Writing for Halloween

When I went to college in the early 2010s, I studied and got my Bachelor’s Degree in Creative Writing. At the time, there were no comic book writing courses at my school, if memory serves, there may have been a graphic novel studies class that I felt too knowledgeable to take (I deserve your boos), but I took writing classes of many types taught by people who had mastered many different disciplines. Fiction, essays, memoirs, sports writing, playwriting, screenwriting, and poetry are the main ones I remember taking.

The goal of the undergraduate program I was in makes way more sense to me in retrospect, the goal was to show us that we could take our writing energy and direct it in many different ways, through many different disciplines, and what was important was that our voice ultimately came through. And then, after that undergrad program, if we still wanted to write, we would pick and follow one of those disciplines in a graduate program or life.

Ultimately, I stuck with comic writing, but I am glad I took classes in so many other types of writing, and I often think about trying some of the other forms I studied again. What I kept for the most part was the lesson: don’t be afraid to try different things. Your voice should come through whatever type of writing you are doing, and in my case, whatever genre it is that you are working in. And you shouldn’t be scared to write in different genres and for different forms for that reason.

Recently, I have lost sight of that a little bit. This year, I have said the phrase “I’m not a horror guy” too many times, and unfortunately, I think it to my detriment. Mainstream American comics love Superheroes and horror, those are the genres most of the books fall into at this point. I have worked with some of the great horror writers and artists in the world, and I’ve even edited some great superhero horror books and some straight-up horror books. Yet, when asked as a writer if I have any horror ideas I’ve kind of shrugged.

In terms of genres, I naturally gravitate to…superheroes, which are number one and act as a bit of a catch-all for genres depending on the characters you’re working with, as previously discussed, I love crime thrillers, science fiction; I think it is cool, and there are types of fantasy my brain gravitates towards. Horror, though, is not always the default place I go when generating ideas. But I do respect the genre; so many comic creators I admire have and do actively work in that space, and so many of the filmmakers I love have either made some great horror movies or made movies with incredible horror elements. And more than most genres, I think horror has so many different variations that it is foolish to say, “No part of the horror genre works for me.”

Now...You may be thinking to yourself. “Hey, Dave…I don’t know if you know this but the main work you are known for at this point…Man-Bat is a psychological/body horror story about a guy who turns himself into a giant Bat monster to avoid his problems and then creates horror in his life and the lives of others” I know. But I came at that through the superhero part of my brain. Man-Bat is a character who lives in a superhero universe and that made my entry point to him easier. But with that being said…it brings me back to the original point I was trying to make. When I was offered the chance to pitch and write stories at DC Comics, I didn’t say no based on the genre.

That first time I got to write when Dan DiDio came to me and said, “You are going to write a story in this year’s DC Halloween special,” I didn’t say, “I don’t know, Dan, I’m not a horror guy.” I had other reservations, but whatever I was getting the opportunity to write for, I was going to do so to the very best of my ability. And I did, in the pages of Cursed Comics Cavalcade I came back with “The Devil You Know,” The Robin (Damian) and Solomon Grundy team-up story where you think the monster of the tale is going to be monstrous Solomon Grundy but instead it’s the spiritually monstrous Professor Pyg. (Art by Christian Duce, Colors by Romulo Fajardo JR, Letters by Tom Napolitano, and Editing by Alex Antone.)

I rose to the occasion, I did something I didn’t know if I could do, but I tried anyway because I knew it was the opportunity I had. And I also did it from as authentic a place as I could. I tried to think of what scares me, what upsets me, and what by extension scares and upsets these characters I wanted to write about. I took that approach with Man-Bat too.

And after Man-Bat and Cursed Comics Cavalcade. There’s one more horror superhero story I did that is probably in my top five of things I have written up to this point. And that’s my Green Lantern (John Stewart) story in the Halloween anthology Are You Afraid of Darkseid. At that point in my writing career, I was pitching for every single DC anthology, regardless of subject or genre because all I wanted to do was write. I would always write up six or seven pitches, minimum, for each one. And Are You Afraid of Darkseid was no different.

