Batman/Superman: World's Finest has been following up on its previous Boy Thunder arc, which introduced the long lost sidekick of Superman - who we already know will grow into the anti-hero Magog from World's Finest writer Mark Waid and artist Alex Ross' classic story Kingdom Come.
Now, in December 19's Batman/Superman: World's Finest #22, Waid and series artist Dan Mora and colorist Tamra Bonvillain will finally bring David Sikela, the former Boy Thunder, fully into the role of Magog.
Newsarama spoke with Waid ahead of the issue's release, digging into the ups and downs of revisiting a legendary story like Kingdom Come, the ongoing partnership between Waid and Mora, and even a little bit of what's to come in World's Finest after the current Heir to the Kingdom arc wraps up.
Newsarama: Mark, the last time we talked, the Kingdom Come elements were just coming into Batman/Superman: World's Finest. How does it feel now to be reaching the peak of another chapter in that saga?
Mark Waid: It's a little nerve-wracking to be honest. You know, it's a dicey proposition to revisit something that seems to have been so popular. But I talked to Alex Ross at length. We went over stuff to make sure that what we were doing was never treading on the toes of anything he might want to do with these characters in the future, or his vision of these characters.
Even though Kingdom Come was a partnership, it's just a matter of playing nice and being respectful to Alex, and he was fine with everything, the editors were fine with everything. And you saw in the Boy Thunder arc, we'd set up the reveal that David Sikela would become Magog. So it really felt like it was time to launch into that story and follow up on Boy Thunder before everyone forgot about it.
Was there anything from Kingdom Come that you hesitated to bring into the story? Or anything you considered addressing but chose to avoid?
There was nothing that I wanted to do that I avoided. But one of the things I was very mindful of is that a lot of the newer generation characters from Kingdom Come like Nightstar and many others were created by Alex whole cloth when he was a teenager. So with that in mind, it felt odd to bring them in. I didn't want to bring in Norman McKay, because he's based on Alex's dad. I just didn't want to do anything that sprang totally from Alex's head first, because that felt disrespectful.
So considering all that, this is very much a prequel, as we've seen in the first issue of this arc, rather than a sequel or anything happening around the time of Kingdom Come. This is sort of setting it up and teeing it up for readers to see the road to Kingdom Come.
So there was one little Kingdom Come Easter egg in this arc that I wanted to ask you about that got a little attention that I thought was funny, and I'm sure you did as well, when you wrote it.
Is it the steak?
Absolutely. It's the steak!
How do you decide on when and how to address moments like Batman changing up his order at Planet Krypton? Was it on your mind for a while, or do things like that come more spur of the moment when you're writing? What's the thought process for digging into those little details?
Those little details generally spring up as I go. A lot of times, I will know coming up that I have a scene between, say, Superman and Batman in this particular place. And I'm not sure what they're going to say yet. But when I get to that place, I know these characters so well that they kind of take over. I know it's a cliche, but it's true with characters that you know quite well, as well as I know these characters, that I just kind of let them talk.
Speaking more about the current World's Finest arc, seeing David Sikela go from a kind of wide-eyed sidekick as Boy Thunder to a more hardened anti-hero as Magog has been quite a journey. Is it a little heartbreaking to take a nice kid like David and put him through all this? What are the goals and pitfalls with that kind of arc?
It is heartbreaking, and it's also very complicated. It's a very complex path I'm laying out for the character, because we know, at the end of the day, that he's going to murder the Joker somewhere down the road, which Superman would never approve of, and didn't approve of in Kingdom Come. That drove the whole story.
So I can't put our Superman in a position where he tries to keep David from being a killer, because then he's going to fail. And our Superman doesn't fail. I don't want to write a story in which Superman tries to inspire someone and blows it that bad. That said, I know his arc. I know where he's going, and I've also built David up as a character in my head where his actions make sense.
He's a much harsher character than the wide-eyed, innocent David Sikela. But a lot of that is because time passes a little differently on Earth-22, the Kingdom Come world. So he's been on that world far longer than the time he was with Superman, who only had him under his wing for a month or two. Which means he's had plenty of time to develop some bad habits.
You said something there about Superman and his place in David's journey, which I think is interesting because Superman will almost certainly be affected by his relationship to David. How do you go about conveying something like a shift in Superman's personality in a flashback story in a way that will hopefully resonate when people read stories set in the present day?
