COMICS
GREG PAK on Concluding DOOMED and Its Aftermath
by Vaneta Rogers, Newsarama ContributorDate: 11 August 2014 Time: 09:50 AM ET 179 39Reddit0Submit0
CREDIT: DC Comics
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CREDIT: DC Comics
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As the Superman: Doomed storyline builds toward its conclusion later this month, readers got three issues of the crossover this week and found out just how dire circumstances are for Superman and the heroes of the DCU.
Written mainly by Greg Pak and Charles Soule (with early help from then-Superman writer Scott Lobdell), the Doomed story has crossed between the Super-books since their prelude issues in April. But the whole thing will wrap up this month with next week's Superman/Wonder Woman #11 (preview via 13th Dimension), a tie-in with Supergirl #34, and the conclusion in the oversized Superman: Doomed #2.
The story revolves around the transformation of Superman into a Doomsday-type monster, as the Earth struggles against an invasion by Brainiac. The story has involved a huge cast of characters from the DCU, with action, humor and drama.
Newsarama talked to Pak to find out more about the themes being explored in Doomed, as well as what's coming up next for Action Comics.
Newsarama: Greg, among the themes explored in this storyline was this idea of trust and friendship. Was that a theme you intended to explore?
Greg Pak: Yeah, there's this whole question of whether Clark can trust himself, or whether Superman can trust himself when he's up against Doomsday and Brainiac. He's got these terrible monsters clawing at his brain, basically.
And it continues to be a theme, as these stories pan out, because there's an interesting way in which the folks who Superman has befriended over the years and months come to his aid, and not only help him deal with the physical or psychic threats that he's grappling with, but I think there's a way in which folks are helping him by just believing in him.
I think that definitely a theme that we're playing with, this idea that, even if you're Superman, you can't do it by yourself, and that there is that capacity to be like Superman in all of us. Those are definitely things that we're exploring in the story.
Nrama: There's also been this idea of an internal struggle — in practical terms, battling your own demons, but in the case of Lois Lane and Superman, they're literally battling monsters within their own minds. It's been fun to see that play out visually. Was that something else you planned to play with in Doomed?
Pak: Yeah, but you know, when stories come together, sometimes there are things that we're very conscious of in the very beginning, and sometimes there are things that are coming through and we realize that it fits with everything else we've been working on.
The Lois stuff is the latter. Coming into this story, Scott Lobdell had been working on a story with Lois being possessed by Brainiac. That was one of the chess pieces we had on the board when we got together to start talking about how to build this crossover. It was an element we had to work with.
And as that part of the story developed, we began to realize it would provide some great parallels between what Superman is going through and what Lois is going through. And it led to these really fun scenes in the Action Comics Annual #3 and Action #34, where we see that parallel between Lois and Superman.