Ask Kurt Busiek

[Kurt Busiek]

I for one would love to see that happen!

Would you still go for the comedy angle a la Duffy or something more serious?

More serious, because I'm not Jo, but with humor to it because of who the characters are.

But I'd like to write them as they were in 1983, rather than as they are today.

kdb

[Kurt Busiek]

Mr. Busiek,

Who would you consider to be the most complex characters in the 616 Marvel Universe? By complex, I don't mean in terms of continuity or so on (i.e. too many retcons) but in terms of personality and character depth?

I have no idea.

I never know how to answer questions like this -- I just don't make lists like that, whether they're about who's the most powerful or the most underused or the most whatever. I don't spend any time ranking characters on complexity. I just want them to be interesting, and if I'm writing them, my job is to make them interesting, regardless of whether they were interesting before.

For instance, take Songbird. As Screaming Mimi, she wasn't all that complex. But to make her interesting, I gave her a past and a messed-up family, as well as a psychological issue for her to overcome, and now she's a lot more complex now than she used to be. So I don't look at characters from the standpoint of "how complex are they," but "how interesting could they be? What's there room for?"

After all, none of them are steady-state -- they've probably been more complex under some creators, less under others. I think there's a lot of interesting complexity to Banshee (Irish laird, Interpol agent, costumed criminal, superhero, country-music fan, has leprechauns in the family castle), so there's a lot to work with there, given all the experiences her must have had, the things he could have seen, and how they shaped him. But we don't usually see that much when we see him; he's just Irish and he screams. I look more at what could be rather than what is, so the possibilities inherent in a character who's been part of all those tangled worlds stand out to me more than the relatively-little that's been done with him.

kdb

[Kurt Busiek]

Hello Mr Busiek,

there’s currently a thread in the subforum X-books about the lack of Black characters in X-books: Why haven't any of the Black Male X-men caught on other than Bishop?

The main idea is that it goes hand in hand with the lack of Black authors. I know, of course, that you have nothing to do with the existing situation but I’d like to have your opinion on it: aren’t there a lot of Black authors? Have they problems to sell stories? Or do you think they aren’t interested by this franchise?

There haven't been all that many black writers at Marvel and DC, and probably even fewer on the X-books.

That said, I really don't know who all the various black X-Men have been -- I haven't read the X-books regularly since the early 1980s, and while I've caught stretches of them here and there there's a ton of stuff I haven't seen. But then again, the number of X-characters who've caught on since, say, 1990 seems to be pretty low, whether they're white, black, or anything else. So it might have more to do with there being few black X-Men in their "formative years" than anything else.

But who knows -- if someone gives some of the black X-Men other than Storm and Bishop more spotlight time and makes them engaging, rather than letting them vanish into the mass of short-term X-characters as most post-1990 X-characters have, then something could happen.

kdb

[Zelena]

There haven't been all that many black writers at Marvel and DC, and probably even fewer on the X-books.

That said, I really don't know who all the various black X-Men have been -- I haven't read the X-books regularly since the early 1980s, and while I've caught stretches of them here and there there's a ton of stuff I haven't seen. But then again, the number of X-characters who've caught on since, say, 1990 seems to be pretty low, whether they're white, black, or anything else. So it might have more to do with there being few black X-Men in their "formative years" than anything else.

But who knows -- if someone gives some of the black X-Men other than Storm and Bishop more spotlight time and makes them engaging, rather than letting them vanish into the mass of short-term X-characters as most post-1990 X-characters have, then something could happen.

kdb

Thank you for your answer, Mr Busiek.

[bearman]

Mr. Busiek...
Banshee is a hot piano player, too,

[Kurt Busiek]

Banshee is a hot piano player, too,

Just give him a hot piano, he'll play the heck out of it.

kdb

[Reviresco]

OMG! I just saw the announcement about the Namor mini-series you are doing!!!

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/marvel...w-namor-series








Yes! YES!! YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!! !!!!!



As a Namor fan, I'm so very happy at this news! It sounds like everything I would want from a Namor book. I've long complained about the lack of world building for modern Namor stories and the disappearance of so much of the Atlantean cast. And I LOVE Lady Dorma. She's always been my favorite of Namor's ladies. I can't wait till December!


