Untold Stories of John Ostrander Suicide Squad Grimjack Star Wars

Legendary writer John Ostrander takes us on a tour of his greatest comic book triumphs. From co-creating The Modern Suicide Squad—and later seeing his creations explode onto the big screen—to redefining The Spectre, reviving Heroes for Hire, and crafting the sweeping Western saga The Kents, Ostrander’s impact is undeniable.

He also dives into his years shaping the Star Wars expanded universe, launching Grimjack and breaking new ground at First Comics. Beyond comics, Ostrander shares stories from his earlier life as an actor and playwright in Chicago, painting a vivid picture of a career that spans stages, panels, and galaxies far, far away.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, everybody, welcome back time again for Word Balloon, the
comic book conversation show. John suntris here. You know, I
got peace Maker on the brain. I think I'm finally
saying it right. Peacemaker, you know half the time, as
I'm sure if you're a longtime listener in Fort Balloon,
I would call him Peacekeeper. Well, you know close. And
of course the George Clooney movie with Nicole Kidman from
GOT twenty five years ago longer, maybe they're almost thirty

(00:23):
years ago. Anyway, Peacemaker on the brain. The show has
been amazing. I think I'm due for a new talk
with Paul Kapperberg, who I just saw a terrific on
back in August. But it'd be great to get him
on and talk about the show. And I kind of
see his eighties Peacemaker as kind of a bridge between
the Charlton version and crazy version that we get today,

(00:48):
Thank you, James Gunn. But you know, it's almost like
he's on the road to madness. And you know, Paul,
of course working on another character that went to in
need even bigger miss Extreme in the hands of the
peace Maker TV show Vigilante as well. There I'm a
broken record when it comes to talking to Paul about
two of those characters that were so great during the

(01:08):
Bronze Age. And Paul really did a hell of a
job and he always does. But anyway, not talking to
Paul today, talking to John Ostrander, a conversation that I
had with him right after the second Suicide Squad movie
came out. You know, James Gunn, I'm loving what he's
doing now. I loved what he was doing then. I
loved what he did at Marvel, and it was great

(01:29):
to give John this victory lap to talk about how
great Suicide Squad was and who knew what was to come.
We also spend time talking about the Specter heroes for Hire,
his Western DC epic, The Kents, all of his great
stuff on Star Wars as well, and Grim Jack in
First Comics, So you know, and you know, John spent

(01:51):
a good portion of his time in Chicago, not only
working for First, but he was also involved in the
Chicago theater scene. So I pulled all those stories and
more from John Ostrander in this conversation on today's word balloon.
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(02:15):
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(02:59):
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at patreon dot com slash word Balloon. I don't know

(03:19):
if you remember, and it's fine if you don't remember.
I work at Chicago Radio and yeah, I used to
work for the Score and XRT and in fact, you know,
we'd bond over the bucket of course, as well as
Mike Oh yeah, great, the great Joe Dano Absolutely, man,
great man.

Speaker 2 (03:36):
Yeah, still miss it.

Speaker 1 (03:38):
I hear you, man, absolutely. I don't even know if
like the family hung on to it or if they
sold the space. I have no idea.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
No, everything was moved out. Yeah, yeah, last I saw,
you know, I mean I actually went up to it
after closed and everything was off the windows, you know,
like everything inside was gone.

Speaker 1 (03:58):
Wow. Kind I wonder if anyone got uh, Tim's Tim
Truman's art from Hawkworld where he walks.

Speaker 2 (04:05):
Into the buckets gam Nolan's Oh.

Speaker 1 (04:09):
It's Graham's excuse me, Oh, I'm so ready correct to me, John,
Because honestly, I hope it's okay that we use this
on on the broadcast, because I think Chicago fans that
know about your history in Chicago and stuff would love
these kind of stories. So yeah, that's okay.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
Yeah, I've oftn't said Bucket of SUTs was the closest
thing to Monday's that I could ever find in the
real and what we call the real world.

Speaker 1 (04:33):
Absolutely, man, No, that's great. So you see, we even
even have said hello to everybody watching or listening, but
we're already in mid conversation. It's John Ostrander. It's great
to see you, and uh, congratulate. I'm so glad that
the Suicide Squad is a nice victory laugh. And I'm
glad that you got to be there, not only part

(04:53):
of the movie, but the Red Carpet and the whole experience.

Speaker 2 (04:56):
What an amazing night, an amazing night. I mean, there
was a pre party that DC gave and then wandering
over to the theater, I signed things for fans. I'm
trying to sign so fast. I'm pretty sure I misspelled
my name a couple of times. I'm sure somebody's got

(05:17):
somebody jorgey o Strand or whoever he is. And then
and then the movie was great. The port James Gun
who I also saw in the Red Carpet. It's a
great guy, a really great guy. And but he went
he introduced the people who were in the audience. He
started with the studio exacs and like a grew within

(05:41):
the cast and he saved me for last and saying,
you know, uh, this guy is the reason why we're here.
So I was very young.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
That's beautiful, man, that's outstanding. How about how about the
shooting experience of the film your cameo and I mean right.

Speaker 2 (05:59):
That was also just great fun, just great fun. I
got there the day before the shoot and they brought
me onto the sound stage and James Gunn is there
along with his production crew and as they see me
walking up towards and they all start going, we're not worthy.
Yeah yeah, I told oh, stop stop stopping. But I

(06:22):
got to sit with them while they were filming that
they did. They did also the costume fitting and stuff
like that, and they gave me my pages. And then
the next day I had my own half trailer, you know, crazy,
which is really nice. And while I was sitting waiting,

(06:44):
I invented my character, you know, based on what they
told me I was going to do. And you can
see a trace of that character even what I was doing.
And then we filmed it. James and I did an
interview afterwards, which I was I wish they would show
because it was a fun interview and so it was

(07:05):
just a really really great day.

Speaker 1 (07:08):
That's wonderful. Maybe they're saving that for the you know,
uh DVD and everything. I hope. So, man, No, that's great.
So yeah, I mean you had at least one line
on camera when you're patting Michael in the back and everything,
Michael Rooker. But but yeah, was that all you leading
up to that moment on off screen?

Speaker 2 (07:28):
Yeah? Yeah, yeah, guy the guy with the hands and
injected those from my hands. I had another line, but
James wisely kept the best line. Okay, So I have
no complaints at all.

Speaker 1 (07:44):
That's great. Somebody asked on Twitter, uh if, and again
we're not We're not looking at your your accountant books
or anything. But did did that appearance make enough for
you to qualify for SAG health insurance?

Speaker 2 (07:58):
I don't think so not, but I may double check
on that.

Speaker 1 (08:03):
Yeah, John, you should have. Yeah, John, I'm I'm a
SAG after a member. Unfortunately I'm in my Cobra period
because I got downsized last year. But I will tell
you it is great insurance. It really is great insurance.

Speaker 2 (08:17):
I better look at that man.

Speaker 1 (08:18):
Absolutely, man, seriously, that's a tip for me. No, that's awesome,
and that's great to hear that they were rightfully referent
to you and and treated you well and truly. Man,
I mean, listen, the first movie, I'll be honest, it
disappointed me. And I have a feeling that David the
director got screwed in the editing obviously. So do you

(08:42):
ever get to see I mean, does he have a cut?
I mean, I know Snyder cuts and all that stuff,
but did you ever see any sort of different cut
than what we got?

Speaker 2 (08:49):
I would like I would love to see what his
cut would be like you said, I think he got
really screwed on that by the then executives at Warners
because they made a decision that it would be more
like Deadpool Midstream when they wanted more yuck yucks. And yeah,

(09:10):
I took it away from you know, totally took away
from this vision for it, and what they got was
not as good, just not as good.

Speaker 1 (09:19):
Yeah. But again, I mean, just anything getting made is great,
and I'm sure you were still pleased to be part
of the at least again, that's my you know supposition.
I mean, you tell me you know. How how did
you feel after the first movie?

