Eve L. Ewing Into the Multiverse

Eve L. Ewing is a renowned scholar, poet, teacher and cultural organizer. She also writes Marvel comic books, including Ironheart, which came to life on the big screen in the movie Black Panther: Wakanda Forever. Eve joins Ben and Khalil to discuss the importance of increasing racial representation in the superhero universe, and the backlash against it. Plus, why creatives should write for kids and take them seriously.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:14):
Pushing last things to say. Are you guys exciting? Yes?
Are you recording? Oh? Yeah, Well in this movie, I
don't think no way this movie is bad. No one
in this movie is bad. It's gonna be good no
matter what. Yeah. Well, okay, I'm Khalil Jabron Mohammed, I'm

(00:44):
Ben Austin. We're two best friends, one black, one white.
I'm a historian and I'm a journalist. And this is
some of my best friends are some of my best
friends are. And listen, Khalil, you just heard your nephew,
my son Jonah Romeo Austin and talking about talking about

(01:04):
how much he's gonna love Wakanda Forever, the Black Panther movie. Yes,
Wakonda Forever. Did you dress up? Did everybody dress up
in costumes? Oh? Man, we had makeup? We had no no, no, no,
we just we just went. But but man, you heard
how excited he was. And he wasn't wrong. He was
going to enjoy that movie no matter what. That's right,
because this is a movie with high stakes. This is

(01:25):
a movie with so many representations of black people and
black women, indigenous populations. And we get to talk to
Eve Ewing, who is a writer and poet and contributes
to one of the characters were Williams, who makes her
debut in Wakonda Forever on the big screen. Yeah, yeah,
we are. We are talking about Marvel comics. We're talking

(01:46):
about superheroes, We're talking about representation, We're talking about superpowers
of all kinds. Let's go into the episode. Oh man,
this is so exciting. I love that Jonah was so

(02:07):
excited and said there can be no wrong in this movie.
I'm a big fan of Ryan Coogler. Of course, I
got dressed up to go see Black Panther a few
years ago. My whole family wents to see Wakonda Forever recently,
And now we get to talk to one of the
contributors to this Marvel universe, Ewing, And she's somebody you

(02:27):
actually know and spend a lot of time with. Yeah, well,
I know where from Chicago. We're part of the same
tribe here in the city. And she is so multi
talented Eve Viewing. I mean, she is accomplished in this
broad array of different fields, and she's so accomplished in
so many different things that we could probably start to
talk about all the things that she does that we're

(02:50):
not going to focus on in this episode. That's right, Yeah,
because I know her work as a scholar and sociologist
at the University of Chicago. She's done amazing work on
inequality in our public school systems and the school closings
that had a really traumatic effect on the South and
West sides of Chicago years ago. Yeah, that's not something

(03:11):
we're gonna talk about. And you know what else we're
not going to talk about. She is this amazing accomplished poet.
She's also a children's book author. I mean she she
can't not do everything to use a double nag. Yeah, no, no,
but even more, even more, she's an activist. She's an organizer.
During COVID, when I had not left the house for
like four months and I was at my lowest point,

(03:34):
she helped organize of basically like a food drive for
families who were enrolled in public schools. But we're not
getting the free and reduced lunch and breakfast that they
needed for nutrition. Wow, and so like it got me
out of the house. I bought all these groceries. I
brought him over there. There were so many people fit.
It made me suddenly feel good again and feel like

(03:54):
I was connected to the community. That's her work. Yeah,
and I mean, and here we are basically about to
talk about superheroes, you know, both on the big screen
and in comic books. And in a way. I know
she doesn't like to be described this way, but she's
only super talented. Let's put it that way, man, She
is super talented. I mean. One of the things that's
amazing about her to me is that she works in

(04:16):
all these different fields. And so now she's even working
in the Marvel universe. So this academic poet, you know,
she's also writing comics that you know, she makes all
these different fields her own in a way that feels
really unique and empowered. Um, I'm gonna quote James Bald,
you know, because I want to sound smart, Okay, but

(04:37):
but I do always think about this quote when I
think about Eve, and the quote is the place in
which I'll fit will not exist until I make it.
Oh and she somehow goes yea. So then you're such
a big fan of comics. I mean, what do you
know about Ianheart? So she writes this comic book from Marvel.

(04:58):
It's about this young woman, a black girl from the
South Side of Chicago. Her name is re Ree Williams.
And you know, she is basically creates an Iron Man
suit for herself, you know, and she doesn't have superpowers,
but she has an intelligence which is extraordinary, and she's
able to become the superhero through that. Yeah, that character

(05:20):
sounds so interesting and certainly she came to life on
the big screen. I have to tell you, though, I mean,
I didn't realize how big a deal this was for
even I can't wait to hear her talk more about it.
Not too long ago, she wrote in The New York
Times and op ed that I happened to read call
Flying while Black, and she talked about how significant doing
this kind of representational work in the comic book space is.

