Planet Hulk Revisited: Greg Pak on Legacies and New Frontiers

In Part Two of our conversation, Greg Pak takes us back to one of the defining stories of his career — the original Planet Hulk saga. He shares behind-the-scenes insights into crafting the epic that redefined the Green Goliath, and teases a brand-new chapter arriving this fall, reuniting the full creative team that launched the original classic.

We also dive into the origins of Amadeus Cho, the boy genius who would become the Totally Awesome Hulk, and discuss the character’s impact on readers and representation. Greg speaks candidly about the sense of responsibility that comes with writing modern takes on Asian heroes, balancing authenticity with the larger-than-life demands of superhero storytelling.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hi, everybody, Welcome back time again for Word Balloon, the
Comic Book Conversation Show. John stuntris here with Part two
of my conversation with Greg Pack. Always love to talk
to Greg. I've been talking to him for twenty years.
It started around the time of Planet Hulk. It's the
twentieth anniversary of Hulk, and we were a mid conversation
about the character, but more importantly to talk about a
new chapter to the Planet Hulk saga that's coming out soon,

(00:23):
because again it's the twentieth anniversary and it's an interesting
between the raindrops story and I'll like Greg explain details,
but we also talk about the fact that Greg is
half Korean and sometimes gets called upon to write stories
with Asians in the story villains and heroes, and how
Greg goes about depicting them, and really we take a

(00:46):
nice walk through comic book history and some of the
more unfortunate stereotype depictions of vasions that started in the
late thirties and early forties, and how things have improved,
but the concerns that Greg still has when he tries
approaches the story today. All that in Part two of
my conversation with Greg Pack on today's word Balloon. Word

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Speaker 2 (02:22):
So.

Speaker 3 (02:22):
Okay, so this is the actually this is the cover
of Planet Hulk World Breaker, which was a sequel story
that we did, which is set, you know, two thousand
years after Planet Hulk.

Speaker 2 (02:33):
But coming up on.

Speaker 3 (02:36):
This October, we've got a new book called Return to
Planet Hulk because it's the twentieth anniversary of the original
Planet Hulk storyline.

Speaker 2 (02:43):
I know, I know. Can you believe it? I can't.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
No, I can't, honestly, Greg, that's insane that it's been twenties.
I know, it's close, it's I got it. Yeah, when
I first started talking to each.

Speaker 2 (02:54):
Other, I know exactly.

Speaker 3 (02:56):
Well now I guess, I guess the gray, the gray
on our temples and in my beard tells the tale.
So twenty years certainly half passed according to my beard.
But but yeah, I know it's really hard to even understand.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
But but there we are.

Speaker 3 (03:12):
It's the twentieth anniversary of Planet Hulk. Planet Hulk is
the big storyline that we did in two thousand and five,
two thousand and six that told the story of what
happens to the Hulk when a bunch of so called
heroes decided he's too dangerous for Earth and they shoot
him into space and he ends up on an alien
planet where he's forced to become a gladiator and then becomes.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
He helps escape that leads.

Speaker 3 (03:36):
A revolution, and it's it's a huge, big epic story,
planetary romance, Planet Hulk.

Speaker 1 (03:44):
And yeah, and he comes back to Earth that he's pissed, Yeah, exactly,
and he's got and he's got a cadre of other
alien gladiators with him that are about to help him. Yeah,
that Planet Hulk and World War A Hulk epic stuff. Man.
And and I hear what you're saying about the Breath
of the Hulk. Uh, you know, entire franchise and stuff
like that. But truly, it doesn't surprise me twenty years

(04:07):
later that we're going to get a return so without
spoiling Yeah.

Speaker 3 (04:13):
So the return to Plane, it's a one shot. It's
a it's it's a it's an oversized one shot, and
it takes place. It's an incontinuity story never been told
that takes place in the middle of the Planet Hulk storyline,
and we got back Carlo Pagulayan, who is the original
artist of that first chapters of the first chapter is

(04:33):
a Planet Hulk and uh, and Chrys Soto Mayor came
back to color, and I believe and Joe Joe Carl
Bagna also lettered I believe and yes, and so it's
and and Mark Pinicicia, who is the editor back in
the day, is the editor again and yes, who was
getting the getting the old team back together. And it's
been it's just been a blast. So it takes place

(04:53):
after issue ninety five, so, which is the first after
the first four issues of Planet Hole. There's this little
moment where this story fits in, and you're going to see, uh,
some pretty cool new things. It's it's a moment you're
going to see a Hulk having kind of a frontier

(05:14):
moment of uh. You know, like at this point in
the story, he has helped the uh. He's he's basically
freed the gladiators from the Great Arena, you know, and
headed off into the Twisted Wood and all these people
are following him. So now suddenly the Hulk, who just
wants to be left alone is being followed by hundreds

(05:37):
of people, uh and who sudden suddenly are expecting him
to be their leader.

Speaker 1 (05:43):
And Spartacus kind of the yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:46):
Yeah, yeah, but imagine Spartacus, and Spartacus doesn't want to
have a damn thing to.

Speaker 2 (05:49):
Do with any of this.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
And yeah, so and and and it's about it's about
the Hulk. You know, Kenny trust these people? Can he
trust himself? Most specifically? You know, they're these conflicting myths
in Planet Hulk about the uh soccer son and the
world Breaker.

Speaker 2 (06:05):
The soccer son who saves us in the World Breaker
who destroys us? All? Which one is the Hulk? You know?

Speaker 3 (06:10):
And so this is the whole grappling with those questions.
You are going to see, Uh, you're going to see
something of the Hulk you've never seen on Planet Hulk.
I won't go into that in more depth here. I'll
let you find that out when you read it. And
you're also going to see a community that we encounter
in Planet Hulk but don't in the original storyline. We

(06:34):
didn't have as much time to explore it. But this
in this in this issue, you're gonna see a lot
more of that specific community. So it's it's a big
fun story and I hope you enjoy it and it
comes out I believe on October eighth as well. Yes,
it does come on on October eighth, because I'm doing
a signing. I'm doing a signing for it at Midtown
Comics the day before. Yeah, yeah, the day before. The

(06:56):
New York Comic Con starts that night before.

Speaker 2 (06:57):
So yeah, And if you're in New York you don't
have tickets to the con Wednesday night, come on by.

Speaker 3 (07:02):
For free and get your you know, like you don't
you don't have to pay a con price to come
get your planet.

Speaker 2 (07:06):
Hole returned the Planet. Holk signed at Midtown Comics that.

Speaker 1 (07:09):
A boy, that sounds great, James great line. Yeah, yeah, man, Yeah.
Black Bolt and black Bolts in the Hulk on the
Moon that drying that.

Speaker 2 (07:24):
Well. John Ramina told me later that that that line.

Speaker 3 (07:27):
Okay, So this is a point in Planet in in
World War Hulk when the Hulk is coming back to
Greek vengeance and all these people and he has a
big fight with with black Bolt, and uh, you know
black Bolt's voice, if he speaks, he can like knock
down cities and everything, and uh, he like sustains one
of his attacks. You know where we're black Bolt says

(07:48):
the smallest word and then stop and.

Speaker 1 (07:55):
You know, verberations from his voice is like a tornado.
It's the Bulk and.

Speaker 2 (08:03):
The whole I didn't come for a whisper.

Speaker 3 (08:05):
I want to hear you scream and uh and and
and it was a big flash page with the Hulk looking,
you know, incredible, all wrecked but incredibly you know, badass
and ready to tear. And John Revie told me later
that that line, when he read that in the script,
that was when he was like, Okay, I'm going to
do this book.

Speaker 2 (08:23):
It's fantastic, which was great, you know.

Speaker 1 (08:25):
Come on, absolutely, no, that's that's huge. I get it.
And and really that's something like yeah, he's been mad
before and stuff, but really to be betrayed by the
heroes and also kind of in fairness, they're like, oh no,
we're gonna we're gonna dump on this very nice pastoral planet.

Speaker 2 (08:43):
It'll be fine.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
And then of course something happens to the spaceship that
popped him on and instead he went up and Gladiator planet.
All fine now, and he was it was really like Bruce,
it really wasn't Bruce inside hulks by this was really
Hulk but more aware, And how would you describe his
cognitive ability?