Speaker 2 (09:34):
Oh? I enjoyed it, you know, I mean, there's no
question about it. And they told me they were going
to put my name on the building, and so I
thought I was gonna be on a little plaque on
the side of the building. So I'm Michael was my
plus one for that, and Mike was sitting next to me,

(09:54):
and so we're watching. I'm peering, ated trying to put
and then not just me, he goes, did see it?
Did see it? And I said, see what he says?
Your name, dummy, your name was up I missed the
fact that was up high. I was looking. I was
so busy looking down below. So the very first time
it was on, I missed it. So but I've seen

(10:14):
him plenty of times since then. And yes, I do
pause it when I get when I play it on DVD.

Speaker 1 (10:23):
That's awesome. Go back to the beginning with suicide Squad, Like,
how did how did it happen? Because of course there
was a Task Force X the military silver age you
know story. But yeah, I mean, so tell me about
the inception of your suicide Squad.

Speaker 2 (10:40):
Okay, Well, first of all, it happened because Robert Greenberger
and I had met at UH several conventions and hit
it off and enjoyed chatting with each other, and Bob
really won me over at d C, and Mike was
going from first over to d C in a senior
editor position, and he landed the job to do the

(11:03):
follow up crossover series to Crisis on Infinite Earth. So
he wanted me to be the plot plot around that
he wanted to bring me along with. So Bob and
I were talking and I told him the book that
I really wanted, which was Challengers of the Unknown. Now,

(11:25):
what is that not a great comic book type one
of the greatest challengers, I think. No, he told me
somebody else had it, you know, they had DIBs on it.
And then he said but then he said, look, we
got this title that appeared in the five issues of
Brave and Bold UH, and no one's done anything with
it since then. You could do, you can do anything

(11:45):
you want with it. It's called Suicide Squad. My first
reaction is, what a stupid name. Who in the right
minds joined something that calls itself Suicide Squad? And then
I thought about it and the answer came, Well, people
who don't have an option. Don't have a choice? Okay,

(12:07):
who doesn't have a choice? Prisoners? Prisoners right now? O
the DCU, that means super villains. I like playing the
supervillains because they're not nice. So I took that and
then said, ooh, combine it with a dirty dozen thirty
dozen with super villains and a touch of Mission impossible.

(12:28):
And that's why I pitched and they loved it, and
from there we went on.

Speaker 1 (12:32):
That's awesome, John, And I'm so glad that in the
second film there was more of that because again and
really not to bag on what you know we got
in the first film, but it's like, I don't want
to see Harley Quinn with a sledgehammer going against that God.
I want street level espionage the way you guys did it,

(12:54):
you and Luke and and the way that it should be.
It's like, these are street level villains. Let them solve
a street level problem and do it the way they
can do it, not not the other. Even I'll even
admit in the current movie, God Star looked amazing, but
I really would have been happy with it being the

(13:15):
island espionage that we got for you know, nine tenths
of the movie and it's just you know, but again
that's that's just my personal taste. But again I am
not complaining. James's humor was great and truly the rest
of the movie to me was classic Suicide Squad.

Speaker 2 (13:31):
Yeah. One of the things that he that he Anderson
very well. I mean, first of all, I should say
that James. When James went over to DC, they offered
him anything. They said, you can do anything, you can
do the next Man of Steel. Yeah that, and he said, no,
I want Suicide Squad because he knew Suicide Squad. He

(13:52):
had read it, he loved it, he understood it. That
was that was his meat, you know, and so and so,
and they promised him he could do anything he wanted.
He could kill anybody he wanted. They weren't going to
interpeer and they didn't, and so he got to do
what he made the film he wanted to make with it. So,

(14:16):
and I've descripted away from the question what was your question?

Speaker 1 (14:19):
No, no, no, no, truly I loved that all that tangent. No.
I was just saying that it's a shame that the
first movie wasn't as street level as what James gave
us in everything. Yeah, and no, that's a great easter
egg that they really did offer him everything, including another
Man of Steel movie, and no, his heart was on
Suicide Squad. That's fantastic.

Speaker 2 (14:41):
He understood one of the basics about the Squad as well,
and that's in just about every issue I've ever done,
is that I'm going to be free about killing people off.
But first, if I don't make you interested in them,
if you don't care about them, then they're dying doesn't
mean anything you got that's got to be there, you know,

(15:04):
so so, and he did that in spades.

Speaker 1 (15:07):
No question. Then absolutely, all the characters, even the ones
that die before the credits come off. I mean, you
know about them, and you you've you've got a moment
with them, except for maybe Captain Boomerang, but we had
them from the last movie, so that's okay, you know.
I mean, no, it was. It was appropriately shocking in
the same way that I'm sure back in the early
sixties everybody was freaking out about Janet Lee dying in

(15:29):
Psycho and it's like, wait a minute, isn't that the star?
What that was? And we all kind of suspected as
comic book fans when we saw the giant cast and stuff,
and it's like, all right, who's gonna make it beyond
that too? But but man, they kill to kill a
good chunk of them, even before the credits. It's like, yeah, damn,
that's awesome.

Speaker 2 (15:48):
Yeah, includes blowing somebody's head off, chopping at the top
of somebody's heads off so their brains are exposed. And
you also got the other element in which it goes
south quickly and someone betrays them.

Speaker 1 (16:05):
Yeah, Pete Davidson, Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (16:08):
So it was all very much if it had the
feeling of a story that I would have written. Absolutely,
And that was fun for me to watch because I
never have experienced one of those stories because I created them,
so I know what's going on, so I don't get

(16:28):
to But this time I got to experience what that
was like.

Speaker 1 (16:33):
So that's outstanding. Man. Absolutely, did they let you see
the script before they shot? Or I mean obviously your sides,
but you know, yeah, no, no.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
Just just besides that that were necessary for my scene?

Speaker 1 (16:46):
Sure, I understand. I will say that I prefer your
Captain Boomerang, who became a much more interesting and colorful
character during your run and even subsequently, Uh, you really
define you redefined I think character from his Flash carry
Bates Days, for example, and I'm I'm sorry they never
took advantage of that in the movie. I could see

(17:09):
almost you know though, even the way Peter Capaldi played
the Thinker, It's like he would have been a good
your version of Captain Boomerang. I think with an ons
the accent.

Speaker 2 (17:19):
Well, I told I told Jake Courtney at the after party,
I know how to bring him back.

Speaker 1 (17:25):
Oh fantastic.

Speaker 2 (17:28):
I could do it. It's comic bookie, but I could do it.

Speaker 1 (17:31):
That's awesome, man.

Speaker 2 (17:32):
Though. The thing I loved about playing with I should
explain first, Bob Greenberger was the one who came up
with the idea of using Captain Boomerang. My first to
that as well was, oh, come on, give me a break.
Look at the guy. You know, he's an idiot. You know,
he dresses like like an ice cream salesman. You know

(17:56):
the hat, You're right, man, the hat and the blousey tunic.
You know, it's like god yeah, but but uh, boomer
rapidly became one of my favorites because, I you know,
since I could do anything with him. I mean, the
idea was Flash at the time had gotten rid of
the Rogues Gallery, and they said we could have him.

(18:19):
And my other rule was anybody that I took on
I got to keep. I had to be able to
control them, uh, change them and kill them if I
need to. Wow. So with Captain Boomerang, uh, what I
did was there was a series of books by this author,

(18:39):
George McDonald Fraser about a character called Flashman. Flashman originally
appeared in a Victorian era novel called Tom Brown School Days, right,
which Tom Brown is at school and Flashman is Uh,
it's the bully. You know, he's a rotten character. He

(19:02):
gets tossed out of school and out of the book
about halfway through. Okay, Fraser picked him up from that
moment and then wrote a series of historical novels and
kept the character as he was. He was a coward,
he was a bully, he was a con man, he
was a lecturer, and he just stayed that way. So
I decided, you know, Boomerang would be sort of my

(19:25):
version of Flashmun in which I wasn't going to improve him.
He's actually the best adjusted character in the squad in
that he knows what he is, he likes it, he's
happy being that so, but what he is is a rotter.