(05:43):
She said that she'd worked on policing and politics and education.
She'd done all the things that we know she is
so talented at. But she said nothing had attracted a
firestorm of hate and vitriol directed towards her, like her
work on writing Ironheart Man. That is something that's wild.
So listen, man, let's just get to eat yea, because

(06:06):
let's hear her unpack some of this and talk about
about her work in the superhero realm. Let's do it all, right,
Eve ewing. Oh my gosh, it's so great to see you.
Oh thanks for having me. Yeah, welcome, welcome to Some

(06:26):
of my best friends are really happy to have you here.
We get to talk to you Eve on the very
day that a new issue of a Marvel comic that
you write is dropping, right, Yeah, issue to a Photon
featuring Monica Rambo. You got it, you got it. And
for folks listening, that's Rambo like U R A M
B E A U. Not Rambo like Sebuster stallone, but

(06:50):
or like Rambo the poet. Yeah, exactly exactly, because with
you they might have thought it was, you know, not
that one. So well, we actually wanted to start by
talking to you about, you know, this other comic book
that you write, Um, yeah, you know iron Heart, and
you know this exciting new character, the superhero in the

(07:12):
Marvel universe. Ironheart's alter ego is Rere Williams. She's this
genius from the South Side of Chicago and what yep,
south side And you know many people have met re
Re because they saw her in the Black Panther movie,
the new one. Were Conda forever, Yeah, Conda forever, yes,
Wada forever exactly and actually, uh, when I went. I

(07:36):
took my kids to see that that movie were Conda
Forever on opening day, and they wanted me to record them, um,
you know, actually to hope that I would play it
for you. And I'm gonna play a little recording of
my daughter. We were doing a little debrief in the
car ride home and she was talking about how many
smart black women are in this movie. Oh my gosh,

(07:57):
I'm so excited. Roll the tape. I thought it was
it was cool to see like like they didn't need
to bring in like somebody, like it was another smart
black woman. Like they didn't feel like too smart black women,
that's too many, like that there could be two of
them and they could exist without competing and they could
be like friends. Yeah, like because normally it would either

(08:19):
be like competitive or what I would have to be white,
but there were there was none of that. Wow, great review. Yeah,
And I mean if you think about it, for me,
what was remarkable about that film is that they're like
wealth and riches of of of incredible black women, um
in a way that I think is a critical mass
that is pretty rarely seen in popular culture, in popular movies,

(08:41):
especially in a movie that is like considered to be
what you know, what we call like a tentpole movie,
like a movie for everybody. I remember several years ago, Um,
the movie Best Man Holiday came out, right, and yeah,
the Best Man's series. It's like Leo and I have
just been catching up on those and watching them together show. Yeah.
So you know Best Man Holiday, like it's a holiday movie,

(09:02):
it's about friends. It's like a middle aged people movie
whatever whatever. And I remember USA Today had this, had
this headline. It was like race themed movies, uh, succeed
at the box at the box office. And you know,
Bestman Holiday is not a race themed movie, right, It's
a movie about black people doing stuff like having Christmas
and yeah and being pugi and right. And I think

(09:24):
that the but but that that lends the idea that
like the mere presence of black people obliterates the possibility
of any other kind of thematic exploration. Um. And you know,
to your daughter's point, the fact that like one smart
black girl is already pushing it and then more than
one is too much. You know. In the movie, you
have you have Rere, you have Shari, you have Nakia,

(09:46):
you have a Koya, you know, and you have Queen Ramanda.
So you have these five black women, Um that all
our leaders and amazing people in their own way. You know,
never in twenty thousand lifetimes when I was sitting down
to write that comic book that I imagine uh, you know,
sitting in a in a premiere in Hollywood, Um, seeing

(10:08):
that character come to this green and so it's definitely
been a wild journey. Well that's exactly what we want
to talk about. First of all, I have to admit,
I mean this is both embarrassing and also I think
a compliment to you. I had never read a comic
book cover to cover until I read the first and
second issues of Ironheart. I mean that that is That's

(10:28):
a huge compliment. Kid, that's a huge compliment. That's a
huge compliment. But he also he also wouldn't buy them.
I had to photo photo, you know. I took pictures
of him with my phone and said the like, I refuse. Yeah.
I mean so, so I want to know, actually, how
did you develop this character? I mean, what what was

(10:49):
the process? How did you make reread the inspiration? Talk
to us about the backstory? Sure, so, you know, I
think that one thing that's important to clarify is that
I didn't create the character, right, and so so Brian
Michael Bendis, who is also his very prolific comics writer,
veteran of the End Street. Um. If you are familiar

(11:11):
with the character Miles Morales from who Everybody Loves up
right into the Spider Verse. Yeah, so so Brian Michael
Bennis also created Miles. Um. So he created Rear Williams
several years ago, and um, you know, created her as
kind of at a time when Tony Stark was out
of commission in the Marvel universe. Um. And so the

(11:34):
story that he created her kind of backstory was that
she was this black girl genius. She was fifteen, she
was from the South Side Chicago. She went to MIT,
and she basically reverse engineered, uh, the the equivalent of
Tony Stark's Iron Man armor by herself in her dorm room. Right.
The idea being that you know, Tony Stark is, you know,
a billionaire who's inherited every social privilege that you could imagine,

(11:57):
and his father was a weapons manufacturer and all this
and um, and what he did with you know, years
of the best schooling. Re redid like on a whim
in a dorm um and from Black Girl. Yeah, exactly,
and so um. But part of a big part of
her biography was that she had lost her father to

