took it to, it was like you said, it was good, but it took it to a place that we could have done without.

00:35:26.030 --> 00:35:27.032
Yeah.

00:35:27.032 --> 00:35:27.853
So good.

00:35:27.853 --> 00:35:36.733
The first and the second one took an entire new universe that introduced this alien species and it took their entire sense of reality by storm.

00:35:36.733 --> 00:35:37.293
Right.

00:35:37.293 --> 00:35:39.833
Which, know, the third one and onward didn't really do that.

00:35:39.833 --> 00:35:45.833
It didn't really take away anything because their realities were not what, you know, what they were used to in the first place.

00:35:45.833 --> 00:35:46.733
Yeah.

00:35:46.753 --> 00:35:48.773
I definitely look forward to it.

00:35:48.773 --> 00:35:49.753
Oh, thanks.

00:35:49.914 --> 00:35:55.121
So transitioning to your next big title in 2021, we're going to talk about Superman here.

00:35:55.121 --> 00:35:57.704
And I wanted to speak kind of broadly here.

00:35:57.704 --> 00:36:05.688
So in recent years, Superman, I feel like it's kind of gotten a little bit harder to appeal to mainstream audiences outside of people like us, the comic book community.

00:36:05.730 --> 00:36:15.456
And obviously, as someone who loves Superman, myself included, I personally think that we probably need him more now than ever with the way the world is currently.

00:36:17.056 --> 00:36:23.713
with the surging popularity of anti-heroes and the Batmans of the world, what do you think the challenges are?

00:36:23.713 --> 00:36:28.835
that you're going to be facing going forward with your run of Superman, approaching the man of tomorrow.

00:36:28.835 --> 00:36:31.297
Essentially, I was going to try to think of a funny nickname for him.

00:36:31.317 --> 00:36:36.068
And then do you have a go-to favorite Superman run that you really enjoy?

00:36:36.068 --> 00:36:38.059
Yeah, man.

00:36:38.059 --> 00:36:46.764
I I hate to favorites because there's been a lot of great writers over the years and I don't want to crap on anyone who's not in my top three.

00:36:46.764 --> 00:36:50.286
But I do really like Mark Waid's take on the character.

00:36:50.925 --> 00:36:52.856
I liked the way he depicted him in Kingdom Come.

00:36:52.856 --> 00:36:58.751
liked how he, shoot, what's the one, Birthright was really great.

00:37:00.132 --> 00:37:05.655
Jeff Loeb's version on Superman for All Seasons was really good.

00:37:05.797 --> 00:37:08.688
Grant Morrison did an amazing job on All-Star Superman.

00:37:08.688 --> 00:37:12.860
That's kind of, if I had to, I'm sorry, what did you hold up just I was holding up my All Four Seasons.

00:37:12.860 --> 00:37:13.431
was going to show you.

00:37:13.431 --> 00:37:13.981
Come on, nice.

00:37:13.981 --> 00:37:19.795
I have All Four Seasons, Jeff Johns, The Men of Tomorrow, and then I have my most recent favorite.

00:37:19.842 --> 00:37:21.032
Superman smashes the clan.

00:37:21.032 --> 00:37:23.782
These are top three favorite Superman stories of all time.

00:37:23.782 --> 00:37:27.164
No, I am embarrassed to admit I've not picked that one up yet.

00:37:27.304 --> 00:37:28.472
Yeah, you got it.

00:37:28.472 --> 00:37:29.034
You got to do it.

00:37:29.034 --> 00:37:29.434
Yeah.

00:37:29.434 --> 00:37:30.804
No, everyone's freaking out about it.

00:37:30.804 --> 00:37:31.824
his address, Chris.

00:37:31.824 --> 00:37:32.626
Send it to him.

00:37:32.626 --> 00:37:33.425
Media mail.

00:37:33.425 --> 00:37:33.865
Yep.

00:37:33.865 --> 00:37:35.126
I got it.

00:37:35.126 --> 00:37:35.626
it.

00:37:35.626 --> 00:37:36.797
He gets comms from DC.

00:37:36.797 --> 00:37:37.987
I'm not sending him anything.

00:37:37.987 --> 00:37:39.286
Yeah, exactly.

00:37:40.288 --> 00:37:41.188
I'll get on it.

00:37:41.188 --> 00:37:41.887
Let's see.

00:37:41.887 --> 00:37:47.375
Yeah, Grant Morrison's All-Star is if I had to pick just one, it's so well done.

00:37:47.375 --> 00:37:49.326
Just sums up everything he's ever been in one.

00:37:49.326 --> 00:37:50.746
You know, right.

00:37:50.925 --> 00:37:52.085
I love it.

00:37:52.346 --> 00:37:53.045
I love it.

00:37:53.045 --> 00:37:55.465
I love his voice in that in that book.

00:37:56.166 --> 00:37:57.045
yeah, those are great.

00:37:57.045 --> 00:38:01.445
As far as we said about antiheroes, I yeah, it's gone.

00:38:01.445 --> 00:38:04.065
I mean, it's so obvious right now that the world needs it, right?

00:38:04.065 --> 00:38:06.585
I mean, this has been such a dark time.

00:38:06.985 --> 00:38:10.766
And I feel like doing a dark, gritty take on Superman is not doing anyone any favors.

00:38:10.766 --> 00:38:16.846
I Superman is supposed to be the one character that's more than any other character that's above that.

00:38:17.322 --> 00:38:26.570
Even more than cap, you know, it's more than anyone that she should be should be the the one incorruptible You know pure voice of hope and light.

00:38:26.570 --> 00:38:28.081
So that's how I see him.

00:38:28.081 --> 00:38:50.701
I've The feeling that I get the feeling that I want from reading Superman is a feeling that I got watching the original films like the first two films when I was a little kid and Just seeing him on stage and hearing the trumpet sale when he comes out and seeing just that just literally just seeing the costume, seeing the S-Shield on screen or in the opening credits.