(19:46):
You know, just when you think that he can't sink
any lower, he finds a new level to go to. Absolutely,
and as a result, I will confess now there were
three characters who I was not ever really going to
kill off, even though I would sometimes make it look like,
what's going to boomerang dead shot? Amanda?

Speaker 1 (20:07):
Of course, Well that's awesome. And yes, Amanda, my god,
we've talked about Amanda before, but man, what seriously, it's
very cool how Amanda has only become more important since
your run and the way that she's constantly used, especially
on TV and of course the films. And I hope

(20:28):
you're getting properly compensated. Well, there is no such thing
as properly compensated, but I hope you're getting something for it.

Speaker 2 (20:34):
Well, I will say, at the time when we created,
Paul Levice was publisher, made sure I had some sort
of contract connected to Amanda so that anytime they received
money for the use of Amanda anywhere else. I've got
a taste, and it's been very tasty.

Speaker 1 (20:52):
That's great to hear.

Speaker 2 (20:53):
Man.

Speaker 1 (20:53):
No, absolutely, and I mean, you know, I'm sure you
saw that recent article in The Guardian Overseas where they
talked about handshakes and five thousand dollars and that's it
for creating these characters that are generating millions, if not billions.
And the cool thing with the Man is specifically beyond
what Viola Davis has been able to do with the character.

(21:13):
I mean, my god, Pam Greer and Pounder animated Bill
Waller noes.

Speaker 2 (21:20):
No slouches at all. I mean no, I mean any
one of them could be done the movie, although I
will admit, you know, at the moment I heard that
they cast by the Davis, I went, Okay, they're serious
about this. Yeah, and then they had Will Smith as well,
but in the first one agreed, they're very serious about this.

Speaker 1 (21:39):
Yeah. Back you know again, back in the creation of
the Squad and then the Roster, were there any characters
that DC are like, please put these people on, or
did you have free reign of anybody?

Speaker 2 (21:51):
I had? I had free rein. But there are certain
characters that I weren't going that I wasn't going to
put in, for instance, the Joker, because there would be
no way that I would be able to control what
the Joker did or what I did with him. So
uh so certain characters I liked, not just the B
list characters, but the C in D list characters. Absolutely

(22:14):
the ones you know, although I will admit uh and
this is where James is more brilliant than I am.
I would never have thought of using Poga dot.

Speaker 1 (22:23):
Man and Dimsion was really great. Ye and I agree too.
I think everybody was like, really, but you know, this
is like Guardians using Groot and Rocket and truly, like
when all the Marvel behind the scenes people I knew
are like, we're doing Guardians in the Galaxy and I'm
like why because it's like, really, you're gonna They're like, man,

(22:46):
you're gonna eat your words. And certainly I did it gladly,
and that's why Poka dot Man was Dimalsion was just
so fantastic.

Speaker 2 (22:53):
Yeah, yeah, really really it made you feel so much
for the character. That character I can also sort of
bring back and excellent and I can tell you how.
And Warner Brothers, if you use it, you've got to
give me some you gotta give me some polding money.
But and who knows, they may already be planning this,

(23:14):
but he mentions that he is brothers and sisters bring
on his twin brother looks like has the same powers,
but maybe a little different in the personality, and you
can still have pokadont.

Speaker 1 (23:27):
That sounds great. That is fantastic. How about someone asked
online and I'm so sorry everybody, I'm looking down while
I'm talking to John. I don't want him to think
I'm not paying attention to him, but I'm going to
another device to get questions. And somebody had asked, how
did you feel about Rick Flagg dying and would you
have a way of bringing him.

Speaker 2 (23:46):
Back from the movie. No, but I did kill him
off in the comic as well.

Speaker 1 (23:51):
I had forgotten that.

Speaker 2 (23:52):
Yeah, yeah, when I killed him off in the comic,
That's what really served notice to the fans that I
was serious about anyone can die. No one said I
did bring him back eventually, because I because even when
I killed him off, I had a trapdoor or a
back door plan so that I could do that. And
now looking back on it, I think it was a

(24:12):
mistake to bring him back, you know, even in the comics.
But but I was able to do it. And uh,
Joe Kinman, I think in particularly in the second film,
to deliver it an ace's job. You know, just ass
you know, it's the whole scene where he finds out
that he's there to cover up things, you know, and

(24:36):
his outrage you know, yes, and UH do with that
Rick Flegg, you know, like his death there really I
think has to stand.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
I agree with you, and I think that's that's a
very good point. And and your Rick Flagg wasn't the
son of Task Force X so the way it's portrayed
in the films. Technically, you know, you know, really he's
I believe, technically Junior kin Men's character, but write him.
I right, it really was the original Braven Bold character

(25:07):
that was leading the squad back when we were doing it,
which I love. I mean, hey man, and we'll get
to like someone had a great question regarding the Specter,
and if you've got time, I certainly would love to
talk about more of your comic book stuff and also
what you're currently doing comic book wise as well, but
other Suicide Squad questions. I you know, I agree with
you on Flag. Yeah, I guess not. Actually, you know,

(25:29):
I write now, nothing else is coming to mind about
the movie other than to say it was just really
really terrific, and I think again they took a patriot. Oh,
I was gonna acknowledge in your run Brons Tiger was
a great favorite of mine. And I'm so glad that
subsequent people always throw Bronze Tiger in. And I loved
him in Tom King's recent run of Batman a couple

(25:51):
of years ago, when he had his little suicide squad
mission and there was the Tiger and everything. So tell
me about choosing Brons Tiger for the team.

Speaker 2 (25:58):
Oh, that too was an idea by by Robert Greenberger.
But Robert had a lot to do with shaping the
squad in the early days, you know, even well as
you heard, even to talking me into doing it in
the worst place. And yes, every time he would suggests something,
maybe I go, yeah, I was wrong. He was right,

(26:20):
you know, And I can say so now because it's
not my editor now, and you can't tell the editor
that they're right, you know, not even gold So but
he he said we needed more heroes in the thing

(26:41):
in order to in order to control the bad guys.
And first I resisted because I said, well, no, I
just want bad guys and he said, no, no, you
got to have some of the good guys in it.
So h And I was bringing Rick Flagg into it
from the original five issue run because I read it
and I like to play around with continuity. I don't

(27:04):
want to serve it religiously. If I got to change something,
I'm going to change it. But in my stories, there
was a previous Task Force X, and we counted for
how it ended. We even used the plane that they
used was repurposed for the squad, So.

Speaker 1 (27:23):
I do remember that. That's awesome man, well, and I
mean perfect example of you playing with connuity but still
coloring within the lines. Is your excellent Western series about
the Kents.

Speaker 2 (27:34):
Oh my all times phase and doing it. I did
a ton of research for that, and there's a story
behind this being done as well. I had originally it
was going to be the Lawton's and it was going
to be about dead Shots family and how they came

(27:54):
to be in the West and gave rise to Floyd
Lawton aka dead Shot uh. And at one point I
was talking with Peter to Mossy, I think it was
by that point my editor onspector, and he said, well,
what else do you do you have? And I told
him I got this idea that editor and I told
him mother Western I had and he said, give me

(28:18):
the Western. I said, I've been annoying people with this
for years. Nobody wants to do it. He says, give
me the Western. I think I can get it done.
So we went to Levitt's with it, pitched it to
him and Levitt said, interesting, but Lawton is in one
of our big names. Why not you Superman? And Peter went,

(28:43):
some of these people aren't who are his ancestors? Aren't nice?
And Paul's attitude was so awesome. So Levitt supported it
all the way. All the way. He offered me a
couple of prestige size graphic novels, to the or the
twelveish of mini service. I left for the twelveish mini series, okay,

(29:05):
because I gave me more space, and also as I
was doing research once I knew it was the Kents,
then became a question, okay, how did the Kents come
to be in Kansas? And from there that led me
into the Civil War pre Civil War, doing research all
over the place about it, and I was staggered by

(29:27):
how much of what we call the wild West is Kansas,
Dot City, Kansas, Kansas, Ellsworth, Kansas. The big cattle drives
going to the railheads, Kansas. You know, Jesse James a
lot of the time in Kansas, you know, while Bill
Hickock Kansas crazy so and if that kan Kansas and

(29:51):
then just across the river in Missouri. So yeah, so
that you know, I did a ton of research on it.
One of my jokes was said, if I total up
the amount of books that I bought to read for
this and then also compared it to what I got

(30:11):
paid for, they almost even out. But I had a
grand time just researching it and finding out all about
these people and characters. But John Wesley Harden, uh.