(12:18):
gun violence when she was a baby, That she had
lost her stepfather to gun violence when she was young,
like about ten or eleven, and that in that same
drive by that her best friend was also shot and killed.
And so that's a very complicated narrative to receive. And
I think that, you know, because on the one hand,
as a Chicago and you know, I and you know,

(12:39):
everybody here, all of us in different ways have been
have been touched by gun violence. Gun violence has impacted
our lives, and that's real. And then on the other hand,
what does it mean for this character to primarily be
defined by those losses? So, you know, so when when
I was asked to give my take on the character,
I had never written for Marvel before, and you know,
they asked me to come in and meet with them,

(13:01):
and I, you know, I had this meeting and I
went in and it's like, it's kind of like if
NASA called me, like you know, the movie The Moment
and a movie like Armageddon or something thing where you know,
Bruce Willis is like, but I'm just an oil rig operator,
like you know, what does what does the government want
with me? Where it's like, you know, I'm just a humble,
you know, poet and local nerd. Like I went in.
I had this meeting, and I went in letting them know, like,

(13:25):
these are the questions that I have about this character
that I think that as a reader, as a fan,
that I think need to be answered. And some of
my questions were, you know, okay, if if you're a
black team girl from the South Side who's lost all
these loved ones to gun violence, what compels you to
go out and risk your life every single day? Um
reads raised by a single mom. One of my biggest
questions was like, what black mom is allowing this to happen? Like,

(13:49):
you know, like I was like, there's no way my
mom would are you joking? Like absolutely not, absolutely not.
She'd be like, you know, I don't care. That might
be what your friends would do, you know, and so yeah, exactly,
so So that was those are the questions that I asked,
and I said to them at that time, you know,
if I might take on this character would be to

(14:11):
try to fill out what is her social world? Like
who are the people who love her we fall in
love for with superheroes, they have the longevity that they
have not because of the person with the powers or
the person with the costume, but because of the person
beneath the suit, right, and so you know exactly, So
those are the type of questions I wanted us to know,

(14:31):
like who is rear, what is she about? Why is
she doing this? Who are her friends? What's annoying about her?
What's great about her? And and also for her to
be defined by a social world that felt real, for
us to feel like she had a cast of characters
of people who support her and who you know, kind
of make fun of her, keep her head from getting
too big, you know. And I think that that approach

(14:55):
of going in with the questions that I have as
a reader are are really that's something that I carry
over from the other you know, genres in which I've
trained I mean, Khalil definitely as a scholar. This is
what we're trained to do, right, is you read the
literature and you say like, all right, well, what's the gap?
Like what do we not know? And so that's that's
kind of what's my intervention. And I think that when

(15:16):
you're writing characters that you know, reason more recent character.
But you know, I've also gotten to write, um, you know,
Peter Parker story and Miss Marvel, and I'm working on
and and Monica. You know, Monica's a character that's been
around for forty years. Um, I'm working on another story
now that I can't say who it is, but it's
another legacy character. Come, I can't do it. I can't.
I can't. They'll come, They'll come and get me. But

(15:38):
you know, the question is always like, well, what do
we what do we need to know? Like what's missing
for me as a reader? And and trying to write
a character that, uh, that feels real to people, that
feels relatable to people, that feels like somebody you kind
of want to give a hug too sometimes and you
want to shake her other times. Who messes up a lot?
You know? Can I just say one of the biggest
surprises though, was that you chose the Harvard Kennedy School

(16:01):
as the site for this like cinematic battle that takes
place with Ironheart and the and the Villain. And I'm like, what, yeah,
actually a job. Yeah. So at the time when when
Brian left off his narrative arc for re read the
end of his story was basically that the Dean of

(16:23):
MIT gives her this lab um and is like, you know,
now you have this all awesome lab You could do
whatever you want with it, like congratulations, go be a hero.
And and that's kind of like a happy ending. Now
I read that as an academic right, And what we
know is that if the dean gives you a lab
there's a lot of strings attall. You know that, Like,

(16:46):
it's not a it's not necessarily easy happy ending. He's
trying to he's trying to use her bring people in
to raise money to Yeah, it's a fun raise right,
what a you know what an academic sub subplot um?
You know. The fun and the challenge of it is
that you're picking up the reins. It's like that story
you play with with kids, like let's all go around

(17:07):
and you know, add tell a story together and everybody
adds a sentence, right, everybody says what happens next? Um,
and and so you don't get to just abruptly. You know.
Comics fans are very big on continuity um and the
stereotype of the nerd who's going to be like, well,
how come an issue for they had this you know,
this happened, but an issue seven of this other thing.

(17:28):
This happened, but like that is a real thing. We
try to keep continuity and so um. Yeah, so you know,
they say, right, what you know, Khalil side, that's right.
I've spent some time around Cambridge and uh and so
you know, even though I was not an MIT student,
I was a I was a Harvard doctoral student. I
was wondering when you were going to admit that. Yeah,
I guess I figured that was probably a relevant detailed

(17:49):
to mention. I have a question related to that to
that eye. And this is a question of sort of
asking you to tell us a little bit more about yourself,
but also you know through rere, like how much of
you is in re re? Yeah, great question. I would say,
there's a robust ven diagram. We are not the same person.