Speaker 3 (09:03):
I mean, my my take on Bruce and Hulk is
probably a little controversial in the sense that I think that, like,
you know, they're the same person, Like I don't. I
don't think it's like I'm not really big on the
concept of a split personality. I just think it's like,
you know, this is Bruce Banner, who you know, he's
he had under different conditions, He's going to react differently,

(09:26):
and so I mean, he he hates himself, and so
you know, like this Hulk hating Branner is all part
of that, right. You know, He's racked with guilt for
many reasons in his life, and so the fact that
those two hate each other makes sense.

Speaker 2 (09:44):
That's his inner conflict.

Speaker 3 (09:45):
But and to me, different versions of the Hulk come
about because you know, because Banner's going through different things
in his life, you know what I mean. But you know,
like if he's when he's unable to deal with certain things,
that's when you get the whole who can't even communicate,
you know what I mean, Like can't can't talk. I mean,
that's this is I mean, this is the way I

(10:05):
think about it, you know.

Speaker 1 (10:06):
But that's great.

Speaker 2 (10:08):
But so during Planet Hulk, the Hulk finds himself on.

Speaker 3 (10:11):
A planet where he uh, he can be cut, he
can bleed, he could conceivably be killed.

Speaker 2 (10:18):
So so this isn't this isn't.

Speaker 3 (10:21):
Dumb Hulk, you know what I mean, This isn't savage Hulk.
This in order to survive, he has to be he
has to let himself be a more cunning exactly.

Speaker 2 (10:30):
And so you get, uh.

Speaker 3 (10:32):
I mean, he kinda he kind of talks like Clint Eastwood,
you know what I mean, Like he's he says very little,
but he's always watching, you know what I mean. And
and uh, he's making plans and figuring things out, trying
to you know, trying to survive. And he's mad all
the time. He's mad all the time. So he's not
you know, he's he's the whole all the time. He's
also the whole all the time. Because if he turns
back into Banner, he'll he'll get killed instantly.

Speaker 2 (10:55):
By something, you know.

Speaker 3 (10:56):
So but uh, yeah, so Banner, I mean Banner as
Banner appears twice during the course of the storyline, and
when he does. It's for real, specific reasons, and I
think the I mean, it makes a lot of sense,
and it's it.

Speaker 2 (11:12):
It works. I'm really glad the way we pulled that off.

Speaker 3 (11:14):
But but yeah, it was we were I think you
never know when a story is going to hit or
if a story is really going to hit big, and
in retrospect you can kind of see why, you know
what I mean. Like with every single thing that we do,
we are trying to make the very best book we can,
and lots of times we make books we think are
pretty fricking great, and yet they don't take off the

(11:36):
same way. Sometimes you make a book that that you
did your best on, but you know it's not perfect,
and yet that book takes off, you know what I mean,
because it's the right place in the right time. Planet
Hark was one of those things where it felt like
all those things came together. I think we made what
we felt was a real passionate book that we cared
about deeply and we thought was pretty darn great, and
somehow the world seemed to agree and it really took off.

(11:58):
I think one of the reasons it took off was
because people were just ready for a Hulk centric story,
you know, where you really spend most of your time
with the Hulk. As the Hulk, there had been this
amazing run by Bruce Jones that had happened before, and
that was really focused on Banner. You know, like you
saw a whole lot of Banner and that was it

(12:18):
was really cool, really cool. But you know, after after
folks have seen something for a while, they're off, they're
ready for something else, and uh, you know, and kind
of similarly the way we did this, you know, this
this kind of sci fi fantasy adventure Hulk and then
later on, you know, other creators took you know, like
the Horror Hulk absolutely took off.

Speaker 2 (12:40):
People were just ready for that. So different different times,
different artinnations.

Speaker 3 (12:44):
We were lucky to you know, to hit at a
time when people were people were feeling what we were throwing.

Speaker 2 (12:50):
So it was it was pretty sweet.

Speaker 1 (12:53):
When you because you did a great novelization of the
story as well. What what areas of or were you
able to expand in the novelization?

Speaker 3 (13:02):
Oh well, yeah, well the most significant thing is that
we have a different ending to the novel.

Speaker 2 (13:09):
Uh and uh, it.

Speaker 3 (13:11):
Was and I think folks who love Planet Hulk I
highly recommend the novel because if you love Planet Hulk,
I think you're going to love the ending of the
Planet Hulk novel. I'm not gonna say any more than that,
but it's absolutely But but we also were able just
to get into people's heads more here and there. Actually

(13:32):
Amadaea's show who does have a role. He he has
a little bit more of an ongoing role in the novel,
like as somebody who's always you know, throughout the story
you kind of cut back to him trying to figure
out how to how to help the Hulk, how to
reach reach the Hulk and find the Hulk can help
him home, which was cool, you know, like it wasn't
necessary in the comics, but in the novel, we had

(13:55):
a little more room, and it adds a little more
dimension and it sort of helps to increase the sense
of possibility of different outcomes.

Speaker 2 (14:02):
And different stories and increase the poignancy of certain moments.
So that was great.

Speaker 3 (14:06):
And then we got to do just kind of fun
things with with ancillary characters, you know, like we had
we had a lot of uh.

Speaker 2 (14:14):
Sort of stories within the story.

Speaker 3 (14:16):
You know, we're different Imperial officers and and and people
had these kind of big moments in in individual issues
and in the novel we're gonna go into that in
more depth and sort of flesh out those characters a
little bit more and show what they're thinking. And and uh,
that was just a ton of fun, and I think
again it sort of deepens the feel of the world

(14:38):
and and increases the stakes, the emotional steaks for the
whole thing.

Speaker 1 (14:43):
Also, there was also an audio dramatization.

Speaker 3 (14:46):
Yes, yes, no, no, I did not, but they.

Speaker 2 (14:53):
I thought it was awesome. They they uh they.

Speaker 1 (14:58):
It is a full cast.

Speaker 3 (14:59):
Yeah, exactly, No, it's a whole it's a whole deal.
It's really cool. They came to me they wanted to
know pronunciations of characters names, which was fun. And then
they also let me do I've got a little voice
clip in there somewhere. They let me record a little
line that they stuck in the cameo at some point.

Speaker 1 (15:17):
Yeah. Yeah, it's funny, nice, that's hilarious. And also what
did you I mean? And we might have discussed this before,
but while we're on the subject and everything, obviously everyone
knows that Thor Ragnarok had a lot of fun at
Hulk in it. Yeah, yeah, yeah, how do you think
did with your story?

Speaker 3 (15:38):
Yeah, yeah, I know this is a little controversial within
the ranks of Hulk fandom, but I love.

Speaker 2 (15:45):
The movie, I thought. I mean, I've got a.

Speaker 3 (15:47):
Big goofy sense of humor and and and I love
stories that combine adventure and humor and heart. And it
was I mean, it's it's probably my favorite Marvel movie,
you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (15:56):
Just I mean, I'm biased, of course, because.

Speaker 1 (15:58):
It it's my favorite Toor movie, and I know I
think it's up there for my top five.

Speaker 3 (16:04):
So I so, I I got a huge kick out
of it. Of course, it doesn't have sort of the
gravity I mean, like the Planet Hulk part of it
stuff does not have the gravity of the original Planet
Cloak story.

Speaker 2 (16:15):
It doesn't.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
It's not that it because it's because the story, I mean,
the the movie kind of takes that as half of
its inspiration and takes other inspiration from other things. And
so it's it's it's kind of like a you know,
like a setting, but less of it's it's not about
that epic story, but which is fine and uh and
you know, and and keeps hope alive that someday Marvel

(16:36):
will hire me to write the you know, like the whatever,
the twenty episode Prestige's television version, or the or the
three you know, the three hour the three three hour
movie trilogy of Planet Hulk for the big screen.

Speaker 2 (16:52):
I could write and direct that. I'm available. I'm available.
I'll play the Red I'll even play the Red King
if you want me to.