00:38:51.061 --> 00:38:56.164
And when the music kicks in and you're just, it just makes you want to be so much more than you are.

00:38:56.485 --> 00:39:00.777
And that's the feeling that that aspirational, like I'm literally getting those tingles right now, just thinking about those moments.

00:39:00.777 --> 00:39:10.114
Like just, I want that, that sensation of, you know, we're going to do this thing and making us want to fly and want to save everyone.

00:39:10.775 --> 00:39:12.027
That's the feeling that we need, man.

00:39:12.027 --> 00:39:12.655
We need it right now.

00:39:12.655 --> 00:39:13.407
That's what I was feeling.

00:39:13.407 --> 00:39:15.690
I want from the stuff that I'm watching and reading.

00:39:15.690 --> 00:39:17.570
That's the feeling I want to give to people.

00:39:19.012 --> 00:39:23.126
I've really tried to capture it in my future state issues that are coming out.

00:39:23.126 --> 00:39:26.327
Cause at the time, as far as I knew that was all, that was the only superman I was going to get to do.

00:39:26.327 --> 00:39:32.201
like this, these superman future state issues are kind of my mission statement on what Superman is.

00:39:32.380 --> 00:39:33.992
So, I mean, you're asking about influences.

00:39:33.992 --> 00:39:39.146
I've been, been flashing this on a lot of my podcasts because I just had it.

00:39:39.146 --> 00:39:41.407
on hand here, but this is Superman 400.

00:39:41.407 --> 00:39:44.646
That was a very important issue to me as a kid.

00:39:45.307 --> 00:39:45.577
wow.

00:39:45.577 --> 00:39:46.527
didn't get that many.

00:39:46.527 --> 00:39:49.556
I didn't get that many comics that were like new back then.

00:39:49.556 --> 00:39:58.291
Most of my comics came from these boxes and ripped up books that came from like garage sales and flea markets and stuff, which were still great.

00:39:58.291 --> 00:39:58.851
I loved them.

00:39:58.851 --> 00:40:02.152
And I just, didn't have any, I didn't have a lot of stuff that was new off the shelf.

00:40:02.152 --> 00:40:04.333
And this is one that was new issue at the time.

00:40:04.592 --> 00:40:07.943
And the list of people who worked on this is an anthology book.

00:40:08.286 --> 00:40:18.034
And the people who did the art are like, I'm seeing Ray Bradbury, John Byrne, Howard Shaken, Steve Ditko, Will Eisner, Jack Kirby, Frank Miller, Mobius.

00:40:18.153 --> 00:40:19.114
gosh.

00:40:19.114 --> 00:40:19.826
It's insane.

00:40:19.826 --> 00:40:21.697
That is an all star cast right there for real.

00:40:21.697 --> 00:40:23.539
Bernie Wrightson, Steranko.

00:40:23.539 --> 00:40:24.539
man.

00:40:24.619 --> 00:40:25.650
Walter Simonson.

00:40:25.650 --> 00:40:30.724
I mean, I'm skipping like Bills and Cabots.

00:40:30.724 --> 00:40:31.724
It just it never ends.

00:40:31.724 --> 00:40:33.385
What's the name of that try there?

00:40:34.067 --> 00:40:35.728
Or the issue?

00:40:35.728 --> 00:40:37.612
This is Superman 400.

00:40:37.612 --> 00:40:40.101
It said at the top, says anniversary issue 400.

00:40:40.101 --> 00:40:40.483
Gotcha.

00:40:40.483 --> 00:40:41.043
OK.

00:40:41.043 --> 00:40:42.905
And in there, there's stories.

00:40:42.905 --> 00:40:46.007
Not every one of those artists did a story.

00:40:46.007 --> 00:40:48.847
Some of them are just pinups.

00:40:48.847 --> 00:40:49.858
you'll see stuff in here.

00:40:49.858 --> 00:40:51.579
Look, Steve Ditko doing Superman.

00:40:51.579 --> 00:40:52.530
How often have you seen that?

00:40:52.530 --> 00:40:53.659
Yeah, no kidding.

00:40:53.659 --> 00:40:54.391
Wow.

00:40:54.791 --> 00:40:57.882
There's an image of of Mobius.

00:40:57.882 --> 00:40:59.773
There's a pinup that he did that looks.

00:41:00.733 --> 00:41:02.934
Right out of.

00:41:03.695 --> 00:41:07.478
God, the Ridley Scott produced show recently raised.

00:41:07.478 --> 00:41:08.358
Raised by Wolves.

00:41:08.358 --> 00:41:09.639
Yeah, Raised by Wolves.

00:41:09.639 --> 00:41:10.561
I'm watching that currently.

00:41:10.561 --> 00:41:10.981
Yeah.

00:41:10.981 --> 00:41:11.731
It's great, dude.

00:41:11.731 --> 00:41:17.206
And Ridley Scott openly says that he was hugely influenced by Mobius.

00:41:17.706 --> 00:41:20.309
And there's this image that looks straight up like a Mobius.

00:41:20.309 --> 00:41:22.014
I mean, that looks like something right on that show.

00:41:22.014 --> 00:41:23.050
Let me find it.

00:41:23.331 --> 00:41:24.711
But yeah, this is...

00:41:24.992 --> 00:41:26.284
Here it is.

00:41:28.333 --> 00:41:28.873
Yeah.

00:41:28.873 --> 00:41:29.273
Yeah.

00:41:29.273 --> 00:41:30.333
I yeah.

00:41:30.773 --> 00:41:34.793
I just read Parable not too long ago and Mobius is one of a kind.

00:41:34.974 --> 00:41:35.514
Yeah.

00:41:35.514 --> 00:41:36.153
Yeah.

00:41:36.153 --> 00:41:43.673
Anyway, that book, to quote Bendis, he would describe, he actually talked about that book recently too on the interview.