(18:09):
I think that some of the ways in which we
are very much the same. I have myself been a
black girl growing up in Chicago. I myself was raised
by a single mom, you know. I myself attended an
you know, an elite university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. You know.
And I think that the genius label is a lot

(18:31):
of my work as an edg scholar is, especially on
the book I'm trying to finish right now, is challenging
and troubling notions of what we think intelligence is and
ways in which the way notions of intelligence as they're
constructed in schools are very restrictive, very sometimes very racist,
very limiting. And then I was a middle school teacher, right,

(18:52):
And so being a teacher means that it's your job
to find the amazing things in all of your kids
and to recognize and celebrate the different ways that quote
unquote intelligence can look and can manifest. And my own
relationship to that comes as somebody who you know, was
tracked into high level classes in elementary school and you know,

(19:12):
went to a selective high school and things like that,
but always had a kind of complicated awareness of on
the one hand, receiving these labels of you know, you
get to be in this program, you get to have
this opportunity, you get to do this that, and the
other on the other hand, being very cynical at a
very young age about the ways that I saw those

(19:33):
labels as being socially constructed. If even if I didn't
have that, how did you have that awareness to feel
like that there's something off about all this, and not
just to sort of feel this sense of like it
was normal and like personal or just like pride in
yourself and not yeah, no, I really didn't. I think
I think a couple of things. M One is I
have a younger brother, and so I witnessed the way

(19:54):
that you know, my brother friends and classmates who were
boys or girls who you know, presented differently or acted
differently or you know, behave differently, the way that there's
like um performance of a certain form of intelligence ascribed
with moral value and goodness in ways that I was like, well,
I'm not a better person than those people. I'm not

(20:16):
a more valuable or more worthy person. So those kinds
of early schisms of just being like, yo, I think
some of this stuff is like kind of fake. So
these questions of deservingness of goodness, all that stuff was
very It made me very cynical about the labels like
gifted and talented very early. And so you know, it's fine,

(20:37):
like it's fiction, it's comics. We can call people geniuses.
Everything doesn't have to be a sociological thesis with it
kind of does, but but I at least try to
conceal it. And but you know, but at the very least,
like that doesn't solve her problems, right, And so so
how is she coping with the losses that she's experienced
in her life? What are the ways in which she
still has to grow as a as a young person,

(20:59):
as a friend, right as a daughter. And that's the
kind of that's the story that I that I wanted
to tell. We're going to talk some more to eat
about superheroes and representation after we come back from the break.
We'll be right back. Hey, we are back on. Some

(21:27):
of my best friends are with Evel Ewing. You brought
up Miles Morales and into the Spider Verse earlier, and
it is my son, Jonah's, by far most favorite, not
even favorite movie. Comic is his favorite thing. And you know,
I asked him why, and you know, even before this conversation,

(21:48):
I asked him again and I could almost verbade him
tell you what he said. He said, Miles is after
a Latino. I'm African American. And we could put an
asterisk there and you know, a footnote for later. You
know when he says that, and he says, you know,
and both of us are these kids who went into
these sort of like high power nerdy schools and are

(22:10):
trying to navigate them. He's like, and then this is
a quote he said, we have the same origin story.
Oh really, which is a great way of also saying like,
you know, we all one of the reasons I think
we love seeing superheroes is because we all dream of
that that this thing will emerge in us that will
also differentiate us. Uh. Yes, and and you know I

(22:32):
love that. Yeah, it's beautiful. Um, you know, maybe you
know something I want to ask you, Like, you know,
you're you're so knowledge about all this and uh and
Khalil isn't, as he said, he has never even studied
any of this. Wait a minute, and I have other
kinds of knowledge, And I want to ask you about
this moment, like, you know, even Marvel reaching out to you, like,
what's what do you think is different about this moment
right now as far as representation, that's different than previous

(22:55):
ones when there were you know, there were black people
in comics before. There's obviously been women around, Like what's
different right now? Yeah, I really appreciate that question. I
think that really something that has been top of mind
for me recently is looking back to Tanahassee's Tanahassee Coats's

(23:16):
run on Black Panther in twenty sixteen. Actually, even though
it gets a lot less attention, mainstream media attention, I
think in some ways it's more important or more stunning
that he then had to run on Captain America. And
you know, what does it mean for the United States
one of its leading black public intellectuals who is known

(23:38):
for what at the time, for many people are very
incendiary arguments about things like reparations and America as a cleptocracy.
The you know, person who has said America is a
cleptocracy to be the person who's like, I'm now going
to write the story of Captain America, right, And I
think that that was a really important historic moment that
opened up a lot of space for writers of color

(24:03):
who perhaps did not have the kind of coming up
through the ranks um pathway into comics because it is
not a medium that has felt welcoming to people and
who have shown their metal in other arenas and other
genres to be able to come into writing. Um, you know,

(24:25):
folks like Saladi Nahmed, who who'd you know been a
fiction writer and Greg pak who is an amazing comics
writer now, but starts as a filmmaker, uh, you know
Roxanne Gay, who was certainly the most high profile black
woman to kind of you know crossover um. And I
think that took some imagination on the on the part

(24:45):
of editors to say, like, well, you know, maybe this
person who's good at this thing could be good at
this other thing. So I'm starting to be in a
position now where I'm trying to be imaginative about what
the next step is. And as a poet, um, you know,
that's my first published book as a book of poetry,
and in many ways I came of age as a writer.