I loved Autumn Lands and I think Ben Dewey will be great on this mini-series. I'm not familiar with Jonas Scharf, however. Is he inking Dewey? Or is the mini-series going to have two artists?

[Kurt Busiek]

As a Namor fan, I'm so very happy at this news! It sounds like everything I would want from a Namor book. I've long complained about the lack of world building for modern Namor stories and the disappearance of so much of the Atlantean cast. And I LOVE Lady Dorma. She's always been my favorite of Namor's ladies. I can't wait till December!

Hope you like it! It's a different kind of story, but it's got stuff I think Busiek fans (or Namor fans, or Marvel history fans, or heck, even Conan fans (though there's no Conan content here) will like.

I loved Autumn Lands and I think Ben Dewey will be great on this mini-series. I'm not familiar with Jonas Scharf, however. Is he inking Dewey? Or is the mini-series going to have two artists?

Ben's drawing the main story, and Jonas is doing some modern-day framing sequences. It's all gorgeous.

kdb

[Reviresco]

Hope you like it! It's a different kind of story, but it's got stuff I think Busiek fans (or Namor fans, or Marvel history fans, or heck, even Conan fans (though there's no Conan content here) will like.



Ben's drawing the main story, and Jonas is doing some modern-day framing sequences. It's all gorgeous.

kdb

Ah, cool! If a series has to have two artists, that's a great way to do it. It worked out well for Zdarsky's recent Invaders. I'll go hunt down some of Jonas Scharf's work.

Your description of it being horror, epic fantasy and superhero adventure is something I've long thought would be perfect for a Namor book. Before Marvel got the Conan license back, I thought epic fantasy with eldritch horror was a niche that Marvel was missing nowadays, that a Namor book could easily fill and add to with the underwater and Atlantean setting. Roy Thomas dabbled a bit with it, when introduced the Serpent Crown in Subby's book. So, yes, I think I'll very much like it. Thank you so much for taking the project.

[Marvell2100]

OMG! I just saw the announcement about the Namor mini-series you are doing!!!

https://www.syfy.com/syfywire/marvel...w-namor-series








Yes! YES!! YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!! !!!!!



As a Namor fan, I'm so very happy at this news! It sounds like everything I would want from a Namor book. I've long complained about the lack of world building for modern Namor stories and the disappearance of so much of the Atlantean cast. And I LOVE Lady Dorma. She's always been my favorite of Namor's ladies. I can't wait till December!


I loved Autumn Lands and I think Ben Dewey will be great on this mini-series. I'm not familiar with Jonas Scharf, however. Is he inking Dewey? Or is the mini-series going to have two artists?

That's awesome! I see on the cover that this is an earlier version of Namor than what is currently in the books.

Which version will we be seeing?

I also believe you have a Spidey book coming out if I'm not mistaken?

[Thor-El]

So excited about you taking on this Namor mini series!! That it stars such legendary Atlanteans as the awesome Lady Dorma and Attuma is the icing in the cake! Any chance we get to see a younger Vashti?

[Kurt Busiek]

That's awesome! I see on the cover that this is an earlier version of Namor than what is currently in the books.

Which version will we be seeing?

Both, but the story is mostly set in the early 1930s, so Namor's a teenager.

I also believe you have a Spidey book coming out if I'm not mistaken?

I have a story in AMAZING SPIDER-MAN 850.

kdb

[Kurt Busiek]

So excited about you taking on this Namor mini series!! That it stars such legendary Atlanteans as the awesome Lady Dorma and Attuma is the icing in the cake! Any chance we get to see a younger Vashti?

If you check out Vashti's history, you'll see why this is unlikely (but not impossible).

kdb

[Thor-El]

If you check out Vashti's history, you'll see why this is unlikely (but not impossible).

kdb

Now you got me researching my Marvel Universe Handbook for Vashti's history. And thanks for giving me hopes!

[Intothevoid]

Sorry if this was already asked, are there any chances of getting a Defenders ongoing again? They are my favorite non-functional team. It would certainly be interesting to see them together, especially considering how much different they are from back in the day.