00:41:43.673 --> 00:41:51.474
So this is his first time seeing Superman as art, experiencing Superman as art and like capital A, like fine art, you know?

00:41:51.474 --> 00:41:51.914
Yeah.

00:41:51.914 --> 00:41:56.333
And that's kind of how I see that book too.

00:41:56.590 --> 00:42:00.809
It's just, it's a, theme of the book was Superman in the future.

00:42:00.809 --> 00:42:02.090
Like, what's he going to be like in the future?

00:42:02.090 --> 00:42:03.590
What is he going to mean to us in the future?

00:42:03.590 --> 00:42:04.590
What's he going to, where's he going to be?

00:42:04.590 --> 00:42:05.690
What's he going be doing?

00:42:06.090 --> 00:42:08.730
That was the theme that kind of tied the whole book together.

00:42:08.869 --> 00:42:12.849
And, um, that and future state, that's what that is.

00:42:12.849 --> 00:42:16.670
And that book meant so much to me as a kid, I really wanted to kind of pay homage to that, that book.

00:42:16.670 --> 00:42:26.510
So the first issue of future state, worlds of war is basically, um, humanity's take on Superman, like how he, how we remember him after he's gone.

00:42:26.637 --> 00:42:29.597
And then the next issue is his take on us.

00:42:29.938 --> 00:42:30.697
That's good.

00:42:30.697 --> 00:42:32.018
I like that concept.

00:42:32.117 --> 00:42:32.498
Thank you.

00:42:32.498 --> 00:42:33.878
And it's still it's a two issue arc.

00:42:33.878 --> 00:42:38.938
I one story, but it's from two different perspectives that I'm extremely proud of.

00:42:38.978 --> 00:42:42.418
And Mikhail Haneen did the art and he just obliterates it.

00:42:42.737 --> 00:42:44.438
I can't wait to able to read that story.

00:42:44.438 --> 00:42:46.177
Yeah, I'm looking forward to it.

00:42:46.177 --> 00:42:48.518
I'm really liking the future state stuff has all been good.

00:42:48.518 --> 00:42:49.518
Really good so far.

00:42:49.518 --> 00:42:52.677
I I really enjoyed the swamp thing one and then the son of Krypton.

00:42:52.677 --> 00:42:55.974
I'm forgetting the writer of it, but that was really great as well.

00:42:56.257 --> 00:42:57.077
so you made a Metropolis?

00:42:57.077 --> 00:42:57.557
I'm sorry.

00:42:57.557 --> 00:42:58.338
Yeah, Metropolis.

00:42:58.338 --> 00:42:59.309
Yeah.

00:42:59.309 --> 00:43:00.019
Sean's great, man.

00:43:00.019 --> 00:43:02.960
He did a really had a really fun take on Jonathan.

00:43:03.400 --> 00:43:04.260
yeah.

00:43:04.260 --> 00:43:04.561
Yeah.

00:43:04.561 --> 00:43:06.782
Everything I've seen of all the future say stuff has been killer.

00:43:06.782 --> 00:43:11.014
And I love the I love listening to you and John talk on word balloon and your take on John.

00:43:11.014 --> 00:43:11.753
I'm sorry.

00:43:11.753 --> 00:43:12.565
Yeah, John.

00:43:12.565 --> 00:43:16.485
And how, you know, for a while we were really getting used to him, especially with Super Suns.

00:43:16.485 --> 00:43:20.407
Such a great run there with Peter Tomasi and Patrick Gleason.

00:43:20.407 --> 00:43:22.949
And then Bendis his runs.

00:43:22.949 --> 00:43:25.690
I mean, it's been top notch from start to finish.

00:43:25.789 --> 00:43:34.994
And, I think the only thing that people are maybe not as happy with, if anything, is John being forced to grow up, essentially being out in space with his grand grandfather.

00:43:34.994 --> 00:43:39.436
So I know you've already said that you're not going to go back and, and, know, switch that up.

00:43:39.436 --> 00:43:42.469
And I'm curious to see if you do anything with the John.

00:43:42.469 --> 00:43:48.099
I know you said a lot of your Superman is going to be out in space, a lot of science fiction Superman for your run.

00:43:48.099 --> 00:43:50.340
So I'm curious to see what you do with him, especially.

00:43:50.340 --> 00:43:51.300
Yeah.

00:43:51.300 --> 00:43:54.190
I wish I could tell you more, but it's.

00:43:54.219 --> 00:43:56.931
I mean, I know that people are super pissed about the John thing.

00:43:56.931 --> 00:43:57.851
I hear that all that.

00:43:57.851 --> 00:44:00.681
mean, I'm not I'm not doing any disservice by saying that.

00:44:00.681 --> 00:44:02.472
I hear about every single day.

00:44:02.472 --> 00:44:03.371
Yeah.

00:44:03.373 --> 00:44:06.603
I get like threats from people like you better not do this or do this other thing instead.

00:44:06.603 --> 00:44:08.844
I'm not going to buy your book if you don't make John 10 again.

00:44:08.844 --> 00:44:23.057
And it's the thing is, man, like, I don't know what show I said this on, but at some point I was telling somebody it's it's kind of like I'm in the middle of like I'm about to take over the second chapter of a Star Wars trilogy.

00:44:23.057 --> 00:44:23.978
Right.

00:44:24.226 --> 00:44:25.887
You are Ryan Johnson.

00:44:26.188 --> 00:44:26.987
Yeah.

00:44:26.987 --> 00:44:30.971
I mean, nobody can fault either J.J.

00:44:30.971 --> 00:44:32.452
or Ryan Johnson as directors.

00:44:32.452 --> 00:44:35.773
Obviously, they're both incredible directors and storytellers.

00:44:35.853 --> 00:44:40.737
And I feel like a trilogy by either one of those guys would have been killer.

