Since the Doom Patrol days , Grant Morrison has helped reshape superhero comics — and his recent Multiversity has been a fascinating experimentation . But now , he ’s take on a novel challenge as EIC of Heavy Metal , the venerable cartoon strip magazine . We peach to him about the hereafter of comics .
We caught up with Grant Morrison at San Diego Comic - Con , at the Heavy Metal booth , and our whole unedited 14 - min conversation is above .
Morrison is n’t altogether finished with DC Comics , or superheroes generally . He’sdoing a follow-up to Multiversity telephone Multiversity Too , which is a series of graphical novel . Plus he ’s doing Batman : Black & White , and Wonder Woman : Earth One . But now , he ’s going to be pretty engaged with Heavy Metal .
Morrison say he ’s pretty much achieve a dead end , or possibly a cul - de - sac , with American superheroes for now — specially after Multiversity , “ which was all about the relationship of the creator to the audience , which has changed so much in the last few eld . ” He feels like he ’s said enough — plus American culture is still grappling with the aftermath of 9/11 , and get by with dark themes of intrusion , zombies , and horrible contagion . So to the extent that he ’s concerned in superheroes , he ’s look to spot like China and India , where there are more “ positive , forrard - wait ” delineation .
“ America ’s kind of turn a loss its sense of the time to come right now , ” sound out Morrison . “ The mind is that the future is going to be the collapse of empire , or the rise of the zombies , or something that wipe us all out . I kind of feel that I desire to oppose that feeling , because I ’m not that depressive , alas . So I kind of laid down American superheroes for a while . ” At the same time , he ’s excited about the Wonder Woman comic , which has “ vary my head word about how to distinguish comic strip . ”
And Morrison wants to drop behind the magazine ’s aesthetic out of 1985 , into 2015 . “ It ’s go for a long time , ” says Morrison , who then quickly impart , “ I have n’t show it for a foresightful fourth dimension , since Richard Corben was doing those Den and Neverwhere stories . ”
So he ’s coming back and trying to immerse himself in it and ask , “ How do I move this forward ? ” He wants to update the “ slenderly date ” view of sexuality , and take in more foreign creators and more women . “ More perspectives . ” He want “ broader types of sex ” and more type of stories . “ I want it more psychedelic . I want more science fiction . I want more seventies influence — the track that we never really trace in comics , that we could have go down in the seventies . ” powerful now , Morrison ’s thoughts are “ slightly tongue-tied , ” because he just took the job . He kind of know what he require , but has n’t seen the work yet .
Speaking of dated gender , when we think of Heavy Metal , we think of this :
“ It ’s kind of Los Angeles , Sunset Strip , you get it on ? Kind of heavy alloy video , ” Morrison aver . “ Unfortunately , we ’re in a earthly concern now where teenage boys have farm up [ and ] they ’ve view everything from the age of twelve … that stuff does n’t tickle any more . ”
Nowadays , we live in a more advanced reality , where sexuality is more complex and there are more options . And Morrison wants to ponder that in Heavy Metal — he does n’t want to dial back the cartridge clip ’s sexuality , because sexuality is part of its DNA . If anything , he want more sex , but “ it ’s just that I do n’t want it to be a 1980s Mötley Crüe sexuality . ”
Morrison will write some comics for Heavy Metal , but also wants to do a lot of editorial content — to his idea , the ripe epoch of the magazine publisher was when it had William S. Burroughs writing for it , plus interviews with Douglas Adams , talks with scientists , reviews of underground comics , etc . He wants to convey back that editorial mental object and have a “ club flavor , ” like “ here ’s a place we can all go to . ”
And in general , Morrison wants to get more of an “ esoteric ” touch sensation of ridiculousness back into the magazine .
One thing that ’s hit about old Heavy Metal comic is the nerveless futurist cityscape by artists likeMoebius . How do you make the metropolis cool again , in the 21st 100 ?