Speaker 1 (30:24):
Yeah, well one shot a man for snoring, as I
remember the timelife Western uh, you know, books about the
Old West, absolutely.

Speaker 2 (30:34):
I know, and Hickock is an amazing character as well.

Speaker 1 (30:37):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (30:37):
So it divided itself ultimately into three arcs, which was
pre Civil War, Civil War, post Civil War, you know.

Speaker 1 (30:46):
Uh.

Speaker 2 (30:47):
And originally we were going to have three different artists,
one to each art and Tim let off with the
pre Civil War one. But then our middle artists dropped
out and Tim said, well, I can do that for you,
but I can't do the third one. So we grabbed
him and then we and then we grabbed Mandrake. Yeah,

(31:07):
and and I hadn't known at the time, but Tomas
a big fan of Western art, and and he shows
it in this, you know, he gets a chance to
really exercise it, uh in that in that final art.

Speaker 1 (31:22):
So that's that's awesome. That was post Specter? Am I correct?
Or contemporary with a Spector? But yeah, I mean because
obviously you mentioned Mandrack and I immediately think of the
Specter now before we leave the Kents. Also a nice
serendipitous thing that Ellsworth, Kansas and Whitney Elsworth being so involved.

(31:42):
Did you throw in any sort of nod to Whitney
by you know, setting stuff in Ellsworth at all?

Speaker 2 (31:47):
No? No, I didn't do. But one thing I did
do that it was gratuitous and was actually you know,
it was one thing that did not actually further the
plot or the care. It was such an interesting bit
of history that I had to throw it in. But
about a year before he assassinated Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth,

(32:10):
who was an actor, played Lawrence Kansaske, so I had
to get that in there.

Speaker 1 (32:18):
That's cool.

Speaker 2 (32:19):
I mean, that was just too tasty sure research to ignore.

Speaker 1 (32:24):
That's fantastic. Today's episode of word Balloon is brought to
you by comic book and screenwriter Ken Jansen's. Ken's new
feature film, The Return, is available on demand. The Return
is the story of Roger Emrick, a college student who
travels to his hometown to settle the estate of his
deceased father. While staying at his family home with two friends,

(32:45):
Roger experiences bizarre and horrifying events, events which awaken the
repressed memories of a terrifying childhood. The Return, starring Richard
Harmon and Sarah Thompson from the CW's The one hundred
and directed by b. J. Verroh has won several awards
on the festival circuit, including Best Feature at the HP
Lovecraft Film Festival and Best Actor at the New York

(33:07):
City Horror Film Festival. Ken is also the writer of
Hindsight for Heavy Metal Magazine's comic book Imprint Virus Comics.
Time like said secrets so much so that it will
do anything anything to keep them. Two band Vincent di'angelo
didn't know that before traveling into the past to uncover
one of history's greatest mysteries, but he'll learn the hard way.

(33:29):
Hindsight features the art of Matt Martin and colorist Frederico Taibo.
Please check out these works from Ken Jansen's and google
him for more of his comic book film than pro's work.
You know, dude, again, everybody loves your Spector run. And
it was you know, I was a big fan of
the Fleischer Spector stories when I was a bit younger,

(33:51):
and you're you know, those eighty stories of yours. I
was in college, in college at that time, love and
everything you were doing, and it was just so great
to get another take on Jim Corgan and the character
and got his entrance being busted out of a OZ,
you know, just like kind of trapped in there and stuff.
Was there any pushback or concerned from d C on

(34:14):
where you went religiously or supernaturally? No.

Speaker 2 (34:19):
No. At the time d C was remember DC at
that time was really wide open. They had done not
too long before Crisis on Internet Earth, which served notice that, Hi,
this is not the same d C. We're gonna we're
gonna play with things. You know. They brought in Michael
who reinvented the Flash as well with Wally West and

(34:44):
and brought me in, you know, with my sensibilities. Sure,
and that's how suicide squad got done, and that's how
I My thing about the Specter was, Hi, everything that
I'm doing or want to do on this is inherent
in the character. You know. A guy who dies it
goes confronts the voice you know, well it's the voice

(35:06):
of God, you know, and gets sent back to do it,
and he has god like powers. I mean, politically, God
had been to be eating his wheedies, you know. Give
he and the Spector are going to come to accommodation,
and you had to do that. Part of the challenge

(35:26):
I was told at the time was that, well, you
can't really do a long run on the Spector after
either you've got to downgrade his powers or after six
twelve issues going to get boring. It's come of the
same thing over and over again. I said, no, I
know exactly. Mandrake and I both agreed. We knew exactly
how to do it. We said, give him to us,

(35:49):
we can make it work. And our thing was, first
of all, you've got to keep the powers. You've got
to keep those visuals. That's the I can gravity of
the spect that's why you come there. You know, you
want to seem to do all these huge or small
outrageous things, you know, I mean very first in the
very first issue, first time we see the specter. Uh,

(36:11):
there's been a drive by shooting and all the bullets
have gone through Corgan, who's not the target, but you know,
he gets mad. And as the punks are driving away laughing,
all of a sudden, a giant spector had starts coming
up through the pavement and then swallows the car hole,
you know, you know. So that's the stuff we were

(36:36):
going for. And we said, okay, a couple of things.
First of all, back in the origin, Corgan dies. Okay.
They after that, they did various things. They brought him back.
The spector was housed in Corgan, and he had return
every so often in order to renew himself. And we said, no,

(37:00):
Corgan's dead. Corgan has been dead since the late thirties, okay.
And the other thing about Corgan was that he was
a hard nose, plain closed detective back in the thirties.
Now go back and read early Dick Tracy, you know,

(37:22):
I mean Tracy pulled literally pulled no punches. I was
not afraid of shooting people. And also, you like some
of the films with the hard boiled detectives or the
police detectives.

Speaker 1 (37:35):
They're you know, uh pre mirandas so yeah, they had
with suspects and the criminals absolutely man.

Speaker 2 (37:42):
Yeah, so so that's who he was, sure, and he
hasn't improved since being dead, so that's why he was
chosen as the specter and that game and that starting
off point gave us. Also, what I really credit DC
with is when they said, Okay, the numbers of startings drop,

(38:06):
we're going to have to cancel, but we'll give you
a year.

Speaker 1 (38:10):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (38:11):
Yeah, they said, in a year, it's going to have
to find We got a year in order to wrap
this up. And they also offered no objection to the
way we ended it, which is something that we wanted
to do, Tom and I from very early in the wrong.
We had a pretty clear idea of where we wanted

(38:31):
to go, so we were allowed to do all of
that and as a result and then merge it with God.
We had all these amazing covers, and Tamasi came on
and did the letter columns and the letter cons were

(38:51):
also amazing and not just talk about the book, but
also about religious issues and there's a real discussion going
on there. So I'm just so proud of that series.
You know, we really got a chance to strut our
stuff and really do what we wanted to do with it.