00:44:41.077 --> 00:44:47.487
But when they when they kept doing this 180 back and forth, it just kind of ruined the whole thing, in my opinion.

00:44:47.487 --> 00:44:49.278
So I'm not interested in doing that, I guess.

00:44:49.278 --> 00:44:54.289
I don't want to just take over and be like, well, now we're going to find a magic wormhole and everything's different.

00:44:54.289 --> 00:45:03.530
And now everyone, you know, I'm not going to do like a one more day thing, Spider-Man thing where now suddenly, you know, no one remembers who Spider-Man, I don't know.

00:45:03.530 --> 00:45:05.422
I erase everything that Bendez did.

00:45:05.422 --> 00:45:05.652
Yeah.

00:45:05.652 --> 00:45:06.724
You don't want to do that.

00:45:06.724 --> 00:45:07.264
It's super.

00:45:07.264 --> 00:45:09.673
Well, for one thing, it's incredibly disrespectful to do that.

00:45:09.673 --> 00:45:13.034
Like Bendez is one of my industry heroes who's done some of most important stuff ever.

00:45:13.034 --> 00:45:13.556
It amazing.

00:45:13.556 --> 00:45:15.277
Created Miles Morales.

00:45:15.277 --> 00:45:17.998
Maybe the Avengers, one of the best books on shelves.

00:45:18.498 --> 00:45:20.097
He he's the man.

00:45:20.097 --> 00:45:22.157
And I have a great deal of respect for him.

00:45:22.157 --> 00:45:25.717
I'm not going to just I'm not going to crap on anything he did that way.

00:45:25.717 --> 00:45:26.518
It's just so disrespectful.

00:45:26.518 --> 00:45:29.257
Plus, I mean, these are the cards that we've been done.

00:45:29.257 --> 00:45:30.838
And this is where Superman is now.

00:45:30.838 --> 00:45:33.038
And I don't have a problem with most of the stuff he did anyway.

00:45:33.038 --> 00:45:35.577
I mean, I totally I honestly I do miss John as a kid.

00:45:35.577 --> 00:45:37.257
I really do.

00:45:37.958 --> 00:45:38.797
That run with P.

00:45:38.797 --> 00:45:39.518
Tomasi was great.

00:45:39.518 --> 00:45:40.717
Super Sons was great.

00:45:41.518 --> 00:45:45.697
But it did give us opportunities to do some really cool storytelling stuff.

00:45:45.697 --> 00:45:49.177
I mean, seeing him in Legion in the future has been great.

00:45:49.177 --> 00:45:50.677
need to read that.

00:45:50.677 --> 00:45:51.217
It's great.

00:45:51.217 --> 00:45:52.157
Bendis is doing really well.

00:45:52.157 --> 00:45:55.637
He really nails John's voice and the voice of the other characters as well in Legion.

00:45:55.637 --> 00:45:59.297
He's so well suited to like team books.

00:45:59.297 --> 00:46:05.998
And especially when the characters are youngish, he gets that that banter so well.

00:46:06.617 --> 00:46:08.318
just love the way he writes teams.

00:46:09.322 --> 00:46:12.623
So that, Legion is really well suited to Bendis.

00:46:12.724 --> 00:46:16.005
And yeah, so we have these opportunities to tell stories with John.

00:46:16.005 --> 00:46:19.307
And the thing is comics are all about the illusion of change anyway.

00:46:19.487 --> 00:46:24.952
And I think there's not going to be, there's nothing that says we can't see John Young again someday.

00:46:24.952 --> 00:46:26.853
It's too soon to do that right now.

00:46:28.074 --> 00:46:29.724
would love to see John as a kid later on.

00:46:29.724 --> 00:46:33.836
Maybe they'll have an opportunity to tell a story myself, or if not, I'd love to see someone else do it.

00:46:33.836 --> 00:46:35.403
But for now.

00:46:35.403 --> 00:46:47.143
This is where John is, and we have opportunities to tell really cool stories with him at this age, like things that like what does this mean for him as a character to just not tell that aspect of his character and just undo it all would be insane.

00:46:48.105 --> 00:46:53.088
Well, we don't have to get into it too much, but real quick before we move on, were you a fan of The Last Jedi?

00:46:53.088 --> 00:46:57.532
And just know that your your current career is on the line depending on your answer.

00:46:58.213 --> 00:47:01.195
There is a mob currently waiting outside your house for whatever you decide.

00:47:01.195 --> 00:47:01.445
Go.

00:47:01.445 --> 00:47:03.297
I'm scared.

00:47:03.949 --> 00:47:05.190
Mob already came and went.

00:47:05.190 --> 00:47:05.969
work in DC.

00:47:05.969 --> 00:47:06.610
Oh, that's right.

00:47:06.610 --> 00:47:07.869
Yeah, you are in DC.

00:47:09.869 --> 00:47:11.230
Let's see.

00:47:12.130 --> 00:47:14.690
There were things about Last Jedi I liked a lot.

00:47:15.210 --> 00:47:17.469
There were things that I did not like as much.

00:47:18.550 --> 00:47:24.329
I thought it was really, it's awesome seeing Luke again, of course.

00:47:24.489 --> 00:47:27.110
It makes sense to me that he would be in self-imposed exile.

00:47:27.110 --> 00:47:28.690
That's kind of the Jedi play, right?

00:47:28.690 --> 00:47:30.250
So that's what they do.

00:47:30.250 --> 00:47:33.849
I mean, they mess up and they just kind of go off in exile.

00:47:35.686 --> 00:47:42.728
Yeah, mean, Yoda's on Dagobah, Obi-Wan's hanging out and just watching the baby sitting on Tatooine.

00:47:43.128 --> 00:47:46.650
And now Luke is off by himself at the Jedi Temple.

00:47:46.650 --> 00:47:47.989
It makes sense to me.

00:47:49.809 --> 00:47:50.701
And I liked his voice.