(25:06):
As a poet. My milia and my social learning space
is very much cultivated by poetry, and that has always
been shaped by the legacy of Gwendolen Brooks. And what
what Gwendolen Brooks teaches us is that it's not enough
for you to just be, you know, to sit in
your little like writing hobbit hole and like write the

(25:27):
great American poem. But that actually, you know, for Gwendolen Brooks,
being a poet meant sponsoring young people's poetry contest. Being
a poet meant uh, you know, being in regular correspondence
with people who were inspired, you know, by her being
a poet meant teaching free workshops. And so my work
as a poet has always been very much inflected with
cultural organizing. And I'm trying to think now about what

(25:50):
my role is in terms of opening up the space
for other people. And you know, I just did a
signing comic book signing this past weekend at on the
South Side on fifty third Street. We were scheduled for
two hours. I went to almost three and we had
to cut the line off and it was amazing. But
what I love about those signings is how many little

(26:15):
black girls, girls in general, kids in general, kids of
color in general, like, you know, all these different identities
of young people, they come to get these signings. Sometimes
they take a picture with me, and I love I
just wanted to be completely mundane for them. I'm the
fifth black woman ever to write Marvel comics, and you know,

(26:36):
all five of us are like the first five are
all like in you know, a stone's throw of each
other in terms of timing, right, It's not like the
first one was in like nineteen, you know, seventy years something.
And so I want them to feel like this is
as mundane and possible and doable and easy and seeable

(26:56):
a path as like, you know, being a dentist or something.
Can I share with you something that connects totally with
what you're describing. So I don't know if you I
can't imagine you have had this experience yet. But when
I started at the Schomberg back in twenty eleven, one
of the people worked for me was the director of education,

(27:17):
woman named Deirdre Holman, And and Deirdre came up with
this brilliant idea. She said, look, I know this guy
named Jerry Kraft who is an illustrator, and this guy
Jonathan Gayles, who is a scholar of black representation in
comic books. And they've come to me and I say, Hey,
Schamberg should be host to a black comic con. And

(27:38):
I'm like, what a brilliant idea. And it just so
happens that this January, starting the end of this week,
is the tenth anniversary of the Schaumberg's Black Comic Con.
Have you ever did you ever participate in it? Oh?
My god, Khalil, Yeah, So I that's very emotional for
me because the first time I went was as a fan,

(28:00):
and I went to the first Black Comics fast of
being at the Schomberg Center. Yeah, being at the Center,
Yeah yeah. And I remember going to that and I
there was a there was a panel about black women
in comics, and I just was sitting there with my
jaw just on the floor. And that panel was so
important to me because, you know, prior to that, I

(28:20):
had been to, you know, in independent I had just
gone to another independent comics festival a few months prior
to that, and I remember that one being you know,
all white people with a few a few people of
color kind of scattered throughout at that particular festival. And
then I went to the Schaumberg Festival and it's like
all black dudes, that's right, And so you know, it's

(28:43):
like the panel, the Black women in Comics panel is
kind of the only you know, it's like whoever's interested
is going to show up for that. I actually remember
that panel, go ahead, yeah, I mean it was, it was.
It was a really important moment for me. And uh.
And then I went and was on a panel um
in January twenty twenty, and it was one of the

(29:05):
last things I did before COVID shut down. And I
remember Vita Ayala, who's an amazing non binary after latine
UH comics writer, was also on the panel and and
it was really powerful. And there's a today, So there's
in the Schoenberg, there's a there's a exhibition about black comics.

(29:25):
And there's a picture of me on that panel and
for me, yes, and it's a quote from me on
the wall, uh which this morning, as I was walking
my dog, a friend of mine was like, Yo, I'm
at the Schoenberg. They got you on the wall, you know,
and I've a arrived and and it's just it's really special.

(29:46):
But I think like continuing to build those spaces is
really important because and one of the things that that
festival does is is bringing lots and lots of young people.
You know. I don't know if y'all remember this, but
like for me, my parents' generation, you know, they talk about, um,
you know, when a black person, we might be your
parents generation not quite not quite nice try the nice try.

(30:10):
You know. My parents' generation always talks about when a
black person came on like the new like a black
news anchor came on, or black person came on TV.
Everybody would run in the room right, because it was
like a huge deal and then by time, you know,
I was a kid who's like, yeah, Robin Robinson's on
TV every night, Like it's I'm happy for her, But
like this is a mundane this is not a nothing
to write home about. So like what I want is

(30:31):
for you know, kids who grow up and who get
to read these comics that I'm writing or meet me
out of signing. I want them to be like equally unimpressed,
you know, and I want them to be focused on like,
all right, well, how many how where's the queer representation,
Where's the disabled representation? Where's the undocumented representation? Black characters
have been in comics for a minute, That's not enough, right,

(30:51):
And so I want, you know, I want the trans
Muslim disabled author writing the trans Muslim disabled heroes, you know.
And not simply because we always have to have this
like one to one, very limited reductive notion of what
representation means, but because the more people we have at
the table, the more we can actually do what comics