Speaker 1 (16:58):
So, yeah, where's Amidia's show these days? In in the
kind of do we know?

Speaker 3 (17:04):
We just did because it's also Amidas chose twentieth anniversary.
So a few months ago we had a twentieth anniversary
uh uh celebration book with Amadeus with three stories.

Speaker 2 (17:18):
And uh it was a that was a blast too.

Speaker 3 (17:21):
Uh And and I got to get back to here
with yeah, oh thanks, I got to get back to
go Takmazawa, who is the original co creator of that character.
We did three different stories, one set uh during Amadeus's
time with Hercules, A one set during uh Amadeus's time

(17:41):
as the totally awesome Hulk you know, uh later on
the line. And yeah, so we yeah, we yeah, we
set different stories in different eras and uh, it was
just yeah, it was it was a it was a lark.
It was fun and In the end, Amadeus now has
a set of armor.

Speaker 2 (17:58):
Uh that uh, you know.

Speaker 3 (18:00):
Because he so he had been he had taken on
the powers of the Hulk, uh to save Bruce Banner
from his curse. Uh and that and we did that
for you know, for a couple of years that with
Amadeus was the Hulk. Eventually he uh he and then
he lost his mind. He hulked out because he's a hulk,
and that happens and then uh and then his power

(18:21):
is kind of scaled back, and he sort of and
he became brawn and so he was sort of permanently
in this he basically has like got the body of
a linebacker, not a linebacker of a of like a
quarterback or a uh. Actually he's more like the body
of a really booked up U N B.

Speaker 2 (18:38):
A center, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (18:39):
He's like seventy tall, but he's not like he's not
like muscle bound like that. He's kind of and he's yeah,
he's he's pretty hot, he's pretty cool. But but and
he and he's in control of his faculties and stuff.

Speaker 2 (18:51):
But at the but but in one.

Speaker 3 (18:53):
Of these stories, he's he's still i mean, the big
thing with Amadeis is that he's young, and he's he's
not really the reason he he bonded with Banner in
the first place is because he has impulse control issues
and he's not in control of his emotions all the time,
and he's liable. Even though he's so brilliant, he makes
all these goofy mistakes because he can't.

Speaker 2 (19:12):
Control his emotional life.

Speaker 3 (19:13):
And that's kind of the ongoing theme of his whole thing.
That's why we love that that kid. But at the
end of this storyline, he's got this set of armor
that will appear around him if he starts to freak out,
you know what I mean, if he starts to lose
his temper. This instead of him hulking out and becoming
dangerous and becoming a savage hulk, we could wreck things.

Speaker 2 (19:37):
This armor. He's basically got this.

Speaker 3 (19:39):
Kind of nanobot thing going around where he'll you know,
he'll look normal. But then if he if he gets
over emotional in a dangerous way, this technology will absorb
that energy and turn it into armor that surrounds him.
It's like literal emotional armor, how about that. But it's yeah,
so it's a fun kind of new power. And look,

(20:02):
that's based on emotion, which is what the Hulk stuff
should be, you know what I mean, Like, if you're
going to do something with the Hul kids, should be
based on emotional some kind of emotional control issues.

Speaker 2 (20:11):
So uh and so you know, so there's new possibilities
with Ama Dance there.

Speaker 1 (20:16):
You know, take me back to that period when you
were when when I'm a Dance Show was the Hult.
Greery Williams was iron Heart and all the all the
major heroes. I think Sam Wilson was cap during that
period as well, and everything. And you know, obviously that
was that was slightly controversial, and I don't even say
for my own from my own opinion, Greg, I thought

(20:38):
it was great that these characters became these legacy characters.
My only complaint was I wanted room for both. I
wanted Bruce to be there with Ama Dance, yeah, and
Sam to be together. And I wanted Tony other than
just being the ghost in the machine, to the for
Reery as well. So you know what was that like
when you were writing that. I'm sure you got some pushback.

Speaker 2 (21:01):
Well, yeah, you know, I I kind of ignored it.
I mean, I can't I can't.

Speaker 3 (21:07):
You know, like, no matter what you do, somebody is
not going to be happy with it. But you know,
like I I mean, I think the fans know that
I freaking love Bruce.

Speaker 2 (21:16):
Banner, you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (21:17):
And and uh and uh and so we had I mean,
and I appreciate the goodwill that folks gave us and
the room they gave us. Uh And and we did these,
you know as part of that run. I mean, uh,
there were bigger storylines going on in the Marvel universe
that and and Bruce got killed, but as part of

(21:41):
our whole thing, we we made the most of that.
And we really, you know, we we uh so.

Speaker 2 (21:49):
Much of that.

Speaker 3 (21:50):
The you know, the first part of that series centered
around Bruce's you know, murder uh and death and Amides
and you know, Amades had you know, there was there
was a send off. I mean, we did a whole
three issue thing and uh Amadeus's reactions to that and
how that affected all the rest of the whole cast.

(22:10):
So so Bruce may or not have. You know, at
a certain point, Bruce was dead, but he was still
reverberating through the book, which totally felt appropriate. And uh,
but yeah, and at the same time. You know, then
the you know, characters have to grow and develop and
be be the characters they're going to be. And so
we had other stories that were not Bruce centric, and

(22:31):
and all kinds of other things happened, and it was great.
I mean the thing about and I you know, I
I totally get it, you know what I mean, Like
if you're if you were really committed to certain characters,
if those are the characters you really want to see,
then you're not.

Speaker 2 (22:50):
You know, you're you're not.

Speaker 3 (22:52):
You're under no obligation to jump onto something new if
that's not gonna do what you want to do. And
one of the nice things about comics is that, I mean,
I I don't know if I'm supposed to say this,
but stuff comes back, you know what I mean? Like, uh,
like most of the characters get killed off will eventually
come back, and uh and and there's there's always gonna

(23:13):
be another bite of that apple and cool thing's gonna
happen again.

Speaker 2 (23:16):
And also also you know, we gotta we gotta.

Speaker 3 (23:20):
Have room to breathe and try new things all the time,
you know what I mean? And not not everything is
gonna swing, but we're gonna have fun trying and and
hopefully folks will have fun reading it.

Speaker 1 (23:30):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (23:31):
The uh, and I have.

Speaker 3 (23:32):
Hugely appreciated folks who have you know, given all the
different stuff I've I've done with these different characters.

Speaker 2 (23:38):
Over the years A shot.

Speaker 3 (23:41):
I Uh, Absolutely, the Hulk fans have been amazing. I
mean I've had so many people talk about like I mean,
and I mean all the Hulk fans, you know what
I mean, Like I mean because there are fans who
love the Planet Hulk stuff, the Bruce Banner stuff. They're
fans who loved Ahmadais. They're fans who love Scar, you know,

(24:02):
like I've had. I've had a Scar son of Hulk,
who's another you know, Hulks exactly. But and folks who
have been you know, I I've you know, at different
cons and signings, Folks who have been really who've cared
a lot about those characters, have said some things to
me that really.

Speaker 2 (24:19):
Blew my mind and really moved me.

Speaker 1 (24:20):
You know.

Speaker 3 (24:21):
I mean I had I had somebody tell me that, well, yeah,
that that the Scar story for example. Uh, there was
somebody who told me that that story just really meant
a lot to them because they had a really fraught
relationship with their parents, you know. And Scar's whole thing
is he'd been abandoned by his father who never knew
he existed on this this wrecked planet, alien planet, and

(24:45):
he's just held bent on coming and punishing this father
who abandoned him. So it's all about, you know, about
abandonment and and it's really also about domestic violence because
you know, because Bruce's whole thing is also that he
was beaten by his father and so he's kind.

Speaker 2 (24:59):
Of terrified of fatherhood and terrified of and.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
Bruce became the thing exactly that you know, frustrated him,
and now he's a dead beat, a weird one.