00:47:50.701 --> 00:47:51.960
I like where he's at as a character.

00:47:51.960 --> 00:47:52.978
There things about that made sense.

00:47:52.978 --> 00:47:58.652
I you can't just start out with Luke being like, you've come to find me and now I'm ready to take up my mantle and blah, blah.

00:47:58.652 --> 00:48:03.106
It makes sense that he would have to start from a different kind of place to get back to where he's a hero again.

00:48:03.106 --> 00:48:04.246
Yeah.

00:48:04.246 --> 00:48:05.668
Might be a little jaded.

00:48:06.128 --> 00:48:06.929
Yeah.

00:48:06.929 --> 00:48:08.371
I mean, it makes sense.

00:48:09.371 --> 00:48:12.014
And I thought the final battle was really cool.

00:48:12.014 --> 00:48:13.936
I do wish he was really there.

00:48:15.458 --> 00:48:20.483
But the way he kind of punks the whole empire is the first order was really clever.

00:48:20.483 --> 00:48:22.103
I thought very well done.

00:48:22.304 --> 00:48:24.507
Visually, the whole thing is perfect.

00:48:24.507 --> 00:48:28.349
I love the like all the that, you know, that desert.

00:48:28.652 --> 00:48:31.485
The race and that when you step on it, you see red.

00:48:31.485 --> 00:48:33.965
Yeah, really just so striking.

00:48:34.226 --> 00:48:38.320
And it also and then you realize that Luke hasn't been making any footprints, which is also really cool.

00:48:38.320 --> 00:48:46.628
Such a cool, you know, small detail that you it's a way to go back and look at it and notice that Ryan didn't put any of those footsteps in such a cool moment.

00:48:46.628 --> 00:48:48.079
Yeah, exactly.

00:48:48.079 --> 00:48:54.478
Yeah, the things that I love the whole thing with the whole mission to the casino thing.

00:48:54.478 --> 00:48:55.938
didn't make any sense.

00:48:55.938 --> 00:48:57.018
Toy didn't need to be there.

00:48:57.018 --> 00:48:57.458
Yeah.

00:48:57.458 --> 00:48:58.958
And then they fail anyway.

00:48:58.958 --> 00:49:01.338
And I'm like, I don't know what's happening.

00:49:01.338 --> 00:49:01.697
Yeah.

00:49:01.697 --> 00:49:04.137
The subtlety is not anywhere to be seen.

00:49:04.378 --> 00:49:05.318
Yeah.

00:49:06.398 --> 00:49:08.057
Yeah, there there were mistakes.

00:49:08.057 --> 00:49:08.918
Mistakes were made.

00:49:08.918 --> 00:49:09.858
Yeah.

00:49:10.898 --> 00:49:17.557
But I feel the same way about the JJ stuff, I mean, I feel like Finn was by far the most underserved character in the series.

00:49:17.557 --> 00:49:18.217
Absolutely.

00:49:18.217 --> 00:49:19.257
That character is super lame.

00:49:19.257 --> 00:49:19.498
Yeah.

00:49:19.498 --> 00:49:20.378
And he didn't have to be.

00:49:20.378 --> 00:49:22.177
He should be the best character in the series.

00:49:22.177 --> 00:49:23.461
He built up.

00:49:24.045 --> 00:49:30.068
much until he was even able to handedly a lightsaber and then.

00:49:30.248 --> 00:49:31.907
Yeah, just yells Ray the next two movies.

00:49:31.907 --> 00:49:32.789
Well, you know, all did.

00:49:32.789 --> 00:49:33.478
Yeah, exactly.

00:49:33.478 --> 00:49:34.489
Yeah.

00:49:34.489 --> 00:49:35.068
Yeah.

00:49:35.068 --> 00:49:38.389
He should have been the best character in the series and he could have been.

00:49:38.389 --> 00:49:45.391
He was this this kid who was stolen as he was trafficked himself by the empire to be a goddamn stormtrooper.

00:49:45.391 --> 00:49:48.842
And then like he's and he he takes off later.

00:49:48.842 --> 00:49:50.063
He makes a decision to leave.

00:49:50.063 --> 00:49:51.313
Yeah.

00:49:51.434 --> 00:49:52.385
What must he.

00:49:52.385 --> 00:49:55.847
You know, I'm the guy that loves to do world building as we've established.

00:49:55.847 --> 00:49:56.708
Yeah.

00:49:56.969 --> 00:50:04.302
And think about you have a character who has raised his entire life to be a stormtrooper and then ran away.

00:50:04.302 --> 00:50:05.063
What would he be like?

00:50:05.063 --> 00:50:10.360
He wouldn't be all like Jokey and I don't know, like his whole the whole portrayal of him.

00:50:10.360 --> 00:50:13.509
Like he should be a different kind of character, in my opinion.

00:50:13.509 --> 00:50:15.065
Like he's a rifleman soldier.

00:50:15.065 --> 00:50:16.420
You ever saw that?

00:50:16.780 --> 00:50:17.960
No, actually.

00:50:19.726 --> 00:50:20.536
All right.

00:50:20.536 --> 00:50:22.416
I'm actually a Scott film as well.

00:50:22.416 --> 00:50:28.007
And I think they've actually said it's tied into the whole, you know, Blade Runner aliens for like same universe.

00:50:28.007 --> 00:50:33.570
So soldier with Kurt Russell, I think it came out, I want to say late nineties.

00:50:33.639 --> 00:50:34.146
God.

00:50:34.146 --> 00:50:34.617
Okay.

00:50:34.617 --> 00:50:43.713
Basically, it's, you know, children, children construct or constricted constricted into us into, you know, being in the military.

00:50:43.713 --> 00:50:49.063
And they're basically brainwashed to be like just selfishly serve or selflessly serving their government.

00:50:49.358 --> 00:50:50.717
Well, that sounds I'm embarrassed.