Speaker 1 (39:14):
Agreed. Man, No, you know I would put it alongside Denny's,
both Denny's, Dennis Cowen and Dennie o'neils question in terms
of again, it just hit me at the right age,
being a college and John, I've had the pleasure and
I don't know if you remember, but in two thousand
and six, I believe at the New York Comic Con
we were walking together and I introduced you to Bendis

(39:38):
and Bennis really and I knew this was going to happen,
you know, obviously just gushed about meeting you and thanked you.
And I know that Bendis, Gail Simone, Greg Rucca, Ed Brubaker,
era of creators that are just a couple of years
younger than me. You were so important to them. I
can say the same thing as a reader, and truly, man, No,

(40:00):
this was the promise of the eighties that you know
that unfortunately old Chess enough comic stunt for kids anymore.
And you guys really were I believe the majority. I mean,
there've always been little pockets here and there in various decades,
and please correct me if you can come up with
earlier examples.

Speaker 2 (40:19):
But that was the thing I'll begin with, you know,
on Green Lantern, Green Arrow. Sure you know he's He
taught me also that you could mild issues with social
issues with with your plots, as did Will Eiser.

Speaker 1 (40:39):
That's great.

Speaker 2 (40:39):
So those were my heroes and models in terms of
what I was doing, And I wasn't setting out to
do or change anything. I just wanted to write the
most interesting stories that interested me and I felt and
I hoped would resonate with the readers the way that

(41:00):
Denny's stories had resonated with me, the way Will Eisner's
stories it resonated with me. So you know, that's all
I was out to do.

Speaker 1 (41:07):
Well again, a generation of us feel like you succeeded.
Of course, subsequent years as well. First of all, before
we leave the question or the specter, any plans on
any omnibus or anything like that for that.

Speaker 2 (41:20):
Have I've heard of? But then again, nobody ever tells
me any of that.

Speaker 1 (41:23):
Well, you know, honestly, well, also are they are they
going to do an omnibus of suicide squad? Given you know,
the current success and also surprise, you're not writing a
current suits squad squads suicide squad story or are you?

Speaker 2 (41:37):
No, I'm not at the present time. They got my
phone number. If they want me to do it, I'd
be interested in doing it. But they've they've issued all
of my stories, uh, at least in trade paperback, and
they can't impact that. Just reissued the first one with
a movie tie in cover. So sure, So that's all nice,

(42:00):
all right, I can very please with that.

Speaker 1 (42:03):
I have noticed, and I'm so glad glad you because
again I go back to our first conversations and I
would gush about Wasteland and I love Wasteland, and I've
seen that it's come back digitally. Are there any chances
that we'll see a printed, you know, rebooting of or
at least, you know, print reprints of your stuff?

Speaker 2 (42:22):
I would like that. And in the back of my mind,
I've got one or two more Wasteland stories have cropped
up in my head recently, including a dead detective story.

Speaker 1 (42:33):
Wow, that's so great, Oh my god. And you know,
people may not recognize the name, but coming from Chicago,
and of course my nerd love for classic comedy, the
fact that Dell Close was your co writer on Wasteland
and over the years you've you've shared amazing tell Close

(42:54):
stories about him tripping on LSD and the Sensory Deprivation Tank,
things like that.

Speaker 2 (43:00):
Yeah, they just did a documentary about Dell and the
name will occur to me a little bit, but not
at the moment. But and Mike and I are both interviewed.

Speaker 1 (43:14):
That's so great. I haven't seen it yet, do you know,
is it streaming anywhere? I'm sure the audience will see.

Speaker 2 (43:20):
Sure, it's going to be okay.

Speaker 1 (43:22):
Maybe they're still you know, running in at festivals or whatever.
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (43:26):
Yeah, yeah, okay. And they do talk with a lot
of people who knew Dell. He was a fascinating, fascinating figure.
Scared the life out of me before I really met him.
And we met while we're doing Christmas Carol at at
Goodman Theater in Chicago. Yes, it was the first year.

(43:49):
And Deal always wore a pentagram under his rogues as
the ghost of Christmas Present. He claimed he was actually
playing a pagan god, so that's some of the way
that his mind work. But in talking with Dell, I
discovered that he wasn't quite as scary. Oh, they could be,

(44:11):
as I thought, and that he loved science fiction and
he loved comic books. He said, comic books is an
American art form in which the first great work of
art has yet to be created. Now, I would sort
of suggest that mouse has certainly become that, but he

(44:31):
was interested in playing in that in that sandbox. In fact,
when grim Jack was going into his own series, we
needed a backup teacher, and I suggested what would become
Munded spar and Mike was very resistant to it at
the time. He said, that's an anthology. Anthologists never sell.

(44:55):
There always a lot more work. You gotta bring together
the artists and writers, and you know, keep them all
on a schedule, and it's hurting casts and I don't
want to do it. And I said to him, I
think I can get del Close to co writing with me.
Boom like wet such a fan of Dell Close that

(45:19):
he went, Okay, we'll do it, you know. And then
Mike came up with the idea for Wistland and pitched
it to me, and I went, well, okay, you know,
because I'm not a big fan of horror stories.

Speaker 1 (45:31):
I don't okay very much interesting.

Speaker 2 (45:34):
But and our idea of it is it would it
wouldn't be like standard comic book horror stories. We would
take it to a different level. A lot of horror
stories they take you into a very dark part of
the forest and then take you back out again. But

(45:55):
Psycho being a good example.

Speaker 1 (45:57):
Sure h h.

Speaker 2 (46:00):
Our concept is we would take you into the darkest
part of the forest and leave you there, let you
find your own way out, let you figure it out.
And yes, there was a lot of humor. Mike has
referred to it as the black hole of humor. Humor
that's so dark, laughter doesn't escape from it.

Speaker 1 (46:22):
That's beautiful. Then, final note on Doug Close and you
mentioned the Goodman Theater. He's been dead for a long
time but still manages to appear in the occasional Goodman
Theater productions. And I'll let you explain why.

Speaker 2 (46:36):
I'll sort of explain why. But also dumonka on you,
I'm sorry.

Speaker 1 (46:39):
Please, oh, that's even better. Please dell or please like John,
I appreciate that. That's great. Give me the give me
the myth, and then give me the reality.

Speaker 2 (46:47):
Okay, dell as jeth Mad willed his skull to the
to the Goodman Theater to be used in productions of
Hamlet and particular. There a lot of us at the
time we're saying, well, you're you're going to be dead.
You don't need to pad the resume. But Sharna Halpern,

(47:08):
who is his partner at Io Palympics.

Speaker 1 (47:12):
For people who don't know, I hope, but God.

Speaker 2 (47:15):
And Uh, there was a big ceremony where at one
point a skull was handed to Bob Pauls, who was
artistic director. You know again, he's it's written the prop room.
About a year or so later, some rotten reporter in
Chicago revealed that there's no way it was really Dell's skull. Uh,

(47:40):
that some of the shape was different, some of the
age on it certainly didn't God and legally you couldn't
do it, which is why Sharna found or got hold
of an actual skull and cleaned up and presented as
Dell and Dell being a witch. You know, our feelings

(48:03):
is that if it's invested with the essence of Dell,
it is Dell. You know, it doesn't matter whether it's.

Speaker 1 (48:09):
Sure he channels himself into the skull.

Speaker 2 (48:11):
I'm with you, Matt, Yeah, I mean Dale always felt
when he was telling stories about himself that he didn't
care whether or not it was all factually true. You know,
change the facts if it makes a better story, and
he did that more than once.

Speaker 1 (48:29):
It's the it's the liberty valance, you know when when
the truth, when you get the truth in the legend,
print the legend. Absolutely, man and God. For people who
don't know who Dell closes again, John and I have
talked about him in previous interviews, but this guy really
is one of the fathers of Chicago improvisational comedy and
taught everybody from the Saray Night Live guys to Mike

(48:52):
Myers and Vince Vaughan. John. I believe John Favreau was
a student of Dell's as well. Yeah, so, yeah, I mean,
this guy's got to het an incredible and he's in
he's in The Untouchables, he's in he's in Ferris Vieller's
day off as U as a teacher, and yeah, I mean, no,
he's he's incredible. And again, you know, you're you're a

(49:13):
vet of Chicago theater and stuff as he was. And
that's one of the great things I love is the
multifacets of your own career. By the way, did you
ever do any and forgive me no please say what
you were about to say about ask my question.