Speaker 2 (25:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (25:10):
Yeah, So all of that, I mean, I'd love writing
the whole also because like all of that emotional stuff
is just that's just part of the character. Peter Peter,
like folks like Peter David may he rest in peace.
They uh, just brought unvarnished emotion into these stories, you know,
without any you know, irony or hesitation, you know, and

(25:32):
that's been there from the very beginning. When you have
a character, well from the not from the very very beginning,
I mean, in the very very beginning, Hulk was really
a werewolf who came out, you know exactly. But then
you know, fairly soon they kind of figured out like
emotion is going to be the trigger here and that, uh,
and that I think when that when they when they
kind of cracked that anything was possible. And I think

(25:54):
the Hulk is one of the simplest Marvel characters and
the very best because because that's that simple, that simple
connection of emotion, you know, to this as a trigger
for this character gives you just so many different things
you can do and so many different kinds of stories
you can you can play with.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
So did you.

Speaker 1 (26:16):
Ever have a chance to talk to Peter directly about
the character? Yeah?

Speaker 2 (26:20):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (26:22):
You know what you lean from those conversations, I.

Speaker 3 (26:25):
Mean, Peter's uh, I think Peter. Peter was a showman, right,
you know, and so Peter had like like kind of
set stories he loved to tell on panels and all
of that. So it was mostly hearing him, you know,
tell those stories several times that but they've been impressed
on my mind. But like I I mean, he was
totally right, and he had so much fun talking about
those first four issues of the Hulk, the original Hulk

(26:48):
series from what nineteen sixty two, right, And and the
fact that everything that he did, like the way Peter
would say it is, everything that he did is in
his run was done in those first few issues.

Speaker 2 (27:00):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (27:01):
Like and and so he was just like playing with
the immense possibility that was present in this character from
the beginning. And I mean Peter is famous for how
long was it like a ten year run on the
Hulk or something like that, Yeah, and for just introducing
all these different incarnations of the Hulk and playing with

(27:23):
the Yeah, I mean he had this all these different
like Joe fix It Professor Hulk, and you know, like
he had all these different ways of playing with the character.
And but he would say, you know, like, you know,
in those first few issues, you had the you know,
the kind of savag Hulk is out of control. You've
got the the the underpinnings of the Joe fix It Hulk,

(27:45):
who's the who basically talks like because the Hulk in
those first few issues often he basically talks like.

Speaker 2 (27:50):
Jimmy Cagney, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (27:52):
And he's like like like he's literally saying things like
you know, it's like this, see you know what I mean,
like you know what you're talking about. I mean, I
could find the thing and do it to find the
actually do that better. But so that kind of you know,
that that kind of hard ass, smart talking gray Hulk,
the core of you know, the the German germination of

(28:14):
that is right there.

Speaker 2 (28:15):
And then he's also you know, he's also the werewolf.

Speaker 3 (28:18):
Hulk, and he's the I mean, I the funniest thing
I remember Peter Peter saying was that because Peter had
a thing where Professor Hulk was basically like the Hulk,
big savage body, but with a kind of handsome face
and head like kind of normal looking, not like savage looking.

(28:38):
Uh face and head and and and uh and and
intelligent mind, you know what I mean.

Speaker 2 (28:43):
Like he had all the faculties of Banner.

Speaker 3 (28:45):
So he was like like sort of the best of
the best, right but uh But Peter joked about the
fact that in that and I'm gonna get this wrong,
but there's this some kind of scene in those first
few issues. I think it might be an issue for
something where the there is a Hulk like Hulk what
it Hulk for some reason hasn't transferred fully and he's

(29:07):
wearing like he has a banner head but the Hulk body.

Speaker 2 (29:11):
But then you know that and so on.

Speaker 3 (29:15):
Top of that, and so where they so he's like
the same, They pull off the mask and he's got
like the normal head and it's like Peters are.

Speaker 2 (29:21):
All there, It's all right there, you know. So that's hilarious,
like that stuff.

Speaker 1 (29:25):
You know, remember they did in the cartoon and though
Marvel Superheroes cartoons they did, they showed that, which is insane.
But yeah, I mean, and you know, I love I
love those cartoons. I have no apologies on my part
for loving those cartoons. You know, I know it's limited animation.

Speaker 3 (29:42):
Oh yeah, yeah, exactly, No, no, no, it's like, yeah, you
gotta love that stuff.

Speaker 2 (29:46):
I mean.

Speaker 3 (29:46):
So, so Peter was great at I mean, Peter told
hilarious stories. But also at the core of that story
is giving credit to the original creators, you know what
I mean, Like he's he's crediting those He's crediting you know,
like Stan and Jack for for yeah, for trying all
this fun stuff and and creating the Other thing that
Peter would say is that in that first issue of

(30:08):
The Hulk, it's incredible because issue number one you know,
you introduce Hulk Banner, General Ross, Betty Banner, Rick Jones,
and Glenn Talbot.

Speaker 2 (30:23):
So it's the it's a full cast.

Speaker 3 (30:26):
It's everybody in need, you know what I mean, it's
full supporting cast, and all of those characters except for
Glenn Talbot, who had an untimely end, remain remain core
to that character to the very end, you know, I.

Speaker 1 (30:41):
Mean to the exact Philip Phillips still playing with Betty
and everything and exactly.

Speaker 3 (30:49):
And you know, that's that's kind of an astonishing achievement
to sort of, like in that very first issue, to
have so fully figured out that that supporting tast to
creative supporting cast that is so so so right for
the character and provides so much, you know, so much
interpersonal dynamic that that can be sustained for all these years.

(31:10):
I mean, so many of the comics that we love
so much, the supporting cast that is the the current
supporting cast is very different from what was there at
the very beginning.

Speaker 2 (31:19):
You know, sometimes it's the same, but uh, but there's
just a lot of development. I mean, like you know, like.

Speaker 3 (31:26):
I mean so much of like Superman's you know, ethos
or or stuff, comes. Actually this is more about Superman's
powers and stuff that developed over time enormously. I mean,
I guess most of Superman's spporting cast was there pretty early,
right was I'm trying to remember that first issue of Supervis.

Speaker 1 (31:43):
There wasn't an editor, but Jimmy came a couple of
years later.

Speaker 2 (31:47):
There you go. So yeah, that's yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (31:52):
The other thing too, is that and and Diverard Hulk
fans will likely know this, but if you're just a
general fan, you know, they did six issues of the
whole and it kind of failed, so they stepped away
from it for a while and then came back to it.
But you're absolutely right those first six issues for being
silver Raged stories, I wanted depth in them despite being

(32:12):
silver Raged Stories and everything.

Speaker 3 (32:13):
I mean, you just got this great foundation and and
and so I'm going to do Peter a solid And also,
you know, sort of as a tribute to Peter, Peter
gave all those guys credit. I want to give Peter
credit because so much of the work that I did
was U would not have been possible without contributions of Peter,

(32:35):
David and Bill Mantlow in particular. You know what I
mean because I spent so much time thinking about Bruce
Banner's relationship to his father and Scar's relationship to Bruce,
and those family dynamics were established by Bill Mantlow and
Peter and that that whole family history of abuse was
something that that those two writers really fleshed out and

(32:58):
and built into the character, which is essential to that character.

Speaker 2 (33:02):
I think.

Speaker 3 (33:02):
You know, when you think about a character who's motivated
by motivated and terrified by his own anger, you know,
like this this whole you know, like like having a
fury this this father who is uh, you know, a
furious abusive father, like those things, that feels like an
essential part of understanding the character. And they brought that

(33:25):
to the character fairly late in the game. And that's
but that's so key. I mean, that's that was key
to my.

Speaker 2 (33:30):
To my run anyway.

Speaker 3 (33:31):
So so thank you to both Bruce. I meant both
Bill Mantelow and Peter David.

Speaker 1 (33:36):
When you created Amada's show. Was there an editorial edict?
Because it's great? Obviously people likely know that Greg is Korean, uh,
and this show is Korean, which is great. And now
we and and truly I I beyond show. I'm hard
pressed to think of Korean heroes in Marvel or DC Greg.

Speaker 3 (33:58):
Well, yeah, I mean they're They're definitely are some more
I think I'm gonna ask. I mean, so Amas came
about because the editors have this notion of giving you know,
some new writers, new to Marvel writers a shot at
taking an old Marvel name from like a timely name

(34:19):
from you know, from from from the forties or fifties
and uh and reimagining that as a character.