00:50:50.717 --> 00:50:51.677
I don't know about that.

00:50:51.677 --> 00:50:54.117
I'm making an amazing film.

00:50:54.117 --> 00:50:54.458
All right.

00:50:54.458 --> 00:50:55.398
I'll check it out.

00:50:55.398 --> 00:50:56.157
Yeah.

00:50:56.237 --> 00:50:59.498
But yeah, I want to I want to see somebody who's a little more fucked up.

00:50:59.498 --> 00:51:04.137
You know, I want to see somebody who's been brainwashed his whole life and is trying to turn that around.

00:51:04.137 --> 00:51:06.217
But instead, he's like, woohoo, I'm free.

00:51:06.217 --> 00:51:10.637
He's like super happy and kind of without any real skills that matter.

00:51:10.637 --> 00:51:11.038
Right.

00:51:11.038 --> 00:51:11.257
Yeah.

00:51:11.257 --> 00:51:15.157
I'm like, they could have made him so bad ass and so different than the other characters.

00:51:16.621 --> 00:51:20.262
And he's like, he's even for sensitive, apparently.

00:51:20.262 --> 00:51:21.202
Mm hmm.

00:51:21.262 --> 00:51:24.322
Explore that like that could and had a great actor to play him.

00:51:24.322 --> 00:51:24.762
Yeah.

00:51:24.762 --> 00:51:25.342
That's that.

00:51:25.342 --> 00:51:26.762
And he said he was a janitor.

00:51:26.762 --> 00:51:28.581
He's literally a janitor.

00:51:28.661 --> 00:51:30.762
Then why was he on a death squad?

00:51:30.762 --> 00:51:31.262
Right.

00:51:31.262 --> 00:51:32.902
Well, I mean, soldier first, I guess.

00:51:32.902 --> 00:51:33.481
Right.

00:51:33.481 --> 00:51:34.382
Yeah, exactly.

00:51:35.061 --> 00:51:39.121
You know, cooks, cooks, here in a village and murdering everybody.

00:51:39.561 --> 00:51:40.262
Yeah.

00:51:40.262 --> 00:51:42.742
I mean, apparently I was like his actual first time seeing death.

00:51:42.742 --> 00:51:43.106
He's like.

00:51:43.106 --> 00:51:43.436
I'm out.

00:51:43.436 --> 00:51:44.315
And he didn't even run away.

00:51:44.315 --> 00:51:45.927
be like, it wasn't like screw the empire.

00:51:45.927 --> 00:51:47.246
It was like, I'm a coward.

00:51:47.246 --> 00:51:48.358
Yeah.

00:51:48.358 --> 00:51:48.807
Yeah.

00:51:48.807 --> 00:51:53.148
So it's that that character, just the concept of that character is so great.

00:51:53.148 --> 00:51:55.570
And then the execution was so poor.

00:51:55.590 --> 00:52:00.318
So that's that's probably my biggest problem with the whole series is like Finn was completely underserved.

00:52:00.318 --> 00:52:03.251
It should have been should have been the crowning jewel of the whole thing.

00:52:03.251 --> 00:52:09.914
So with you having we'll get back on our interview topics, but with you finally being able to dip your toes into the big two.

00:52:10.112 --> 00:52:14.233
Is there a character from each publisher that you'd love to get your hands on eventually?

00:52:14.233 --> 00:52:18.653
And then do you have any more creator owned projects you're currently working on that you can tell us about?

00:52:18.653 --> 00:52:22.204
Let's see, big two.

00:52:22.204 --> 00:52:25.085
Yeah, I've got a I've got a Batman story.

00:52:25.085 --> 00:52:28.226
I've gotten the chance to write Batman a couple of times and I read your story.

00:52:28.226 --> 00:52:29.123
Your green arrow one.

00:52:29.123 --> 00:52:29.817
I read that one.

00:52:29.817 --> 00:52:30.106
Thank you.

00:52:30.106 --> 00:52:30.648
With the cape.

00:52:30.648 --> 00:52:31.427
It was awesome.

00:52:31.427 --> 00:52:31.927
Yeah.

00:52:31.927 --> 00:52:32.445
Thank you.

00:52:32.445 --> 00:52:32.918
Appreciate it.

00:52:32.918 --> 00:52:34.128
Yeah.

00:52:34.128 --> 00:52:40.010
And I got to write him in the Tales Dark Multiverse, which is super fun to see like an alternate reality version of him, which was great.

00:52:40.288 --> 00:52:42.248
I'd love to do like a long form story with Batman.

00:52:42.248 --> 00:52:50.061
And I have a murder mystery that I want to do with him that I got an idea, specific idea that I want to do, kind like my my version of Long Halloween, you know.

00:52:50.061 --> 00:52:50.900
Nice.

00:52:50.900 --> 00:52:55.731
But I mean, even in other contexts, I'd love to write Batman, Batman, Superman, one of my big heroes growing up.

00:52:55.731 --> 00:52:58.052
They both represent such different power fantasies.

00:52:58.052 --> 00:52:59.742
Yeah.

00:52:59.742 --> 00:53:04.204
I love the idea of the guy that just made himself into this thing and can do anything based on his will.

00:53:04.204 --> 00:53:05.784
So I'd love to do that.

00:53:06.324 --> 00:53:09.536
Aside from him, I would say Constantine all day.

00:53:10.043 --> 00:53:10.655
yeah.

00:53:10.655 --> 00:53:18.134
I love Constantine and I, I said, got the opportunity to pitch for him once and I gave him like a dozen pitches.

00:53:18.134 --> 00:53:20.760
And like I, and some of them were already in the back of my head.

00:53:20.760 --> 00:53:22.672
And I, at the time, like then there was this big switch.

00:53:22.672 --> 00:53:26.923
There was a big, changeover and then the editor I was pitching was no longer doing Constantine.