Speaker 2 (49:26):
I was just going to say that with Dell, it's
not only that his improv he was one of the
great influences sometimes some of the unknown influences in American
comedy with the people that he taught and who they
are in turn influencing it. Just you know, I get
spread on out, you know, from that. And he was

(49:47):
a genius, one of the very few people I personally
met who would call a genius.

Speaker 1 (49:53):
That's awesome, man, that's fantastic. I was going to ask,
did you ever Stuart Gordon, of course is a big
You're in live theater and science fiction, And did you
ever perform in any of Stuart's plays?

Speaker 2 (50:05):
I co wrote one of Stuart's all Right.

Speaker 1 (50:06):
You see, shame on me. Please tell me about your
association with Stuart Gordon?

Speaker 2 (50:10):
Right, Uh, well, I knew Stuart, Uh my friend. All right,
I was doing a children's show at a summer theater
and the runs were extended and we were extended and
the children's uh director, show director went off. So Marshall Miggotts,

(50:35):
who was the producers who brought in Dell to kind
of goose things up, and Dell had us rolling around
on the floor like we were turns at one point.
But I and my friend Bill Norris, William J. Norris
went from that to joining the Organic Theater, and he

(51:00):
did that to play I think for po and then
he was there for warp Okay, which people should know
was the world's first comic book serial or comic book
play in serial form, and there were three plays actually,
and it's done on the stage, and it had when

(51:22):
they were really going, it had all the energy and
burd of a Marvel comic with a lot of launch
and yeah, it would James Gunn would love it.

Speaker 1 (51:36):
Yeah, I mean, this is why I'm even bringing it up,
because it really does have kind of an organic tie
to what we're getting now in superhero films. Please continue. Yeah,
that's that's fantastic.

Speaker 2 (51:47):
Yeah. So, and I went to work all the time.
I loved it, sure, and in fact I came to
it so often. Bill often got the comps. I was
coming back episode one, and Lenny Kleinfeld, who wrote the script,
was also handing out programs because that's how Chicago Theater

(52:09):
ran in those days and and you looked at me
coming and he said, you're here again. Well, when the
author asks you you're here again, you may be there
too often. So eventually Stewart for a show that he
wanted to do. He wanted to it was a Nick scenario,

(52:30):
and Stewart felt that there was revenge in the air,
and so he wanted to do a revenge a blood
tragedy in the Jacobian manner. So he researched a lot
of he didn't find any that he liked well enough
to do, so he decided he would commission a play

(52:53):
and he was going to be a pirate play and
feature two female pirates based upon actual man pirates and
became Bloody Best. And so Bill and I, with a
little bit of help from Stewart, wrote script together Wow
and Uh and eventually, because it was a very active play,

(53:16):
it was an amazing play. They It was a small
seater in uh thrust stage. The furthest seat back was
like maybe ten rows back, and then behind it because
there was this wall behind it too, and the big
wide aisle behind it, and the nile's going down, and

(53:39):
they built a platform up on top of it so
that at one point when there's being pursued the pirates
are being pursued by the guards. There there are swords
whipping over the heads of the people on the last row,
you know, and so and the people in the first
couple of rows could get splattered with fake blood as well,

(54:02):
and probably probably did, but people would get hurt, and
then they have to cycle people in and out. So
I became I was brought in to do the merchant
captain in the first scene, and only the first scene.
He's stilled the first scene that helped starts off everything.

(54:23):
And what happens at that point is the merchant Captain
gets slung up by his heels, you know, and as
he makes his dramatic final speech, you may kill me now,
but my words, my words, they shall live. And that's
when one of the pirates go your words and just
draws a fake knife across the throat, and the blood

(54:46):
bag is released and the spasm and die. Well. At
this point, Bill, who had been playing a different part,
was searched, so he's playing the part of the pirate
who sits my throat. So there I am. I'm hanging
up side, all right. We got two playwrights there, right,

(55:06):
Bill's also one of my great friends. But yeah, it
can there be some competition in there, you bet. And
so I'm saying my words. You may kill me now,
but my words, my words, they shall live and build
instead of just slicing my throat. Starts sawing on my
throat and says your words, you fat turkey, your words.

(55:29):
That's when I release the blood bag and starts fascinating
because I'm trying not to laugh, and so I'm making
my laughter look.

Speaker 1 (55:36):
Like yeah, death thrust.

Speaker 2 (55:41):
And there is one other connection with a Bloody Best
to my comic book career, which is Bloody Best was
a great favorite of my Gold who's already a good
friend of mine, yep. And he came to it very often,
and he decided that based on Bloody beg see one,
he knew my love for comics. He wanted to see

(56:03):
what I would do in the comic book field. So
they were adapting the Warp statefully to comics in first comics, Yes,
and I was offered to write a backup and a
page backup. Mike wanted to see what I could do,
and so I wrote the plot. It was for Saragon,
Mistress of War, and I sent in the plot, and

(56:26):
Mike would make notes and suggestions and send it back
and says, do it again. I would do it again,
send it back in, come back, more notes, and do
it again. And then finally, uh, Mike calls me one
day and says, well, John, congratulations, we're going to use it.
We're going to use your story in the back of

(56:46):
the very first issue of Warp, which was the first
issue that first Comics issues. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. And so
I said, that's great. Do I get paid for this?
And my said yes, you sap. And so I did
get that. I got another three part thing to do.

(57:09):
I Star Slayer came in so and Grell was going
to do two issues, and then at lanted in my lap.
I was told that don't worry of Grell. Ah doesn't
like what you do. You'll know because he carries more
armament than some world countries. And and then we did,

(57:34):
and then we or we started grim Jack in the
back of and they told me, well, you know, we'll
see how it works, maybe two years or so. You know,
if it catches on, will we'll we'll spin him out
into his own book. Eight months after his first appearance,

(57:56):
grim Jack was in his first issue. The response was
that immediate it and that's strong.

Speaker 1 (58:02):
John. I it's crazy because again this was these were
my college years, and I had no idea initially that
First Comics was happening in Evanston, and I grew up
in the town next door, well met, and and I
won't deny that a part of me is like, man,
maybe if I'd blown off comic college, I might have

(58:23):
been able to get a job at first, it might
have ended up in the comic book business as opposed
to the broadcast business. And you know, again, it's just
it's like learning that the Keebler elves are in a tree,
you know, ten minutes away from where you live. It's like, oh, man,
I loved First Man. Grim Jack was amazing. I loved

(58:45):
what Mike did with John Sable and everything that was
coming out of First certainly Howard's American Flag. My god. Yes.
And it's also been so great to talk to many
of you over the years and get to know you
guys a bit in this forum and everything. And really,
Tim Truman is the only one I haven't had a

(59:05):
chance to have on you, and I should because I
adore his work as well. And then, like you said,
you guys made the great exodus from First to d
C and had such a major impact on DC during that,
you know, your period in the eighties and everything.

Speaker 2 (59:18):
Yeah, yeah, And then from d C, I Marvel at
the time thought was on exclusive and it's only after
they approached me that they found out that I wasn't. Also,
Jim Shooter had gone over to Valiant and they called
me to see if I was on exclusive. I said no, no,

(59:39):
I'm not, And that's why I wound up on Magnets.

Speaker 1 (59:42):
Oh that's awesome. Okay, I wasn't a Valiant reader, but
I was a Heroes for Hire reader. Tell me about
Heroes for Hire?

Speaker 2 (59:48):
Oh, yes, what's fun. Originally that was going to be
Roger Stern writing it, and I think Roger put together
the team to begin with and did some plotting on it.
But because he's a good friend of Jim and Jim
left Marvel and know he was happy, Rogers decided that

(01:00:11):
he wasn't going to continue, but he recommended me at
that point. So I came on and I had Pascal Ferry,
who's a brilliant, brilliant, brilliant artist, and and I had
the team. I added somewhat to it, but I wanted

(01:00:32):
to do something obviously very different from either Suicide Squad
or anything else that I had going, and I just
wanted it to erupt all over the place. You know.
Sometimes we would have a cliffhanger finish it off at
the start of the next issue and then go on
to another story and the back half of that issue.
One of the great fun times I had was my

(01:00:54):
narrator in it gradually became more and more of a
character in it and wanted to casually get into hysterics saying,
oh my god, they're all dead, and eventually got hired
by the Sea Gull.

