One of the best aspects of DC’s recent push to reissue old material has been Keith Giffen and J.M. DeMatteis’ Justice League International, which has now seen four hardcover collections (with the first recently released in paperback, and more of both formats to come). With the recent release of the Volume Four hardcover, I sat down with co-writer J.M. DeMatteis to do a quick interview about the experience of writing what many fans still think of as the best period in Justice League comics.
Blog@Newsarama: So the “recruitment story” has long been a Justice League standby. What motivated the “too many guys in a room to be effective” variation?
J. M. DeMatteis: It worked for the Marx Brothers, why wouldn’t it work for us? But, really, the idea was Keitho’s.
BLOG@: Is it just me, by the way, or do the badguys trying to avenge their ridiculous defeat kind of remind you of the subsection of Skrulls who, during Marvel’s Secret Invasion event, were griping about having been turned into cows?
JMD: I haven’t read Secret Invasion, but I’d gripe about being turned into a cow, too. Keith actually was turned into a cow once—by Andy Helfer—and he still hasn’t gotten over it.
BLOG@: It’s interesting that the Beetle & Booster solo story (the vampire one) in this collection is the most action-packed of the book. Obviously among the critics of your run, there are those who complained that it was too much talking, not enough punching–and meanwhile Beetle and Booster are the most representational of your book.
JMD: Action? There was action in one of our stories? How did that happen? I hope there were a lot of word balloons covering up most of the art. If there weren’t, we failed. Miserably.
BLOG@: Max reaches out to Ted mentally during this collection, and it’s the first time he uses his powers, right? It’s interesting to me, given Ted’s destiny.
JMD: Destiny? You mean getting his brains blown out by Max? Never happened. Those were evil doppelgangers and the Ted and Max we know and love are still alive in the parallel universe we saw in I Can’t Believe It’s Not the Justice League. (Okay, so maybe I’m delusional. But I’m a writer and they pay me to be delusional. And if Bucky Barnes and Barry Allen can come back, so can Ted and Max.)
BLOG@: At this point in the series, Kevin was gone a lot–how much, if any, input did you and Giffen get into the selection process?
JMD: As I recall, Andy Helfer was the chief artist hunter, but Keith and I were certainly allowed to voice our opinions. Andy would never listen to those opinions, but we were certainly allowed to voice them.
BLOG@: Guy & Ice have their first date here–whose idea was it to put these two diametrical opposites together?
JMD: I suspect it just evolved out of the character interplay. Those JLI characters were very much alive to us, still are (in fact, J’onn J’onzz is in my office right now, with a carton of milk and a box of Oreos), and we let them lead us wherever they needed to go.
What’s that? Oh. J’onn says hi. And he wants you to know that he’s not dead, either.
BLOG@: Guy’s head trauma, Bea’s injuries–these things seem to play out in real time to heal. NOT common in superhero fiction, but Jurgens’ JLA actually carried through with it the next time Ted ended up in a coma. Was this a conscious decision?
JMD: Conscious decision? We were always flying by the seat of our pants. Most of the time I never even knew what was going to be in the next issue till Keith’s plot arrived and he never knew what I was going to do till the dialogue was finished. It’s amazing these stories ever made sense at all.
BLOG@: Black Hand! Are you guys expecting a Blackest Night bump on the sales of this HC?
JMD: You mean Black Hand is a major character now? BWAH-HA-HA-HAAAAA!!!!
BLOG@: Funny that you guys got tagged for having subpar villains in this run, but Darkseid and Black Hand are here, and they’re headliners in big event crossovers these days!
JMD: Darkseid was a major league villain from the instant he popped out of Jack Kirby’s genius imagination. Even we couldn’t ruin a character that brilliant. As for Black Hand… BWAH-HA-HA-HAAAAA!!!!
April 3rd, 2009 at 12:40 pm
I just loved this series. Read it a couple years back and it holds up very well. There’s a great indepth interview with Keith and JMD (and maybe Andy Helfer) in Back Issue magazine.
April 3rd, 2009 at 1:29 pm
“(Okay, so maybe I’m delusional. But I’m a writer and they pay me to be delusional. And if Bucky Barnes and Barry Allen can come back, so can Ted and Max.)”
PLEASE, DC, BRING BOTH OF THEM BACK. Or revisit the WW/Max murder storyarc somehow. I can’t stand that it’s yet to be finished still. But really, I just want Teddy back.
April 3rd, 2009 at 2:45 pm
Yeah, I know. I just wanted to be sure I acknowledged the release, and am in contact with JMD because SAVIOR 28 is freaking awesome, so I decided to do a quick-hit Q&A. But I agree: Check out Back Issue, as that interview is far better than what I did.
April 3rd, 2009 at 3:34 pm
I always thought DeMatteis’ work on Captain America was much funnier.
April 3rd, 2009 at 4:09 pm
Best quote of the whole interview, and my sentiments, exactly:
JMD: Destiny? You mean getting his brains blown out by Max? Never happened. Those were evil doppelgangers and the Ted and Max we know and love are still alive in the parallel universe we saw in I Can’t Believe It’s Not the Justice League.
This is the proof of how wrong Geoff Johns always got of the JLI, Legion and practically everything Keith Giffen has ever worked on.
April 3rd, 2009 at 4:12 pm
I wasn’t reading comics in the 90s (I got into comics when I was 20) so I missed JLI and have been loving these hardcovers. I haven’t seen a volume 5 solicited. Will there be a volume 5? Please say yes.
April 3rd, 2009 at 7:09 pm
Ricardo–I so completely agree with your assessment of that as the “best quote of the interview” that it’s actually up on my Facebook profile right now in the little “more about you” box. Owen–as far as I know, they’re planning to make their way all the way through the series. Right now it’s kind of at a crosssroads because with JLE and JLA about to branch off, it might be a little harder to decide what they’re going to do with the collections.
April 3rd, 2009 at 7:39 pm
I don’t see how these collections sell I have found near complete runs amongst quarter bins dozens of times at conventions, flea markets, and comic shows. These are so easy to find.
April 4th, 2009 at 4:04 pm
Nice piece, Russ. I’m with you guys on the Ted and Max thing as well. The entire Max Lord evil turn was just lazy writing – big businessman with questionable ethics, of course he must be a cold-blooded, manipulative murderer.
JLI’s the only Justice League run I’ve really enjoyed. Although I’ve reread it several times since I discovered it (I found the Club JLI issues in a 50-cent box around the time Morrison JLA was hitting Rock of Ages, which moved me to track down the entire JL/I/A/E run in just a few weeks), I’m loving the chance to collect the entire run in hardback.
I wouldn’t mind JLE editions too. It was never as good as JLI/A, but with the Teasdale Imperative, Breakdowns, Power Girl’s cat, etc., it really helps to read both.
Heck, I’m so into the run, I would love to see the Annuals and some of the better JLQ stories included as well!
No run of JLI hardcovers be complete without JLAnt!
April 5th, 2009 at 1:04 pm
I guess we may be out of luck, unless we speak with our dollars or start writing. When I asked him this weekend, Bob Wayne says that DC currently has no plans to solicit further JLI hardcovers.
April 5th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
That’s terrible news! Well, I’ve already voted with my dollars, and I’m writing a very positive review of Vol. 4 encouraging others to buy it. So I guess I’ve done all I can short of buying multiple copies.
Still…bummer.
April 6th, 2009 at 6:18 am
Well, continued JLI collections are the only way DC’s getting any money out of me on the Justice League franchise. I’ll leave it up to them.:)
April 6th, 2009 at 9:12 am
Know what the difference between JLI and the stuff DC’s currently churning out? People are still talking about JLI 23 years later.