00:53:26.923 --> 00:53:30.985
So I had to actually eventually became my Aquaman annual instead.

00:53:31.606 --> 00:53:36.548
But, anyway, those are my two big ones at DC, but I also love Jason Todd.

00:53:37.518 --> 00:53:41.137
I have a very specific idea of who Jason's supposed to be.

00:53:41.137 --> 00:53:42.057
Yeah.

00:53:42.077 --> 00:53:44.597
And it's now we've seen in the books most recently.

00:53:44.597 --> 00:53:46.358
And I there's a version of Jason Todd.

00:53:46.358 --> 00:53:47.237
I want to show everyone.

00:53:47.237 --> 00:53:48.338
So I would love to do that.

00:53:48.338 --> 00:53:49.898
And Marvel of him.

00:53:49.898 --> 00:53:51.557
I cosplayed Jason Todd.

00:53:51.557 --> 00:53:53.617
He's like one of my number one like costumes.

00:53:53.617 --> 00:53:54.478
That's awesome.

00:53:54.478 --> 00:54:02.938
His look is so great, especially like when he first came out of the gate, you know, the Matt Wagner design that he gave the Red Hood when they brought Jason back is just iconic.

00:54:02.938 --> 00:54:04.358
It was instantly iconic.

00:54:04.657 --> 00:54:04.938
Yeah.

00:54:04.938 --> 00:54:05.717
Yeah.

00:54:05.898 --> 00:54:07.117
For Marvel.

00:54:07.806 --> 00:54:09.907
I love Moon Knight, but everyone does.

00:54:10.266 --> 00:54:13.528
He's like this wish list character for a lot of writers.

00:54:13.528 --> 00:54:16.590
And apparently the book typically does not sell well.

00:54:16.590 --> 00:54:19.190
They did Moon Knight with Bendis and Alex Malief.

00:54:19.190 --> 00:54:20.331
That's a good one.

00:54:20.331 --> 00:54:26.873
When Bendis was at the height of his powers at Marvel, he was crushing everything he was doing.

00:54:26.873 --> 00:54:28.155
I love that book.

00:54:28.155 --> 00:54:29.494
And apparently like that.

00:54:29.494 --> 00:54:34.521
then after that, you see Jeff Lemire doing it and Max Bemis.

00:54:34.521 --> 00:54:35.447
There's all these great people.

00:54:35.447 --> 00:54:37.077
Warnel's one's really good too.

00:54:37.358 --> 00:54:37.918
Which one?

00:54:37.918 --> 00:54:38.878
Warren Ellis.

00:54:39.157 --> 00:54:39.777
Yes, exactly.

00:54:39.777 --> 00:54:40.737
Yeah, it's like a four.

00:54:40.737 --> 00:54:41.418
Yeah.

00:54:41.557 --> 00:54:42.777
Yeah, I've got it.

00:54:42.777 --> 00:54:43.538
Yeah.

00:54:43.538 --> 00:54:44.898
I love Moon Knight.

00:54:44.898 --> 00:54:46.458
And there's been a lot of things.

00:54:46.458 --> 00:54:52.418
I've been so many kind of recreations of Moon Knight and you can kind of get away with it because he's so crazy.

00:54:52.478 --> 00:54:54.998
He's like as crazy as Batman probably should be.

00:54:54.998 --> 00:54:55.518
Right.

00:54:55.878 --> 00:54:56.657
Right.

00:54:56.657 --> 00:54:57.697
And I love that.

00:54:57.697 --> 00:54:58.757
So he's he's read.

00:54:58.757 --> 00:54:59.958
I'd love to write Doctor Strange.

00:54:59.958 --> 00:55:01.097
I'd love to write more cap.

00:55:01.097 --> 00:55:01.878
I've done a cap thing.

00:55:01.878 --> 00:55:02.777
I'd love to do more.

00:55:02.777 --> 00:55:03.858
I love Bucky.

00:55:03.858 --> 00:55:04.717
Yeah.

00:55:04.838 --> 00:55:06.657
And not even just.

00:55:07.190 --> 00:55:09.329
Not just Winter Soldier, but like Bucky.

00:55:09.329 --> 00:55:13.153
Like I want to see like like a teenage psycho Bucky.

00:55:13.514 --> 00:55:17.097
Well, they kind of did that recently with Kyle Higgins run.

00:55:17.137 --> 00:55:17.958
Have you read that one?

00:55:17.958 --> 00:55:21.050
The Kyle Higgins recent core issue where he had like the sidekick.

00:55:21.050 --> 00:55:21.961
Yeah.

00:55:21.961 --> 00:55:27.166
And the sidekick is kind of a crazy guy that the Winter Soldier kind of converts over to the good side.

00:55:27.465 --> 00:55:28.030
Yeah.

00:55:28.030 --> 00:55:29.027
Yeah.

00:55:29.027 --> 00:55:30.809
I think Winter Soldier is a great character too.

00:55:30.809 --> 00:55:37.333
And I kind of have this fantasy of writing like a, a Kill Squad book.

00:55:38.331 --> 00:55:48.498
World War Two era kill squad with cool like Wolverine Bucky like when he's still a kid and I can I can different version of Ghost Rider.

00:55:48.498 --> 00:55:52.599
You could do like your Mike Nick Fury could be in there perhaps.

00:55:52.621 --> 00:55:53.351
Yeah, exactly.

00:55:53.351 --> 00:55:54.262
You know, yeah.

00:55:54.262 --> 00:55:55.722
Yeah, like that'd rad as hell.

00:55:55.722 --> 00:55:56.643
That would be super.

00:55:56.643 --> 00:55:59.125
I would be that would be pretty dope.

00:55:59.684 --> 00:56:00.786
So anyway.

00:56:00.786 --> 00:56:05.059
And then do you do you create your own stuff that you potentially want to do that you are working on?

00:56:05.059 --> 00:56:06.574
I do really feel I do.