Speaker 1 (01:01:11):
Outstanding. That's great. I noticed one of your hous friaristors
I believe is in the current shang Chie collection that
they just put out, So that's awesome, man. You know,
well all now I want to mention the dark Horse
Star Wars stuff because god damn man, what an imprint
in what a thumbprint you put on Star Wars in
your years there and especially acknowledge, And I'm glad you

(01:01:32):
guys have moved on to create her own stuff. Jan
Doorsma and I always feel like Jan never gets her
due in terms of being the incredible artist that she is.
When we're all celebrating, you know, women in comics and stuff,
I never see Jan's name on the list, and it's like,
that is a glaring omission.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
You know, some people aren't even aware that she's female.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
That's true too, you're right beyond doors.

Speaker 2 (01:01:54):
Sure, absolutely, and they're unaware that she's married to Dom Mandray, absolutely,
and that their daughter Sean Mandrick is now doing conversation.

Speaker 1 (01:02:04):
Oh, that's great. I had no idea. That's wonderful. That's
really great. But yeah, tell me about your Star Wars
run in particular, and again legacy, the great characters you created,
you know, a thousand years or was it one hundred
or a thousand years in the.

Speaker 2 (01:02:18):
Future, one hundred years?

Speaker 1 (01:02:21):
Okay.

Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
We wanted to have some physical contact with what I
had gone before, but we wanted to be far en
up ahead so that we wouldn't a trip over continuity,
which eventually that failed because Continuity caught up to us
and we were hearing such fun an other people want
to play in the same sandbox. Tim Truman was also

(01:02:46):
part of the reason that I wound up there, because
Tim was writing the Star Wars book at that point.
But he was going to go off and do a
special project. So he recommended me and they brought me
into do a just one Forestry series. And Uh and Jan,
who I I've already worked, I had already worked with,

(01:03:10):
was the artist. Little little did they know. And we
both were huge Star Wars fans and Jan I knew
a lot and had a lot of uh reference books.
But Jan god Jan was an even bigger fan of
Star Wars than I was. Uh. And in fact, for

(01:03:33):
our first story, we created the character Quinland Boss and
Jan had seen the Phantom Menace ah and Uh. She
created Quinland Boss from someone that she saw in the
background of a canteena scene for like a split second.

(01:03:56):
I mean, her eyes are that good. She saw him
and he said, Okay, that's him, that's our Jedi and
uh and created Quinn from from that. Uh. And so
then we did Quinn for a long time. We did
we were doing Clone Wars in the in the main
book before because at the time Lucas had no interest

(01:04:17):
in doing Clone Wars.

Speaker 1 (01:04:18):
Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:04:19):
Yeah, of course that eventually changed. But but we got
a chance to do our version of the Clone Wars
because it wasn't being done anywhere else. Also at the
time after we did the first story and they were
I talked with the books, including Randy Stradley up at
Dark Chorus. Yes, I said, look, this is your choice.

(01:04:44):
But instead of having this anthology of rotating or put
in this guy or that.

Speaker 1 (01:04:51):
Person, are you afraid of the Star Wars stories anthology
that they were doing back then or whatever? They yeah, yeah,
that was a great anthology. But continue.

Speaker 2 (01:04:59):
Yeah, but I said, for your ongoing book, have a
regular team, whether it's me and Jan or somebody else,
because the fans will then get to know them and
will come and say, you know, your numbers won't go
up and down to depending upon whether or not they
knew that the team.

Speaker 1 (01:05:15):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:05:15):
Absolutely, And I said, and create your own characters. Don't
get stuck in using only the minor characters from the start.
You aren't going to be able to use the major characters,
or if you are, you can't do anything with them, right,
I said, But if you create your own circle of characters,
this is the only place they can go to get

(01:05:38):
those stories the fans, and you can control them, and
the fans won't here Again, the fans won't know whether
they're going to live or die, you know, they don't
have to live through the end of it. So they
did that and that worked, and then eventually, because the

(01:06:00):
movies were done, we weren't allowed to do anymore in
that era. So Randy said, well, okay, what do you
guys want to do? And I knew they were planning
to go there. There's talk then about the next set
of films. We're going to go and do a prequel.
I said, I don't want to do that for me
as a reader, as someone involved in story, I want

(01:06:23):
to know what happens next, you know. So I said,
let's go about one hundred years in the future and
we'll invent new characters against our characters, and then go
on from there, you know, and we'll explore everything about
you know. We created a whole new situation that and

(01:06:44):
was built and based upon what the extended universe was
for for Star Wars at the time, you know, including
remnants of the Empire. But we created a new empire.
Uh you they had me Sith, so we created a
new Sith. We created. I think one of the best

(01:07:04):
things we created was that because the new Empire wasn't
as evil as the old, uh, they sought out their
own Jedi and those were the Imperial Nights, you know. Uh,
and those were kind of cool. Absolutely, that's kind of cool.
So so we did all of that, and and we
created Cad Skywalker, you know this uh, this descendant of

(01:07:32):
Luke uh. And but no, he wasn't a good guy.
You know, he was very scrubby. I mean it was
the basic idea was what if hand Solo had a lightsaber,
you know, and so he was a scoundrel. Yep, he
was a rogue with a lightsaber. Uh. And eventually came

(01:07:55):
out that he was a Jedi, and that became but
he fought against his whole heritage and his destiny. Something
of a drug addict too, you know. So and he
had his own team, and we really created this vision
of this whole universe. What was that? What was what

(01:08:16):
did the Republic now look like? What did ah the
Empire looked like? What did the Sys look like? What
did other groups look like? And we had a vast
a range of characters. There were sometimes when Jan couldn't

(01:08:36):
do an issue because you know, she put so much
into each one, and so I would invent some characters
that weren't the characters we were usually playing with so
that we could do a story with them, and that
spread out our universe even even further. One of the
fun things about it was that anything that we did

(01:08:57):
had to go through Lucas Licensing. So I went first
through our editor, then through Lucasfilm Licensing at every step
along the road story, idea, plot, script, pencils inks, colors,
everything you know, I can't pass must So our stuff

(01:09:19):
would go off and they would occasionally we would get
notes back from Lucasfilm and they would say, well, okay,
we're not sure about this, this or this or this,
and we'd go, well, okay, we'll change it if you
really want us to. But it's based on this from
the film, that, from that book, from that previous comic book,

(01:09:41):
so it's just a fair extension of what you've already done.
And they would look at it, and then we go
and go, hmm, okay, you're right, never mind awesome, And
got to the point to where we we very regularly
regularly got questioned and never got anything rejected by them,

(01:10:06):
because we knew the stuff and we loved the stuff,
and they knew that, and so they respected our enthusiasm
and our energy.

Speaker 1 (01:10:17):
I hear you, John, and then forgive the comparison, But
I don't think I'm a troll when it comes to
Star Trek. But everything you did and talked about just now,
and the way you guys handled Star Trek or Star Wars,
I wish to god the people that were making new
Star Trek Live Action had the same sensibilities. And really,

(01:10:39):
it's anyone who loves that's listening that has never read
your dark Horse comics owe it to themselves to find
the collections. Would Marvel ever reprint any of your stuff
or have they already?

Speaker 2 (01:10:50):
They have already? They call it a legacy. Okay, I'm
actually getting royalties.