(31:13):
and what Marvel Comics in particular has always promised and
supposedly said it was going to do, which is show
you the world outside your window. You know, yes, and
so yeah, I just think everybody, everybody should everybody jump
in the pool. That's how I feel. So speaking of
everyone jumping in the pool, we have seen an explosion
of diversity, and you've already talked about Miss Marvel, We've

(31:33):
talked about the new Black Captain America. But there's been
tremendous backlash. And you know, you've talked about precisely how
getting into comic books unleash some of the worst hatred
that you've experienced personally. But we also know that the
black girl who's going to play Arial in the upcoming

(31:54):
Little Mermaid has been subject to all this total insanity
and racism. There's a quote from The Washington Post that
the trailer sparked anger and dismay among fans who felt
that Ariel was written to be a white character, and
these critics saw it Bailey's asking was nothing more than
wokeness gone awry. I mean, so talk to us a
little bit about the relationship of this work and what

(32:17):
we're seeing happen with people who are pushing back. Yeah,
you know, I think that in a way, there is
actually an interesting analog. So, you know, I'm teaching this
quarter and prepping to lecture tomorrow about critical race theory,
and I think that, you know, for the type of

(32:39):
scholarly work that we do, there's an interesting analog here
in terms of how you strike the balance between I
think a number of sometimes competing needs that are all urgent.
So one of them is recognizing the viciousness of the
backlash but not only responding to it in a kind

(33:01):
of sensationalized way, which I think is what a lot
of mainstream media does, and instead taking a deeper look
at what is beneath it, right, And that's where we
dig into our critical race theory to help us understand,
you know, when somebody gets really mad about a fictional
character like Ariel, you know, being portrayed by Hallie Bailey.

(33:23):
I think about when I first started writing Ironheart. The
joke I always made was like, you know, at the time,
I was using Twitter a lot, and I was using
Twitter a lot to critique police and prisons and the
mayor at the time and all these like, you know,
pretty weighty political topics. And I always thought, like, so
I can go on Twitter every day and say abolish
the police. But and that's all fine, right, But if

(33:44):
I say, if I'm writing a fictional story about a
black girl who flies around and shoots laser beams out
of her hands. That that's like a problem, Like what
is that about, you know? And it's about young people,
right at the end of the day. That's part of it.
That's part of it. And I think that I think
for me, one of the challenges with the comics stuff
and the world of sci fi and star wars and

(34:05):
specular fiction and all this being grounds for these kinds
of reactionary takes is that it's really easy for people
who love you, who are outside of these industries to
say well meaning but ultimately unhelpful things like, well, that's
just a bunch of losers in abasement. They suck, they
couldn't even blah blah blah, and that stuff all might
be true, but like they're just losers in abasement until

(34:27):
they show up with a gun, right, And it takes
a toll. It's taxing, right that this this kind of language,
in this kind of experience is taxing. So I think
one of the things that's really important for us to
do is to step up and support and defend and
celebrate the folks who, you know, have received these kinds
of vicious attacks that these major media companies have had

(34:48):
a really mixed back in defending defending people and having
their back. But I think the third thing is like,
you know, man, I gotta tell these stories, like I
got to write these books. I really strike a balance
between trying to be aware and be realistic and be
safe about the folks that are out there that do
not support this type of work. It is very important

(35:10):
that I give them a mere infinitesimal fraction of the
attention that I give writing good stories, you know, for
Ben's kids to be like this, This made me feel seen.
This is my origin story. And I think that one
thing that my friends and I and these industries talk
to each other about all the time and is that
the internet is a vile place. And when I go

(35:32):
to cons, when I do signings, when I do these events,
the kid who comes up to me and hands me,
they're like kind of crumply comic book, you know, standing
there in their Black Panther costume or their Miss Marvel costume,
and you know asks if they can sit on the
table and take a picture with me. It is so
important that that person takes up tends you know, manifold

(35:55):
more time in my head. And because the moment I
stop writing for them and start writing for those other people,
what am I actually doing with the limited days I
have on this planet? It's just a waste. And the
other thing is that, you know, I'm going to quote
something that Tanahassi said earlier to me many years ago,
when when I said earlier that, like, I used to ask, like, well,

(36:16):
why is this the thing that pisses people off so much?
And he said, well, it's because they're right, They're right
that this actually is threatening. It matters, right, like it
actually really does matter. Comics as a medium were invented
in the United States, right, certainly a pastiche of many
things that had existed before, but invented in the United
States context by and large by Eastern European Jewish immigrants

(36:40):
and children of immigrants, right living in New York City.
This history has always been about you know, subjugated people
trying to tell these outlandish stories about what could be possible.
And that is scary, That is countercultural, and I believe
it remains countercultural even as these movies you know, take
over the global box office and this and that. That's

(37:01):
kind of the kernel that I'm that I'm trying to
hang onto. Well, you love amazing, Amazing. We are going
to take one more break. We were talking with Eve Ewing.
We're talking about comics and superheroes and really everything else
at this genre. This form tells about us and I
guess you could say our alter egos. We'll be right
back after the break. We are back on. Some of