Speaker 2 (34:26):
Now, you know.

Speaker 3 (34:27):
So I took this name mastermind Eccello just because I
thought it was so big and goofy and uh and
it just made me think of like some brainiac kid,
you know.

Speaker 2 (34:36):
And then I.

Speaker 3 (34:37):
And and so uh and and Homed s Jo came
out of that.

Speaker 2 (34:42):
I knew that.

Speaker 3 (34:43):
I mean, I'm I'm a Korean American writer, and I
have always tried to include folks in my stories that
look like the folks in the world that I inhabit.
So I uh, I mean, not just Asian Americans, but
all kinds of folks. I'm I'm like, you know, like
that's but yeah, with a I mean, I definitely have

(35:05):
had a special eye open for putting you know, non
stereotypical and three dimensional Asian American characters in the world,
And in particular at that moment, I was like, Marvel
does not have an Asian American kid who.

Speaker 2 (35:18):
Talks too much, you know, and I mean the talks
too much.

Speaker 3 (35:23):
Was just like, I've been writing these kind of terse characters,
and I wanted a character who just like said everything
that was in his head. Also, because that goes against
one of the Asian American stereotypes, you know, this idea
of like inscrutable, you know what I mean, like the stoic,
silent Asian, you know, wise Asian person. I wanted just
a kid who flapped his app all the time and

(35:44):
got into trouble because of it, you know.

Speaker 2 (35:48):
So and that's you know, so those are you know,
some of the.

Speaker 3 (35:51):
Origins of Ahmedas. I loved it because I was coming
out of film, you know, where I'd made this independent
movie and I was trying to get these other movies made,
and these scripts I had were, you know, feature had
had characters all different backgrounds, most of them had Asian
American leads. And in two thousand and five, nobody wanted
to give any money to any movie that had an

(36:13):
Asian American lead because they couldn't they couldn't conceive of
how they were going to finance it or who'd come
see it. And I'm like, you know, demographics are such
that in fifteen years this will be inevitable, but they
couldn't see it at the time. And so but when
I came to Marvel and I was you know, and
I got this chance to create this new character, and
I pitched this Amedees show story, people were just.

Speaker 2 (36:34):
Like, cool, let's do it.

Speaker 3 (36:37):
You know. It was literally like all right, cool. No
one ever said, can we not make am Asian?

Speaker 2 (36:42):
You know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (36:43):
It was just like this is this is this is cool?
Why not let's do it? And there wasn't that No
one even said why is he Asian?

Speaker 2 (36:50):
You know what I mean. Like it was just like,
this is cool, let's do it.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
And I love that, Like, you know, like in comics,
and not every comic story goes like that. I'm sure
creators have had all kinds of trouble getting stuff made,
but but in in this, in this story, it was
this kind of beautiful thing where I, uh, you know,
got two people to say yes, and suddenly we were
doing this you know, and twenty years later, you know

(37:15):
that that dude's co starring and I think two different
TV shows right now, and like there's the spighting As
Amazing Friends, and there's also a kids show, the the
There's an Iron Man show that has amidae as in it.
There's like I got amedaeas action figures and bobbleheads, you
know what I mean, Like it's it's a little wild. Well,

(37:36):
I mean very specifically, multiple Asian American actors have gotten
work because I because talk and I co created Ommas
show back in the day.

Speaker 2 (37:46):
So it's fun.

Speaker 3 (37:48):
I mean the most, I mean, the biggest moment for
me with that was, uh, there was a signing that
I did in Philadelphia and uh for the I'm gonna
ask for the totally awesome hook book that Domedes was
the star of. This was a few issues into the
run and I you know, I go to the signing
and this little kid comes up, a little Asian American
kid with glasses and I'm like, this could be a

(38:09):
mini me and he, uh, he had he had a
poster and omeda like a totally awesome hop poster that
he wanted me to sign, and that in itself was
absolutely adorable. But then he handed me the thing and
it's like and the poster had like tape marks on
the edges, and I literally almost started crying because it's

(38:29):
like this kid, this kid took this poster, had this
poster on his wall and took it down to bring
it to get it signed, you know what I mean.
And that was you know, that's that.

Speaker 2 (38:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (38:42):
People talk about like, you know, it's almost a cliche.
Representation matters, and sometimes we overplay that. I've got a
friend who says representation is not liberation, and that's absolutely true.
You can have tons of rep You're can have tons
of representation and yet still kind of be beat down
and impressed in a million ways. Yeah, exactly, but it

(39:04):
still matters, you know what I mean. And so so
that's yeah, I mean, it's been my all the adventures
I've had.

Speaker 2 (39:12):
With that character that have just meant a lot to me.

Speaker 1 (39:15):
Well, and you know, honestly, man, I always used to
give it up to Marvel and my exposure to Jimmy
Woo in that original What If about the nineteen fifties
Avengers That's where I first saw it, and I know
the problematic background of a character like the Yellow Claw. Yeah,
of course horrible. Why we had Jimmy w Yeah, Jimmy

(39:39):
was just a cool secret agent.

Speaker 2 (39:41):
Yes, no, Jimmy was dude. Jimmy was awesome.

Speaker 3 (39:44):
And those early Jimmy WO stories are hilarious, like he's
fighting like what like all these.

Speaker 2 (39:49):
Unbelievably weird, weird things like what is it like a
little chicken man or something. I can't even remember now,
but there's like, I don't know what I mean.

Speaker 1 (39:58):
I hope Marvel Unlimited still had some of the early stuff.

Speaker 3 (40:00):
Yeah, I got to I know what.

Speaker 1 (40:01):
You could get problematic, but well, you know, honestly, man,
this is something I was talking about with Ron V
from an Indian stand Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know,
the tropes are there, and the question is what or
not a question? The solution is what a minor writer
can do is take these characters, give them more agency
and not have the bad stereotypical stuff.

Speaker 2 (40:23):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (40:24):
I mean he's talking to Jimmy's up about Robert Howard
and Conan.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
And oh yeah yea yeah, and a lot of the other.

Speaker 1 (40:30):
Non Conan characters that again can get very problematic in
terms of the stories they were in. But it's like
you can strip all that away still have a great
foreign intrigue story where the natives are not ug and
really again are bringing their culture to a problem in
a way that it wasn't in the thirties and forties
and fifties stories. And that's why again, I was swilled

(40:53):
when A. Randall Park was playing Jimmy Wou on the
Marvel TV shows and in the movies. It's like, hey man,
there's my guy. I love this.

Speaker 3 (41:00):
No, Yeah, it's interesting because as a as a person
of color, or as a person from a marginalized community
who has you know, established some established credits and is
working in this kind of field, You're you're gonna get
approached to work on some properties that deal with these characters.
And I mean sometimes I call these reclamation projects, right,

(41:21):
because you're basically trying to clean up this Like the
objective of the IP owner is to clean up this
property so it's not so fricking racist, so they can
make some money because there's no nostalgia attached to it, right,
And sometimes that's a fantastic opportunity. Sometimes I say no,
because sometimes I think some of these characters are too

(41:41):
far gone. And I'm and and also and and and
maybe somebody else can do it, but I'm not the
person to and so sometimes I'm just tired too, you
know what I mean. It's like, it's like it can
be it can be exhausting to deal with with. I
mean there was a time during the uh I mean, yeah,
we'll go there, during during the pandemic when there was

(42:03):
all this anti Asian violence and I was not interested
in doing I mean, there was a project I said
no to because it would have required me to look
at a lot of old comics that were full of
anti Asian racism, you know, and the intention of the
project was a good one to kind of like confront
that and deal with it.

Speaker 2 (42:23):
But you know what this was.

Speaker 3 (42:25):
This was when people were getting shot in Atlanta and
people are getting pushed into the subways in front of
trains in the subway, and I didn't want to I
you know, like, I wasn't. I wasn't. I wasn't going
to be there for that, you know. I didn't want
to do that kind of work. I didn't want to
try to clean up that character at that time. So
so you know, there are different times when, on the

(42:47):
other hand, I got a chance to do a James
Bond story, and I actually pitched because I was asked like,
is there a James Bond.

