It Has to Happen

The last few weeks have been kind to me on the comic art front. I have seen work from six different artists from six different projects, and as has been previously stated…seeing new comic art is the best part of being a comic book writer. And it was definitely the best part of being an editor while I was at DC Comics in that capacity. In this modern era you get emails from artists across the globe sending you wonderful jpegs/tiffs of art they did traditionally and scanned or brought to life on their computers. Some days as an editor I would see pages on ten different projects, those were the great days.

But you know what’s even more magical than seeing comic art no one has seen yet in your inbox?

Seeing it in person.

This was one of the many great privileges of working with Jim Lee on a project while at DC. You may know this, but on top of being DC’s publisher, Jim is one of the greatest comic book artists who has ever lived. And when someone’s your boss, it’s easy to forget that, but then…Eddy Choi, Jim Lee’s then assistant, right hand man, and someone himself with a phenomenal eye for art…would walk up to your desk with a freshly pencilled Jim Lee cover and your jaw would drop on the floor. When I edited Batman: One Bad Day, Jim did a run of variant covers for us and I’m pretty sure I saw almost all of them in person before he sent them off to his phenomenal collaborators Scott Williams and Alex Sinclair. The cover for the Clayface issue at the start of this Newsletter I hold particularly close to my heart.

On occasion other artists would come to the DC offices, set up in an office for a day and work. Often it was so they could come in, take meetings, consult with us on some projects, and maybe teach the editorial staff a class about some aspect of comic book at. The person who came in the most was Andy Kubert, the man who was pencilling Batman when I started reading it when he and Grant Morrison took over the title. I was a big fan of Andy’s before meeting him, and after working with him for over a decade I only became a bigger fan. On top of being a terrific comic artist, he’s one of the kindest guys around, and a terrific teacher. When I was a young editor he helped me with my artistic vocabulary and taught me how to give better notes to line artists and colorists. Ultimately I think I worked with Andy on around 20 issues worth of comics interiors, and a few dozens covers on top of that, which is something I carry like a badge of honor.

On the days Andy would come in, he would often set up in the office next to mine, and have started a few hours before I got there. When I arrived he would open the door and greet me with a big smile and a wonderful “Hello, Dave!” He would then give me the great gift of letting me sit in his office and talk to him for a few minutes, inevitably showing me the beginnings of the piece he was working on that day. As more people came into the office, I would scurry out, Andy would close the door, and every few hours he would walk out of the office saying things ranging from “It’s going good” to “This is a tough one” to “We’re going to figure it out.” And then at the end of the day the door would open and he would let me come back to the office and I would see this cover that didn’t exist before, that no one else had seen, and I would be enchanted.

Comic art is magic. It’s storytelling, it’s beautiful, and I have a deep reverence for the people who do it. But Andy, in addition to a few other artists I will mention, were the people who showed me it was a craft, a job. This guy gets up early in the morning, starts his day, and by the end of the day, something has to exist that wasn’t there before. It’s a lesson I have taken into my work as a writer and something I am reminding myself of as I am working on something this week that scares me. But by the end of the week…the day after this gets posted…that thing will be done. I will have given it my all and I’ll either have missed the mark, hit it perfectly, or more likely my editors will go “Hey this is strong work, but let’s talk about how we can make it better.” The same way I would do with the freelance creators I used to work with.

Is the thing I’m working on going to be as magical as art by Andy Kubert and Jim Lee? It’s going to be very cool, but I tell those stories not only to brag about my tremendous career, but to remind myself that we all start with a blank page, and by the end of the workday hopefully we have something that’s ready to show others. That we’ve properly applied our skills and the thousands of hours it took us to get to this point to make something new and excellent.

Someone else who teaches me this on a regular basis is my friend and collaborator Riley Rossmo. I have seen some of Riley’s best covers before anyone else has and I have gone “Dude, this is going to rule.” And he’s gone “I’m not sure.” Not because he’s fishing for compliments, but because Riley doesn’t get high on his own supply, and because he’s always challenging himself and getting to the next level of his craft. I have seen amazing pages from him that clearly took hours, a couple tries, and a lot of thought. And again, I have said “This rules!” And while proud, Riley reminds me that it was a long day’s work.

When I work with Riley on a story he’ll often call me about the page he’s working on, we’ll talk about that page of the script, the essentials of it, and he’ll share with me his initial thoughts and decisions he’s going to make. This makes me feel like I am collaborating very closely with him, but it also has undeniably made me a better collaborator to others. Getting to be so close to Riley’s process when he works on a script I wrote, makes me more thoughtful and considerate when I write scripts for others.

“You’re a comic writer, though, Dave, not a comic artist, certainly you have learned a lot from comic writers too.”

Undeniably. Reading scripts and collaborating with some of the best comic writers of all-time has undeniably made me a better writer. But the end goal of what I do is something takes my scripts and draws pages based off it. So getting to talk to comic artists, is invaluable. Learning what’s worked for them in the past, what hasn’t, and also seeing art that sometimes only a few hours ago didn’t exist? It’s a terrific thing for a writer, you gain tools you might not get from other writers, and you just become a better team player for the future. Which I think is the most important thing about making comics or any type of collaborative art.

So, this week I take these strolls down memory lane and tell you stories about comic artists I have gotten lucky to know to let you know I am writing something intimidating this week, but…by the end of the week a draft will be done. I’ll be proud, and I’ll make the following draft even better. But like Jim, Andy, Riley, and everyone else who makes comics. I’m starting with a blank page and I’m going to start filling it.

See you next week.

Stay safe!

—Dave Wielgosz