(37:33):
my best friends are with the amazing Eve, you and
Holy cow Eve. There's something that's been coming up throughout
this conversation, and actually, as I think about all of
your work, there's this incredible focus on young people. And
even the moment that I played the clip of my daughter,
or when I mentioned my son, you lit up in
a way which is like almost like nothing else. And

(37:54):
I remember once we we met in a coffee shop
and my son was there, and the way you talk
to him about his bay blades, like like which these
toys he had. You are so connected to young people,
and it's so much a part of everything you do.
I mean, it's kind of wild. Yeah, I mean, thank
you for seeing that. You know, as a writer, I

(38:15):
believe that young people are very important in making literary canons.
And I believe that oftentimes people who see themselves as
serious writers don't take young readers seriously. Yeah, And I
think I don't know why other people don't take young
people seriously. To be honest with you, I was. I
was joking with a friend of mine, a friend Kaba Akbar,

(38:35):
who's a poet an also huge Simpsons fan, and he
sent me this meme yesterday of Principal Skinner on The Simpsons,
And in this meme, he's like, am I out of touch? No?
It is the children. It's the children who are wrong,
you know. And it's such a funny joke. But it's like,
I don't know about y'all, but when I was a kid,
I looked around at adults all the time, and I

(38:58):
was so aware of this obvious logical fallacy, which was
like you were like me once, right, you were like
me once, which is something you can't really say about
most social identities. But it's like everybody was a kid,
and that I just used to stand around looking at adults,
just pondering that fact, like every single one of you

(39:18):
was my age. Yeah, we're all every age we were before, right, right,
Like sandrasis Narrows teaches us, right, when you're eleven, you're
also ten and nine and eight and seven, right, And
so so I didn't understand then why it was that
adults seemed to have so little regard for the inner
life of kids. And I remember feeling that way as

(39:41):
a kid and taking myself so seriously. I took myself
so seriously as a reader and as a thinker, and
had a lot of confidence in myself that the things
that I had to say and the things that people
around me felt and thought were important. And I didn't
understand why adults didn't feel that way. And so I

(40:02):
think I kind of made a pact with myself that
I just never I just never wanted to be that person.
And it doesn't mean that I haven't failed at times.
I mean, certainly there are things that I did as
a CPS teacher that I look back at, you know,
moments of being public schools uh not not a Child
Protective Services CHOB schools teacher, um, and ways in which

(40:23):
as a teacher you get co opted into certain ways
of treating kids or acting, you know. So, so it's
not like I've always been perfect or that I'm never
messed up, but I just I just really tried to
keep that promise to myself. Um. And then I think
on a more utilitarian level as a writer, I think
that if you look around like young people reading in school,

(40:43):
for many folks, that is the most robust and consistent
reading life that they'll ever have. Um. Right, like the
frequency with which you read, having time in the day
you're marked to read and to talk to other people
about what you're reading. Right, Like most people don't have
that past high school. You come of age, you begin
to be the person that you are in your engagement

(41:04):
with literature. I believe when when you're young, and you know,
many of us, I don't know about y'all, but I
feel like I'm always chasing that like under the cover's feeling,
you know, like the feeling you have when you're a
kid reading a really great book, and you know. I
remember when I was in seventh grade, my my aunt's
boyfriend gave me a doggeared copy of Flowers for Algernon okay, um,

(41:26):
and he was like, I think you'll really like this.
And I remember reading it on this like sixteen hour
road trip and I finished it and I just was
just weeping alone in the back of the car and
didn't couldn't even say anything to anybody, you know, And
and I'm just I'm always chasing that, like I'm always
trying to reclaim that as a person who reads and
writes for a living now. And so I just think
that is when we become, in many ways who we are.

(41:49):
And that's not everybody. People have many different journeys, but
I think that's some people. Yeah, and that's fine too,
you know, but even for those even for those kids,
I think I think many people who aren't bookish kids,
there's something about storytelling that probably engaged you as a
young person, right, And that could be like a person
in your family that told really great stories. That could

(42:10):
be a movie you really loved and watched over and
over and over and over and over. You know, you
talk about Spider Verse. You know. A friend of mine
just sent me a video of her son. He's two
years old, and it's him reciting one of the opening
monologues from from into the Spider Verse, you know, from MEMBERY.
He's like, Okay, let's try this one last time. My
name is Peter Parker. You know, he's too right, That's
that's one of his earliest texts that he's making a

(42:32):
relationship with so I just think, um yeah, I just
think as a writer, I try to everything that I've
written so far, and I can't make this promise into
the future, but everything I've written so far, I've tried
to imagine that a young person of some age could
read and enjoy. I feel very affirmed by what you said, Ben,
because I just want to be a person who takes

(42:55):
young people seriously, and I have to. I'd be really
remiss and probably in big trouble in case you ever
hears this if I didn't give a shout out to
my mom, because when I was a kid, my mom
always said children are to be seen and listen to. Um,
oh that's great, said that all the time. Yeah, and
then she would always be like, you know, I would
get an arguments a mom, and she'd be like, it's

(43:15):
so annoying how I raised you to express your opinion.
Because I really don't want to have this argument with
you right now. But like, but I but it's my
own fault, Like I'm being punished for encouraging you to
to speak up all the time. Yeah. I just want
to say this has been really wonderful. Keep doing what
you're doing. Thank you. That's a that's a Black proverb.