00:56:06.574 --> 00:56:11.233
I'm doing a different kind of fantasy book right now.

00:56:11.233 --> 00:56:12.373
It's not revealed yet.

00:56:12.373 --> 00:56:13.873
can't say anything about it.

00:56:13.873 --> 00:56:15.574
And honestly, we don't have a publisher yet.

00:56:15.574 --> 00:56:17.634
So it's still extremely early.

00:56:17.833 --> 00:56:21.634
But the art is insanely good.

00:56:21.693 --> 00:56:24.054
And it's very different from Last God.

00:56:24.054 --> 00:56:27.494
It's not the same kind of thing, but it's also a high fantasy.

00:56:27.494 --> 00:56:29.693
I'm very proud of it.

00:56:29.693 --> 00:56:32.713
I hope it finds a home soon and I can't wait to talk about it.

00:56:32.713 --> 00:56:35.822
I'm also doing a kid's book called The Moon Dragon, called Arlo the Moon Dragon.

00:56:35.822 --> 00:56:40.581
that I'm doing for my, some I'm making for my son with a friend of mine named Dustin Malik.

00:56:40.581 --> 00:56:44.081
He's the colorist that was on Smoketown at Scout Comics.

00:56:44.641 --> 00:56:46.762
And he's a very talented illustrator himself.

00:56:46.762 --> 00:56:49.802
So he and I are doing a kid's together right now and that's been really fun too.

00:56:49.802 --> 00:56:50.501
Oh cool.

00:56:50.501 --> 00:56:50.722
Wow.

00:56:50.722 --> 00:56:51.601
That's awesome.

00:56:51.601 --> 00:56:51.922
Yeah.

00:56:51.922 --> 00:56:57.302
Then I have another, I have another big two book coming together too and I can't talk about yet, that's that'll be out later this year.

00:56:57.302 --> 00:56:57.521
Secrets.

00:56:57.521 --> 00:57:00.342
Can you say for which of the two?

00:57:00.402 --> 00:57:01.121
I probably shouldn't.

00:57:01.121 --> 00:57:01.402
Okay.

00:57:01.402 --> 00:57:02.521
It's pretty early.

00:57:02.782 --> 00:57:05.702
Just trying to, just trying to, you know, just get you for everything.

00:57:05.929 --> 00:57:08.592
Does rhyme with Carvel?

00:57:11.273 --> 00:57:12.724
Anyway, plead the fifth moving on.

00:57:12.724 --> 00:57:17.543
Well, actually, I mean, concludes pretty much what we have for you.

00:57:17.543 --> 00:57:20.670
We honestly we cannot thank you enough for being here with us today.

00:57:20.670 --> 00:57:22.193
It's such a pleasure.

00:57:22.193 --> 00:57:23.253
Such an honor to talk to you.

00:57:23.253 --> 00:57:28.177
And it was, you know, like I said, we've heard you talk to John on word balloon and other interviews and such.

00:57:28.177 --> 00:57:32.349
But honestly, it's just great to sit here and kind of go back and forth, talk about things that.

00:57:32.371 --> 00:57:36.282
Equally we all love and kind of pick your brain on what you have coming in 2021.

00:57:36.282 --> 00:57:38.184
Cause you know, I think I speak for everyone.

00:57:38.184 --> 00:57:46.768
I say this is going to be a big year for you and we're really looking forward to following your career and maybe even at some point, hopefully having you back here on the above in bar.

00:57:46.987 --> 00:57:47.498
Thank you, man.

00:57:47.498 --> 00:57:48.068
I'd love that.

00:57:48.068 --> 00:57:50.030
Thank you guys for your service and for having me on.

00:57:50.030 --> 00:58:00.833
Yeah, thank you for being an inspiration to, pretty much, you know, like I said, you brought a soldier under your wing and helped him kind of, you know, enter the new world of the army for him.

00:58:01.096 --> 00:58:18.172
And you know, you're, are what I would like to share to my soldiers as a, as an example of what somebody can truly do, you know, with what they've learned or what they know with the military and turn it into something that's even bigger, you know, not just hobby, but sheer love of something.

00:58:18.172 --> 00:58:18.704
thank you, man.

00:58:18.704 --> 00:58:19.414
Thanks for saying that.

00:58:19.414 --> 00:58:20.494
I appreciate it.

00:58:20.494 --> 00:58:21.125
Yeah, absolutely.

00:58:21.125 --> 00:58:27.317
It's, definitely, it's a, it is a standard that, that I believe everybody should be able to, you know, look up to.

00:58:27.317 --> 00:58:29.427
I, so thank you for that.

00:58:29.452 --> 00:58:30.202
Yeah, man.

00:58:30.202 --> 00:58:30.722
My pleasure.

00:58:30.722 --> 00:58:31.623
Thank you.

00:58:31.623 --> 00:58:35.884
And honestly, if you guys would like to follow Philip in his career, we'd recommend that you do.

00:58:35.884 --> 00:58:37.364
He's on Twitter at Philip K.

00:58:37.364 --> 00:58:39.965
Johnson on Twitter and Instagram, correct?

00:58:40.405 --> 00:58:40.806
Yeah.

00:58:40.806 --> 00:58:43.336
Instagram is Philip underscore Kennedy underscore Johnson.

00:58:43.336 --> 00:58:43.706
OK.

00:58:43.706 --> 00:58:43.994
Yeah.

00:58:43.994 --> 00:58:45.458
And then Twitter was Philip K.

00:58:45.458 --> 00:58:45.918
Johnson.

00:58:45.918 --> 00:58:49.168
And then his website is Philip Kennedy Johnson dot com.

00:58:49.168 --> 00:58:51.059
And yeah, thanks so much, Phil.

00:58:51.059 --> 00:58:51.559
We appreciate it.

00:58:51.559 --> 00:58:53.166
Thank you guys.