Speaker 2 (42:54):
Villin you think would be fun to work with? And
I was like, oh, man, odd job, Let's let's make
odd jobs sex. And that's what we did.

Speaker 3 (43:01):
You know what I mean, because years ago I read
a Maxine Honkingston book where she talked about that, and
that just stuck in my head forever, that you put
any character up on a screen that.

Speaker 2 (43:09):
Big, you can make the audience fall in love with
that character. Odd job? Is this basically a racist joke
in the books, you know what I mean?

Speaker 3 (43:16):
He's also kind he's kind of awesome in the movie
because he's played by this big a dude.

Speaker 1 (43:21):
Yeah, fantastic sixties wrestler.

Speaker 3 (43:25):
Exactly exactly, and he's got I mean, his gimmick in
the in the movie is that he's got a hat,
a bowler hat that he throws like a frisbee and
it cuts your head off, right, it's got to, absolutely,
So he is kind of he is a joke. But
at the same time, Maxene Honkins was writing about this
and she's like, you know, put that face on the
big screen, that odd job shouldn't be a joke. You know,

(43:46):
I should He's she's writing to the point of view
of an Asian character who's saying, like, I should learn
how to walk from watching this guy. You know, women
should fall in love with him, you know what I mean,
Like like and and it's.

Speaker 2 (43:55):
True, you can do that. That's the power, that's the
power of storytelling.

Speaker 3 (43:59):
And so I was like, we're gonna freaking do that
in comics, and we did, and it was amazing, you know,
we made we made odd Job hot and a sexy
and arrival for for James Bond. It was it was
basically structured like a romantic comedy, you know what I mean,
Like a romantic comedy. Was like that man drives me crazy,
and then by the end of it, you know they're
gonna be, you know together. This was sort of like,
you know, these two super spies drive each other nuts

(44:20):
and then by the end of it they're working together.

Speaker 2 (44:21):
You know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (44:22):
But but there's but there's always that friction, you know,
and Odd Job.

Speaker 2 (44:28):
You'll you'll dig it your old school you know.

Speaker 1 (44:31):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (44:34):
Yeah, And that story also actually that's that's our retelling
of the whole gold Finger thing too.

Speaker 2 (44:38):
So it's it's fun. But anyway, but different.

Speaker 3 (44:42):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's a kind of a
modernization exactly. So yeah, so so sometimes that's a ton
of fun to do and and it's cool to have
that opportunity. And then and then also, you know, and
then creating new characters from scratch of course is the
uh you know, when you have the chance to do that,
that's that's that's that's where the real gold can shine.

Speaker 2 (45:03):
But it's not no, it's you know, it's a it's
been fun. It's it's uh, you know, it's a jumping on.
I just I just jump on the chances as they
come and see where they take me.

Speaker 1 (45:13):
Well again, I I I honestly, I really appreciate this
portion of the conversation because I am always interested what
writers of color and artists of color. And again, you're
taking a stereotypic turning it into an opportunity.

Speaker 3 (45:28):
Yeah, I mean, and I'll reiterate, I'm not always gonna
do that.

Speaker 2 (45:32):
Sometimes I'm just gonna say.

Speaker 3 (45:33):
No, But sometimes I ask, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (45:36):
Can I ask like like is fu Manchu? Sorry? No, no, thanks?
There you know, I'm wondering if I don't know, if
you want to mention a character that you know or
and it's okay, you.

Speaker 3 (45:47):
Know, yeah, well I'm not gonna tell I'm not gonna
name the character that I actually said no to because
I don't want to, you know, like that that doesn't
seem fair. I mean, Fu Man Too is interesting in
that there actually is a take on Fu Man Shoe
that I nearly did in the uh because I did
in Totally Awesome Hulk. I did this storyline where all

(46:07):
the Asian American characters and get together and just hang
out and like singing karaoke and have barbecue Korean barbecue,
and then and then and then New York gets attacked
by aliens and they have to fight this alien war.
But uh, there was but there was a point when
I was considering basically having a Fu Man Shoe style
character be the big villain there, and but I ended up.

Speaker 2 (46:31):
Just like it was just too much to try to
fit into this story.

Speaker 3 (46:34):
But I still have this thing in the back of
my head where there's a super villain like a Fu
Man Shoes. But you know what, the Ironman movie kind
of scooped this because that the Iron Man movie that
Ben Kingsley as the Mandarin was kind of playing the
same note. And I mean, so my idea was that
you have you have a fu Man shoe character who

(46:55):
is not the stereotype, but who is using this area
type in order to scare white people, you know what
I mean, just like leaning into the the racist trope
of the you know, yellow peril terrifying you know, like
like Asian villain, uh you know, but you know, just
in order to to terror, you know, to using that

(47:18):
and and and and and the Asian heroes to find
him are particularly annoyed because it's like he's not only
doing just like normal supervillain stuff, you know whatever, try
and take over the world or still you know, like
Rob Fort Knox or whatever the hell it is, but
he's like spreading bad stereotypes that herd all of us,
you know what I mean. But that was so maybe

(47:38):
I'll play with that someday, but that but for that
particular story, it was a little too much tread to
wedge in there.

Speaker 1 (47:44):
Well, honestly as a white guy reading the because I'm
read some of the sex form or stuff tonight. And
of course I read shank Chie back in the day
and everything when when Marvel had the license and and
he was the Big Bad in the Shan Cheap Book,
and I get you know, listen to that. There was
a lot of stereotypical stuff in there, unfortunately, but I
always regarded to a Manshu as an Asian moriarty.

Speaker 3 (48:05):
Yeah, well, it's interesting because sometimes it also comes down
to just physically the way these comics were drawn, you
know what I mean, and the and the coloring. I mean,
Larry Hama has an amazing story he tells all the
time where he, you know, he only Asian guy working
in mainstream comics as a writer and then as an editor.

Speaker 2 (48:28):
And when he got a job.

Speaker 3 (48:29):
As an editor, he like went went to the you know,
to the office and he was like, you know, went
to talk to the folks who were coloring the books
or dealing with that. I was like, and he pointed out,
you know, like he's pointing to these characters, Asian characters
who were literally colored like this light shaded yellow, and
basically Larry was like, hey, why do we not do that?

Speaker 2 (48:46):
And then they stopped doing that, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (48:48):
But dude walking in there to say, that's not what
we should be doing for people to really, I mean,
so some of that is based on ignorance, and it's
just like inherited racism from from from the cut, from
from the from just generations of how people would draw
people of the background.

Speaker 1 (49:06):
Tradition of an issue until someone brings the attention to
it and says this is wrong, and it's like, yeah,
you're right, sorry, yeah.

Speaker 2 (49:16):
Literally, yeah, I mean it's also it's also I mean,
I I think that's also linked to World War two propaganda.

Speaker 3 (49:23):
You know, anti Asian like Will Eisner, who is revered
in the comics industry, are freaking oscars are named after him,
drew a lot of incredibly racist uh war propaganda and also.

Speaker 2 (49:38):
An exactly know yeah, exactly, yeah, I mean.

Speaker 1 (49:41):
That's part of the story. Sorry to to uh you know,
people of color, I mean, I get it.

Speaker 3 (49:52):
Yeah, yeah, no, so but that that kind of so
this sort of like ways of drawing Asian people have
come from a lot of different sources, and some of
those sources have been really racist, and then later on,
like non racist people would sometimes just incorporate that because

(50:12):
that was the way they that was the only way
they saw them drawn, and not just drawing them but
then coloring them. And then there's also this kind of
weird thing where then there's this there's also the extreme
sensitivity to those things that can screw up depictions too,
like like a fear of drawing people with like, okay,

(50:35):
so Asian eyes, right, Like this is not something that's
comfortable for people to talk about, but you got to
talk about it if you're gonna draw Asian people. And
Asian people have a lot of different kinds of eyes,
you know what I mean. Like if you look at
actual Asian people, like I mean, you've got some people
who have what you know, the who have monolids, which

(50:56):
are the upper lids, do not have a fold in them.
Some people have have a fold in their upper lid.