(43:37):
Keep doing what you're doing. We are we are grateful
for your contributions. I have to say I wore this
T shirt just for you today. Black scholars Matter. Thank you.
I appreciate that's right, but you are way more than
that and just excited to see what is in the
future for you. And I'm going to keep reading Ironheart.

(43:58):
You can count on it. Thank you, and Khalil, I
meant it when I said, you know, for me, when
people say this is the first comic book I've ever read,
that's a huge compliment because I do want this to
feel like a welcoming space that hasn't always been welcoming
to lots of people, So that means a lot to me,
and I appreciate you giving it a shot. Awesome. Thanks
than thanks for joining us today. Thanks so much. Thanks Kalil,

(44:28):
So Khalil, Uh huh what's the superpower that you would want?
Oh man, put me on the spot. Come on, I
kind of think, I don't know, this seems so lame,
but reading people's minds, m you don't already have that power.

(44:49):
You seem so discerning. I'm pretty good at it, but man,
it'd be it'd be wonderful to know. I'm right. Interesting, Interesting,
you're a snoop. You're a snoop. So I think teleportation
would be cool, you know, just to get somewhere really fast.
But then listening to Eve talk about having a long
trip and reading an entire book, I kind of like that.
I've been thinking after speaking with Eve about what her

(45:12):
superpower is. And I know, I know she's like, I'm
just an ordinary, you know, citizen doing my job kind
of stuff. You know, I don't want the distance between
me and everybody else to be that great, right, But
talking with her, man, this this combination of her intellect
and her analysis and just how smart she is and

(45:33):
also how at the same time how empathetic she is,
how caring, Yes, and those two things she has the
analysis of the caring and the empathy, and it's it's
part of her intelligence and vice versa, and that is
really rare. That's a superpower. Yeah right, yeah, I think
that's right. And I think that's what makes her appetite

(45:55):
and curiosity for trying to make sense of really complicated things.
And here's the other side of it. Just to explicate
what you're saying and then do it for young people,
like to say, I want young people to see how
this works in the way that adults sometimes figure it out.

(46:16):
But they shouldn't have to wait. They have every right
to understand this stuff as much as anybody and to
be part of the story. That's that is a rare
gift that she has. And the thing she said about
about when she was assigned to add to reread William's
story ironhout story of asking that question like who are

(46:37):
her people right, who cares about her? Who loves her? Yeah,
and and thinking about that that wider world that's connected
with what you just said. It's like it's both just
being like a good writer and thinker, but it is
thinking about this larger community, you know, especially for this
this young this black girl, Like who does she need
in her world to bolster her? That's to keep her going.

(46:59):
And it also cuts against traditions in the canon of
Western literature, which is generally about the individual protagonist who
by dint of their superpowers, can do everything on their own.
And what she's saying is actually, we need each other.
And in a way, that's the story of Wakanda, that's
the story of black Panther as a series. I mean,

(47:21):
that's kind of the intervention that's happening in this Marvel universe,
and that that scary collectivism that folks on the right
are basically saying, all this race stuff in these racial
representations are going to be the ruin of us. And
guess what, they're right, We're coming. I'm glad you're getting
into comics and you're getting into superheroes because you're seeing that,

(47:44):
you're seeing that it is just like the real world,
that it's a way to make sense of it, in
the way to expand our understanding and our imagination. And
guess what, there's this whole field of afrofuturism that uses
comics as the way it will imagine a future that's
different than the present. And that makes me feel better
because sometimes it's all this stuff we talk about can
be a little depressing. So I'm going to read more

(48:06):
comic books in twenty twenty three. All right, well, I
love you, Love you too. Some of My Best Friends
Are is a production of Pushkin Industries. The show is
written and hosted by me Khalil, Gibron Mohammed, and my
best friend Ben Austin. It's produced by Jonasanti and Lucy Sullivan.

(48:29):
Our editor is Sarah Knicks, our engineer is Amanda Kawan,
and our managing producer is Katonstanza Gallardo. At Pushkin thanks
to Leita Mulad, Julia Barton, Heather Faine, Carly Migliori, John Schnars,
Greta Khne, and Jacob Weisberg. Our theme song, Little Lily,

(48:50):
is by fellow chicagoan the brilliant Avery R. Young, from
his album Tubman. You definitely want to check out his
music at his website Avery R. Young dot com. You
can find Pushkin on all social platforms at pushkin Pods,
and you can sign up for our newsletter at pushkin
dot fm. To find more Pushkin podcast as listening on

(49:10):
the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you like to listen.
And if you like our show, please give us a
five star rating and a review and listen. Even if
you don't like it, give it a five star rating
and a review, and please tell all of your best
friends about it. Thank you for yeoh. Earlier in the

(49:39):
episode when you said, Wakanda, what accent was that? What
are you talking about? That's Chad Bowsman. I'm just I'm
just keeping I've keeping the accent alive. I don't know,
all right. So I found out the secret that Eve
couldn't tell us about what Marvel comics she's writing. She's
actually writing the new Black Panther comic. Holy smokes, Really, man,
it's gonna be amazing. Yes it is. I can't wait.