Speaker 1 (01:10:56):
Fantastic, John, that's so great, And I'm so glad that
they also, because I know they were doing a lot
of the classic stuff and certainly bringing back a lot
of the old Marvel stuff prior to dark Horse getting
the license, and nobody can blame them for that because
they're great creators in that area as well. But I
always tell my friends that are massive Star Wars fans
that haven't necessarily been compacre. So I'm like, you got

(01:11:19):
to read what John and Jan did. I'm like, it's
it is such great world building. And it's certainly again,
this is my opinion. I will make you comment. I
certainly think you handled the post you know, Revenge of
or Return of the Jedi period in ways a lot
better than what we got on film. And I and

(01:11:39):
I even compared your character because that initial character, he
was the secret Agent. Am I right?

Speaker 2 (01:11:47):
We had? Yeah? I did? I think. Randy asked me
what else I had, and I said, what are We
combined James Bond with Star Wars because they actually linked.
They match up. Yeah, very well. Going to exotic locations.
You have set pieces, you know, like you have a

(01:12:07):
charismanic lead character. So he was agent of the Empire.

Speaker 1 (01:12:12):
Yes, absolutely, And and then I mean that's the thing.
I think those stories are so superior to what we
got in the sequels. And and I mean I'm like, listen,
I love Rogue one. I'm like John and Jan We're
doing stories that you can easily, you know, put alongside
Road one in terms of here's a bunch of other
people from the rebellion in this case that you don't know,
but they're involved in these kind of you know, plots

(01:12:34):
and everything. And yeah, man, no again, I'm so glad
and I'm so glad that Marvel recognizes how great that
stuff is. And so Hexter Hexter Ducks. Wasn't that the
uh dusk? Excuse me?

Speaker 2 (01:12:47):
Yeah, Hextter Dusk is a kickstarter that Jan and I
have done. H and we're working out a second volume.
Too Great to Hear go on and uh. It's combined
Space Apper as we did with Star Wars, without being
Star Wars with horror. You know, there's these races or

(01:13:09):
these I guess race of beings called the weird from
a different dimension who come in and possess things, and
the Hexers are the ones who can find them. And
we have a whole background for all of that as well.
We're gradually revealing it. Uh. And and like I said,

(01:13:29):
the first volume is done and is out there. I
think you can still located on indieg go, you may
be able.

Speaker 1 (01:13:40):
Okay, so digitally people can buy it on.

Speaker 2 (01:13:42):
Indiegg yeah, or get a hard copy I think too.

Speaker 1 (01:13:45):
Oh great to hear again? Okay, that's wonderful man, that
was my interest. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:13:50):
Yeah, And Tom Mandrake and I did a kickstarter as
well called Cross k r o S. Hallowed Ground, and
that combines vampires, the Vampire Hunter and the Battle of Gettysburg.

Speaker 1 (01:14:08):
That's great. Is that also still available?

Speaker 2 (01:14:11):
I think so? Okay, it is through Indiegogo?

Speaker 1 (01:14:14):
All right, that's again, that's wonderfully here and obviously I
point people to both of those. What do you think
of I mean, you've done a couple of crowdfunding things.
What do you think of this current age of the
comic market compared to when you you know, got in
in the eighties.

Speaker 2 (01:14:28):
And everything very different. What the good side of it
is that you own the characters, You control the characters,
but you have to do all of the work yourself. Sure,
and right now stuck with doing most of it for
extra dusk because we're not in the same part of

(01:14:51):
the country. Yes, if I still lived in New Jersey
by over there helping get the books out. But sure,
you have to annwnly create the you have to get
a letter, Do you have to get a printed do
you have to mail it out? Yeah, you're doing all
of that yourself. Plus there are prizes that if you
pledge a certain amount of money here or there, you know,

(01:15:15):
depending on what you contribute. Yeah, contribute, you know, you
get a greater or less surprise.

Speaker 1 (01:15:24):
Sure, yeah, I understand, And yeah, I believe me. I've
talked to many creators even recently, people like Jimmy Palmiatti
and Shelley Bond. Who are you know, sitting in their basement,
you know, putting together packages to send out to everyone
who who bought the project and everything. So no, I
can certainly appreciate that. Absolutely are there. I mean, really

(01:15:47):
got John, You're such a truly Again I don't mean
to blow smoke up your ass, but but you are
such a great writer. Are the publishers aware or are
you just like doing your own thing with creator own
right now? I mean, are you getting any nibbles from
every anybody out there? There's a lot more publishers these days.

Speaker 2 (01:16:03):
Not right now, But so as a result, I'm doing
those jo I'm beginning to play around with some other ideas.
We'll see how they work out, whether or not they'll
be comics, whether or not they'll be straight pros. I
had an idea for a character the other day that
came out of a dream, so cool, So we'll see

(01:16:23):
what happens with some of those.

Speaker 1 (01:16:25):
You know, well, I wish you the same fortune that
Dave Gibbons has now found, given the success of Suicide Squad,
where he can knock on a door and go hi.
I don't know if you know about me. I co
created something called Watchman. You might want to talk to me.
You might want to have a meeting with me, And certainly,
thank god, I'm so glad that that James Gunn and
company are obviously giving you your just you know, rewards

(01:16:49):
in terms of what you did for the suicide Squad
and so yeah, man, I hope, I hope it opens doors.
How if I may real fast and forgive me if
this is too personal, but I know you've had some
eye issues in years, and how you doing.

Speaker 2 (01:17:03):
Yeah, I just continue to deteriorate. But they are those
who are suggesting to me that I might look into
cataract surgery. At one point, about ten twelve years ago,
the eye doctor that I saw said, no, you'll never
be able to get cataract surgery because of the damage
to your eyes. But from what I've heard from other

(01:17:23):
people recently, there have been a lot of advances in it.
So I'm going to start looking into it, and it'll
be nice if I can if the cataracts are if
something's done with them, and that I can get better vision.
I don't I'm not looking for twenty twenty, but better
would be nice.

Speaker 1 (01:17:43):
I can appreciate that, are you. Does it impact your
work right now?

Speaker 2 (01:17:48):
Not the work? Not the work? I mean I got
big enough screen you and sure that I can zoom
everything if I need to in terms of what's on there. Okay,
So uh that's all a possibility.

Speaker 1 (01:18:04):
Well that's that's a great relief to hear, John, because truly,
when when we all heard about it and you were
public about it, I know there's a lot of concern
in the in the in the fandom and everything. So
that that's wonderfully And I'm so glad you're working on
other new stuff because hey, man, as as we both
before we started recording, we were discussing our ages and stuff.
It's like, hey, uh, you know, please don't please don't stop,

(01:18:27):
Please don't slow down. We love your work. You're you're
a very important voice, uh that still needs to be
heard today with new stuff. And and truly, I really
hope that the Suicide Squad film uh makes people go, hey,
this guy man, he created this stuff. Well maybe I
should really investigate and and get more of his books.
So it's great to hear that your old stuff is

(01:18:48):
being reprinted, but you're also working on new stuff.

Speaker 2 (01:18:50):
M Yeah, yeah, well you got to keep busy.

Speaker 1 (01:18:54):
Yeah, man, well and you know, yeah, but it's uh
also like feed those ideas that's terrific yet an idea
you know recently and everything absolutely man.

Speaker 2 (01:19:03):
Yeah, I got my work journal right here on the
uh on the desk, this is where I shot the
ideas down, sometimes works them out a bit more so
it's always there. I'm often jotting things down on it.
For every idea that I actually use, I probably get

(01:19:24):
about fifty that I that don't go anywhere.

Speaker 1 (01:19:28):
That's fair and that's okay, man, nobody nobody bats a thousand,
that's all right, you know, and and got again. I mean,
I could go on longer, but you've been very generous
with your time, so if if you you know, we
can wrap it up here and just tell you again
h as always, thank you for coming back, Thank you
for talking. I I likely will follow up with new
conversations with Mike Gold and Rob Greenberger as well, and

(01:19:52):
and flesh out the suicide squad story even more. But yeah, John,
it's it's great to see you. You look great, and
I'm glad things are that are going away, continue success
as always and truly appreciate your time today.

Speaker 2 (01:20:04):
Thanks you, take care,