Speaker 2 (51:02):
Uh and uh.

Speaker 3 (51:04):
And and also just like you know, some people's eyes,
you know, tilt tilt this way, some people's eyes tilt
that way. Some people's eyes don't tilt at all, you
know what I mean. I mean, white people have a
different eyes so to Asian people, you know what I mean.
But and and but but lots of times artists are
scared to draw anything but the most sort of generic yes,

(51:25):
uh looking kind of Asian face. And as a result,
the I mean and oftentimes that's actually like almost like
a like a half Asian face. I mean, it's a
face that looks more like I'm I'm biracial, I'm half
Korean and half white, and so I I will often
see Asian characters drawn in a way that look like me,

(51:46):
you know, like half Asian people, and it's like, okay,
that's fine, but you know, there are literally millions upon
millions of Asian people who have who don't look like that,
and so let's you know, like but then but then
people are scared to draw like that because they're scared
to look too like like that. That will tilt into

(52:06):
previous depictions, racist depictions of Asian people, you know what
I mean. So it is a it is a tricky,
tricky thing.

Speaker 1 (52:14):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (52:14):
And and as a as a as a writer, and
as somebody who's working with artists, I have to I've
had to learn how to just be really upfront and
matter of fact. Also, like noses, you know what I mean,
Like Asian people tend to have uh, flatter, broader noses,
and that's yes, and beautiful still, you know what I mean.
But lots of artists are lots of artists will draw

(52:36):
people with sort of like Asian looking eyes. But then
like a kind of perky little nose that tilts up
like a like a like a like an English princess nose,
and like I've literally you know, like I mean, that's
that's anyway, and some Asian people do have noses like that,
but most don't, you know what I mean. So let's
let's you know, like IM praising that diversity and and
find I don't know, so it's that's ongoing. It's an

(52:58):
ongoing struggle, you know. I mean, I'll.

Speaker 1 (53:00):
And truly I first, great, seriously, it means a lot
that you're willing to talk about. Oh yeah, we need
to talk about this to understand where people are coming
from the problems they have with depictions and things. I
forgive me, and I hope, I hope it's okay. Asked
one more question.

Speaker 2 (53:16):
We're going h yah yea yeah yeah.

Speaker 1 (53:18):
To me that when Ditko was originally drawing Doctor Strange.

Speaker 2 (53:22):
Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah totally.

Speaker 3 (53:24):
Well, that's always been one of my dreams, is to
like reveal Doctor Strange being half Asian, because.

Speaker 2 (53:29):
He totally is drawn as an Asian dude also.

Speaker 1 (53:32):
Beginning, but now he's very Anglo looking.

Speaker 3 (53:34):
Yeah yeah, yeah, totally totally well yeah. I also, I
mean this is also goofy. But like I always thought,
like Tony starts should be he should be Latino. His mother,
his mother's name is Maria, likes to be to be Yeah,
like make his mother Latina and make him you know,
like he's he's he's biracial.

Speaker 2 (53:51):
But I you know, if I ran the world, but uh, but.

Speaker 3 (53:54):
There's yeah, no, I mean it's I mean, these same
issues come up with you know, like when people are
drawing black characters black creators, We'll talk all the time
about like hair, you know what I mean, and like
the way, you know, like hair often drawn really.

Speaker 2 (54:09):
Badly for black characters and all of that.

Speaker 3 (54:11):
I mean, you know, so these are just you know,
things that we all I think I love it when
we can just talk about it and work on it,
you know what I mean. And I've kind of found
over the years that just like learning not to be
shy and just like saying eh, you know, and and
it's not about like jumping down anybody's throat. It's just
about like, hey, you know, like you know.

Speaker 2 (54:33):
Let's let's look at this.

Speaker 3 (54:35):
And I mean, but when I was talking about second guessing,
I had this wild experience where I've been thinking about
this stuff for years, you know what I mean. So
I'm always so careful and I'm always like trying to
So I worked on this book and and it.

Speaker 2 (54:50):
Was literally, you know, like had just come out.

Speaker 3 (54:53):
And suddenly I was like, holy crap, did we make
these characters, these aging characters with yellow skin?

Speaker 2 (54:59):
You know what I mean? And no we didn't.

Speaker 3 (55:01):
But you know, we had this variety of Asian characters
in this book. We had like an Asian artist, Asian colorist.
I was the writer, you know what I mean. So
we had this like pan Asian, you know, creative team.
And then suddenly I was looking at the cover of
the book and I was like, the these characters look
kind of slightly yellow. Like I mean, different characters are
like different Asian people have different skin tones, right, and

(55:21):
so the colorist was doing that, was giving people different
skin tones.

Speaker 2 (55:25):
But I was looking at these.

Speaker 3 (55:25):
Characters and then and then I was and I was
freaking out about this. It's like like like because yellow
was such a charged color and charged word when it
comes to depictions of Asian people, particularly in comics, particularly
in like art, and and I was like, I was,
I was kind of dying inside. And then I was
like looking in the mirror, and my own skin has

(55:48):
yellow undertones, you know what I mean, like like it
just does it?

Speaker 2 (55:52):
Just does I have yellow undertones because some people do.

Speaker 3 (55:55):
And I was like I was looking at my own skin,
and I was looking at the covers, like these characters
look like.

Speaker 2 (55:59):
Me, you know what I mean, Like what am I?

Speaker 3 (56:01):
What am I doing? But it's because I would have
ever thought of that. It would never have occurred to
me if it hadn't been the fact that that there
have been racist yellow depictions of Asian people, like like
canary yellow.

Speaker 2 (56:15):
We weren't doing canary yellow.

Speaker 3 (56:16):
We were doing like realistic yellow undertones in some characters.
Like if we colored every single Asian person that way,
that might have been a little weird. But all these
different characters had different skin tones, which is because that's
people in.

Speaker 2 (56:30):
Real life, you know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (56:32):
Like so, but yeah, I mean, like this stuff can
really you know, get into your head.

Speaker 2 (56:36):
And uh, truly I.

Speaker 1 (56:38):
Feel for people of color that unfortunately, because of the
way things have been depicted, that you are conditioned to
maybe have a reflexive way a minute, what are we doing? Yeah, no,
I absolutely get it greg talking about it.

Speaker 2 (56:55):
No, No, I you know, I appreciate you.

Speaker 3 (56:59):
We've alway talked about this kind of stuff, and I mean,
I love you for that because because we're always yeah,
I mean, it's it's a good space to talk about all.

Speaker 2 (57:06):
Kinds of things. And this is just part of the business.

Speaker 3 (57:08):
We're we're in a visual storytelling business, and we're in
a world with everybody, and.

Speaker 2 (57:13):
So you know, you're figuring this all out is important.

Speaker 1 (57:16):
We want the world represented by everybody and by the
same token. There is this history of bad depictions. So,
like you said, it's a type broke and I and
I sympathize as much as a white guy can. Yeah,
you know, seriously, I mean.

Speaker 2 (57:35):
All of it.

Speaker 1 (57:35):
Me being Mediterranean man not well.

Speaker 3 (57:37):
Yeah, I was gonna say, have you ever have you
ever gotten really angry about the way a Greek person
was to did we grew up?

Speaker 2 (57:42):
All we did how we did Hercules?

Speaker 1 (57:45):
Hercules is great, kidding. We were all very happy with that.
I truly I love I do love the various shades
of Hercules who've gotten over the years, whether he's hero
or villain. Yeah, And it's like, hey man, those Mythologies series,
that's why I was with Kelly Sue had like the
Greek gods and especially Hercules is a real asshole, and

(58:05):
it's like, I love Marvel, Hercules. I'm Gladys and I
love this. It's Bravado and everything about him. That's that's
wonderful that they didn't picked that. So yeah, yeah, it's
too funny. All right here, let's we can wrap up.
But okay, somebody bring up to write Darth Vader. Yeah yeah,

(58:26):
a different person of color, but just that, but an
American or other black. I find it interesting how the
series has the main character at a at a remove.

Speaker 2 (58:38):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no, yeah, I get it.