I pitched stories starring a few characters but at the time I had the powerful desire to write John Stewart in particular. I had written a Green Lantern story focused on Hal Jordan for From Beyond the Unknown, another one of my favorites, and I really enjoyed writing Hal but John Stewart is really deep in my heart from growing up on the Justice League and Justice League Unlimited cartoons where he was front and center as Green Lantern.

So I had two goals. Write a John Stewart story, and write a horror story that feels like it fits his character. Quickly in my brainstorming process I realized John Stewart was an architect and what’s a better horror story for a guy who is both an architect and a member of the Green Lantern Corps then sending him to an haunted house in space? And that’s what the story “Escape the Dark Fortress” became about. John set out to repair an abandoned structure in space that was rumored to run on the life force of travelers and refugees who tried to use it as shelter. While inside the Dark Fortress, he sees first hand how it tries to defeat people into staying there forever, but John doesn’t take any of the bait and instead tries to help the haunted house find a greater purpose. It’s one of the short stories that I hear about a few times a year online and I take a lot of pride in that it worked for the John Stewart fanbase. It doesn’t hurt that the story was drawn by the terrific Pablo M. Collar, colored by Wil Quintana, and lettered by Dave Sharpe.

These stories I think were successful because I knew the characters well, I asked what would be the best scary things to challenge their character, and I explored that. And if I did that three times why am I saying I can’t do it again? Well, not to be too on theme, but it comes back to fear. I never want to half-ass anything. And because I am not a capital H Horror Aficionado, I’m afraid ideas I come up with for the genre won’t be able to compete with other people’s, and that’s nonsense. I shouldn’t be thinking about competing with anyone anyway when it comes to writing or making art, that’s always a surefire road to failure.

In the last few months I have started naturally coming up with a few horror ideas, I’m going to try to develop them and see where they take me. As I get older I get more genre-agnostic, and I think that’s a good thing. I’m willing to try more things as a reader, and as a writer, I want to have a good story in all types of different genres. Will I succeed in that endeavor? I don’t know but I’m certainly going to try.

But I’m not going to be afraid of Horror. I’m not going to be afraid of any genre. I’m going to respect them, think my stories through, and see what genre they would best fit under. Appropriate for a Newsletter where I wrote a bunch about a Green Lantern to end on the idea of not being afraid to do something. Completely unintended but I’ll take the thematic coming together!

Addendum: AND THEN! After finishing this damn post, I realized this year I had written a fourth horror/thriller story in the pages of DC’s I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST CRISIS with “God’s Chosen Man,” which is all about Lex Luthor losing his mind after Superman was defeated, but he wasn’t the one who did it, so he creates a Superman in his head to torture himself with. I have done this FOUR TIMES. At this point, a good chunk of my output has been scarier stories. My ability to compartmentalize is unbelievable.

The First Annual Dave Wielgosz Holiday Q&A

Last Year, I posted my advice for writing comic book short stories on social media, and it was one of my most successful posts. I’d like to do something like that again. 

This December, in this very Newsletter, I will answer any questions you have about writing comics, making comics, and specifically any questions you have about the comics I have written. I won’t read pitches, scripts, or treatments. And I won’t answer rude emails. I will answer the occasional silly or pop culture-related question, though. 

Mainly, for any real-deal comic book craft questions you have, I’m open, and I will give you the best possible answer I have for them. I want to do this because I love helping people on their comic book journeys, it feels like a great thing to do heading into the end of the year, and I would love more people to check out/subscribe to this Newsletter where I try to offer that kind of transparency into creativity often.

Email me at [email protected] to submit your question; I won’t share your name in the response in the Newsletter unless you ask. Be cool to me; I’ll be cool to you; please don’t email me weird/inappropriate stuff. I’ll be taking questions until 11/29/24 and running the Newsletter post on 12/5/24. Let’s have fun! 

That’s it for this week and, as a matter of fact, this month! Next week, we head into November, and I’m going to talk a little bit about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Black, White, & Green because the trade paperback of the whole series goes on sale anywhere you can get graphic novels on November 12th, 2024, and in physical and online comic book retailers on November 13th, 2024. I would love for you to buy it!

Stay safe!

—Dave Wielgosz