I think that there is a little sliver of daylight with this, where the story takes David and Superman to a place that we have never seen before, in terms of Superman's reactions, and his interactions, and his personality, and how he deals with things.
So I'm able then to sort of use that to say, "Okay, here's why Superman feels this way, in modern day continuity." It's teeing up little subtle things with David. You know, how do you deal with the fact that you can be influential, you can be inspirational, you can try as hard as you can to be that way. But you're not going to win everybody over.
The comic industry right now seems to have a fascination with revisiting classic stories and eras, even more so than usual, and the Kingdom Come arc of World's Finest is kind of a perfect nesting doll of that idea. What do you see as the pros and cons of that kind of nostalgic trend, and how do you find ways to still have those kind of retro stories feel new and forward thinking?
I wish I knew what that secret sauce was. I'm proud of that x-factor. I'm just not sure exactly what it is. But I, I just have no interest in revisiting things, whether it's my stuff in Kingdom Come, or the comics that I read as a kid, I have no interest in revisiting that as it was. Because that material doesn't have anything new to say to a modern audience, right? Like, I love the Beatles. But I'm not going to pretend the music of the Beatles still has the same sort of relevance to people that it did 50 years ago.
So it's just a matter of looking at the pieces, finding the emotion in those pieces, because the emotion in them is eternal. That's the one thing that is eternal. It's about finding the emotion of those pieces, and finding a way to write new stories around those feelings that were originally kicked up by those stories.
I want to talk a little bit about Dan Mora, because he is one of the hardest working artists in comics, and he nails it every time. What's it like to be building that partnership still, and to be tapping into the kind of ongoing relationship between a writer and artist that is very rare in mainstream superhero comics right now?
It's really wonderful. You know, I love the fact that every morning I wake up and there's two more pages of art in my inbox, because he's phenomenally fast. But beyond that, he's very receptive to the kinds of stories that we're telling. He's very complimentary, as I am to him, obviously. But it's nice to hear back from him that he's still enjoying it, and that he still has no interest in ever leaving this book. Same as me.
You know, we're just having a grand old time because, in part it scratches an itch for Dan, that he's able to draw pretty much anybody in the DC Universe at some point or another. Because that's, as you've seen, that's a big part of World's Finest, bringing in the rest of the DCU.
I also want to once more throw out props to Tamra Bonvillain for her amazing colors. She really brings the thunder every issue, and Dan and I both could not be more pleased with what she's doing. We're very lucky to have her.
Tamra's fantastic, she and Dan are really crushing it together.
So speaking of the wider DC Universe, How much do you let Dan dictate how that expansion into the rest of the DC Universe happens? Are you going to him and asking things like, "What villains do you want to draw? Which guest stars?"
None of the big stuff. But on the smaller stuff, it's like, "Give me a list, what heroes have you not drawn yet that you want to draw? What villains?" I asked that early on, and we've been ticking things off as we go, just knocking them off the list.
That said, the next arc after the Kingdom Come arc, I can't really get into too much right now, but I can say that we're bringing in a character that Dan very, very much wanted to draw. And it's maybe the last character you would expect.
Okay, well, I'm intrigued now, and I'm excited. But before that arc starts, you've got an annual coming up. What was it like curating that, and bringing other creators into this corner of the DC Universe, and DC history that you and Dan have kind of been pioneering?
That was great, because everybody had a different take on things. Everybody had their own unique point of view on, say, the Challengers of the Unknown, or Metamorpho, or whoever. But all of it felt very much the spirit of what we've been doing on World's Finest.
And it's always fun to see someone like Christopher Cantwell, who I think is a terrific writer, take on a near forgotten franchise like the Challengers of the Unknown and see what he does with it. Really nice stuff there.
Before we wrap up, what can you tell us about what's coming up in the next issue, Batman/Superman: World's Finest #22, and in the rest of the Heir to the Kingdom arc?
Many things are heating up in issue #22. We finally get to see the transformation of Boy Thunder to Magog. That's a big moment. We finally get to find out exactly what Gog has been doing with all the villains in the DC Universe, which is a big moment.
And I will also say, we're gonna show what I think will count as the first conversation between Batman and Metron of the New Gods. I know they've met before, but at least at the point in Batman's career we're showing in World's Finest, I believe we're gonna show their first conversation ever. We're overdue for that, as we find Metron a prisoner of Gog.
Batman/Superman: World's Finest #22 is published by DC on December 19.
Kingdom Come tops our list of the best DC stories of all time.