Speaker 3 (58:40):
He's because you know, he's like, Vader is the central character,
but Vader doesn't talk a lot, you know what I mean, Like, uh,
you know what I mean. So Vader's you know, and
and the supporting cast is really big in that story.

Speaker 2 (58:55):
Vader is a challenge. But I loved writing Vader, I.

Speaker 3 (58:58):
Mean, the big I think I think this question gets
to that in that Vader's story is the central story
of Star Wars, or at least of those first six
episodes of the of the movies, you know what I mean,
That's the I mean Lucas described that as the tragedy
of Darth Vader, right, like that are the tragedy of
Anakin Skywalker. That's that's the big arc that defines all

(59:19):
those stories. And so Vader's story is kind of set.
So when you're telling stories that are between the movies
like we did, you've got to find compelling things that
you can do that do not step on the big
moments that are shown in the movies, you know. And
and that's a challenge, you know what I mean. Like,

(59:40):
but the folks at Lucasfilm and the folks at Marvel
were fantastic, and Lucasfilm gave us the green light to do.

Speaker 2 (59:46):
Some really cool stuff.

Speaker 3 (59:48):
All I need when I'm doing this kind of story
is a little window and time in the continuity, and
and and an emotional hook, something where I can take
a character from here to there, you know, I mean,
something that matters, something that we can dig into where
a character can change a little bit, if something can happen.
And and what they gave me, what they what they

(01:00:08):
let us do was explore that time between Empire and
return when Vader is, i mean, Vader ends Empire sort
of full of rage because his son has rejected him.
He's offered, you know, like he's he's identified himself to
Luke as his father, and he's like, come with me together,
we'll overthrow the emperor.

Speaker 2 (01:00:27):
We will rule the galaxy together, you know what I mean?
And Luke is like, no, we won't.

Speaker 3 (01:00:31):
I would rather die and uh and and so we
got to explore Vader's reaction to that. You know, in
the movies, it's, you know, like when you're a kid
watching those movies in the seventies and eighties, like we were,
your focus was on Luke, you know what I mean,
because it's you know, because you're a kid, you're watching
the story, and Luke's the Luke feels like the main character,
and it's about you know, it's it's this horror of
finding out your father's a monster, and like how are

(01:00:53):
you going to deal with that? And then ultimately Luke,
Luke redeems Vader, you know, in the end, and that's
like that, that's that's the that's that story. But for Vader,
it's like, what.

Speaker 2 (01:01:02):
Do you do if you've you've you've you know, you've.

Speaker 3 (01:01:06):
Exposed your whole self and your son has rejected you,
And what makes it even deeper, is that when you
look at the like when you really look at the
prequels and everything that happened before that, Vader was rejected
twice before, or lost people, lost the most important people
in his life twice, with his.

Speaker 2 (01:01:21):
Mother and his and uh and podme, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:01:25):
So it's like it's like, so he's losing people like
you know, and and and uh and so it's to
lose Luke again. That's like, you know, three strikes, you know,
and and so where is Vader emotionally through? And that's
what our and that's what our whole storyline was about.
So and that just gave us so much. And then
they let us use Sabe. Sabe is the that was

(01:01:46):
my big thing. I was like, I gotta have a
character in here who's emotionally resonant, who means something, you know,
like when I was building that cast, I needed, I needed,
I need and and Sabe is the handmaiden who is
trained to.

Speaker 2 (01:01:59):
Look like pod May and two and she knows all
pod May's secrets. Yes, absolutely, yeh yeh yeah yeah. And
she's played by Kiera Knightley in the actual movie.

Speaker 1 (01:02:10):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (01:02:10):
And so we take that character and uh.

Speaker 3 (01:02:15):
And basically when Vader first Caesar, he thinks she's she's uh,
she's uh Podme, but she's actually Sabe and she thinks
Vader killed Podme, so she's coming to try to kill Vader,
and and all kinds of stuff happens as a result.

Speaker 2 (01:02:26):
But but that was the emotional hook, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 3 (01:02:29):
So that that made it possible to do this Vader
story sort of more directly back to I think it
was James's question about like, was it like writing a
character who sort of you know, at a remove, I
had to figure out a way to get into Vader's
head without having Vader just like say what he's thinking,
you know, because you can't do.

Speaker 2 (01:02:49):
Normal like like like.

Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
Little voice voice captains for Vader, which is like, well
I woke up and I was feeling a little off,
you know what I mean, Like that that's not you
can't do that with Vader. So so but I did
use those little voice captions. But I didn't like almost
like abstract poetry. It's just like words that are going
through his head, you know what I mean. So so
it would and that was a carefully done thing. It
was it was literally like writing poetry because you can't,

(01:03:14):
like oftentimes they're not complete sentences, they're kind of little
just in Ko eight expressions of emotion, and but they
they kind of fill you in.

Speaker 2 (01:03:23):
A little bit more.

Speaker 3 (01:03:24):
And then and then we also did a lot of
stuff just with silence, you know, just and and raf
Yenko is the artist and was brilliant because we had
a character who you almost never saw his face, but
he was finding the right angles and the lightings so
that you would you would be able to read this
emotion into you know, we have all these moments, you know,
moments where like Vader's betrayed or you know, lost or

(01:03:47):
something like that, and and.

Speaker 2 (01:03:49):
You can't have Vader being like, oh I feel bad.

Speaker 3 (01:03:51):
But but just with the angle and in the way
we stage it, you can you feel something. Whether or
not Vader is actually feeling that remains a question, you
know what I mean. But and I we wanted to
do that to kind of leave that ambiguity as well,
you know what I mean, to like make a question
how much. But but we feel it as the as
the readers. And so those were those are some of

(01:04:14):
the challenges with Vader. But I loved working on that
book and and all of this, all the creative solutions
were part of what made it so much fun.

Speaker 1 (01:04:21):
There you go, man, this is why, this is why
I try to pay attention to what you're writing. I
appreciate it great, absolutely. Then and yeah, listen, hey, you
know I've been talking. You can write.

Speaker 2 (01:04:30):
Oh no, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:04:31):
Likewise, do we miss anything?

Speaker 3 (01:04:33):
I think that's that's the main thingy. Yeah, So to recap,
the books you want to get would be Dungeon, the Dragons,
The Fallbacks number one, coming I think on October eighth,
and also the Return or the Supernatural book which is
coming in later in October, and the uh Return to
Planet Hulk one shot, which this is not the right

(01:04:55):
this isn't the cover for it, but it's the Return
to Planet Hulk one shot, which hits October eighth as well.
And and then come see me at the New York
Comic Con. See me at Midtown Comics on oc Coober eight,
and then come see me at the New York Comic
Con and artist ally from the ninth through the twelfth.

Speaker 1 (01:05:09):
I'm sorry, I'm not gonna be there.

Speaker 3 (01:05:10):
Man.

Speaker 1 (01:05:11):
It's always good to see if you know, in person,
but at least we get a little face to face
their exactly and uh, hey, you know, dude, anytime you
got something new, you that signal and I'll come running.

Speaker 2 (01:05:22):
Huge pleasure. Thank you, John. I appreciate you so much.

Speaker 1 (01:05:25):
And truly, man, I I really do, and we can
we'll talk a little bit off there, but I really
do appreciate where the conversation went because it's important to
talk about that stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:05:33):
That will credit to you too, because you opened the door.

Speaker 3 (01:05:36):
And uh and and uh it's I I appreciate that
you'll let.

Speaker 2 (01:05:40):
The vampire in the room. Buddy, It's true.

Speaker 1 (01:05:43):
It's true. Man. We're going to reach back on Monday
and my next we're going live. Uh, we're going to
talk about Evil can Evil. There's a there's a big
book that Ryland Grant is putting out a Kickstarter campaign
on I was an Evil Canevel kid. I didn't have
the toy, but Snake River and all of his jumps
I was there. I've loved the documentaries. I even liked

(01:06:05):
the George Hamilton Evil Canevel movie. Yes it was crap.
Also Evil made his own movie, So big Evil can
Eevel discussion coming your way on Monday night on We'd
Ballue Live. I hope he will jug me. Then, until
next time, everybody, stay safe, stay happy, stay healthy,