Morrison says part of it is that in a portion of dad culture , the city is a ruin — in the Batman video recording game and movies , Gotham City is a inferno that nobody would ever want to exist in . It goes back to what he was saying earlier about only being capable to envisage the fall of civilization . So Morrison want to get back to suppose , “ allow ’s imagine again , countenance ’s see : What would the metropolis of the future look like ? It would n’t necessarily be sailplane phallic towers any more . It would be something new , that we demand to think of . ” He wants “ forward - looking , reformist science fabrication , ” that ideate going to the future tense .
In the era of gentrification , how do you make cities experience relevant and interesting ? By “ letting everyone speak . By render everyone a voice . ”
But meanwhile , what about awing , big - than - life , Frank Frazetta - style steel and sorcery ? Morrison says he ’d like to feature some of that , but it count what people send him . One of the things he ’s been cogitate about doing himself is a variety of sword - and - sorcery comedian . But he wants to update everything , and make it contemporary — so “ everything that was never questioned in the past , I require to question . ” That means if they do sword and necromancy , it has to poke into “ the introductory assumptions of how that hooey work . ”
Morrison was doing Multiversity , which deals with a multiverse of DC universes , at the same time as DC was also exploring the multiverse in Convergence , and Marvel was doing its own collection of alternate universes . Have we gone as far as we can with superheroes and alternate realities now ? Are we done with that ?
“ I hope so , ” say Morrison . “ I started Multiversity in 2006 . Most of the consequence were written then . All I ’ve done is polish it . We wait three days for [ artist ] Frank Quitely to do his beautiful workplace . ” But to Morrison , this is something he did several years ago , as a followup to 52 and Final Crisis . “ So it ’s kind of comic to me that everyone ’s pop out doing this kind of multiple stuff . ”
But part of the rationale behind explore alternative adaptation of superheroes is just the logic of capitalism , not creativity , tell Morrison . “ It ’s the same idea as , if you look at Kit - Kats — you now have orangish Kit - Kats and brittle Kit - Kats . [ So ] now you ’ve got an orange Wolverine and a toffee Batman . So all we ’re doing is fractioning the lineament , to appeal to ever more distinct consumer groups . ”
At this head , because we misheard Morrison saying “ toffee Batman , ” and think he say “ Tofu Batman , ” we started inquire him questions about Tofu Batman .
What kind of cable car would Tofu Batman drive ? “ I do n’t know that he ’d need a motorcar . He ’d just bounce down the street . ”
Would he have batarangs made of tofu ? “ He just flings it into your mouth , and that ’s enough to stop you . You ’re too busy relish that lovely bean curd to commit crimes . ”
What form of Batcave would Tofu Batman have ? “ I cerebrate he ’d have a Taiwanese soup Batcave , so he could just be dropped into it and float . And hooey would be adrift around him . You know , like noodles and material . Which would be like computers and screens . It would be more like a soup bowl , it would n’t even be a Batcave . ”
Comics extend through a Golden Age and a Silver Age , followed by a kind of “ Dark Age ” in the eighties and 1990s . But then , in the mid-1990s , there was a “ retro - nostalgic affair that appeared , ” which “ give way a caboodle of interesting stuff . ” That ’s when Morrison took over the Justice League , and on the spur of the moment he was allowed to do huge , challenging , somewhat absurdist science fable stories , instead of small stories of “ Batman weeping over his torn tights . ”
But it ’s been 20 long time since that get going , and Morrison trust “ that epoch is now over . ” We still do n’t know what account will call that geological era , but “ it ’s over now . ” And now , we need to start up recall about what strip — including superhero cartoon strip — are now , and what they can do . “ No - one ’s yet defined it , and it ’ll be interesting to see . ” What we need is new untried voices to descend along and redefine it , he say .
Will American superhero comedian ever bar catering to the core demographic of senesce male fans ? Morrison thinks we ’re starting to see that , because on a business level , the Lord realize those citizenry “ are go to die soon , and in some case are probably work to fail tomorrow . ” So you ’re starting to see more of an effort to move beyond that demographic already . “ I think in the end that demographic will become a shrinking minority , that we should all listen to because peradventure they ’ll have a uncanny position that by that time , no - one will have imagine of for twenty days . ”
As a European person who ’s ghost with delving into Indian and Chinese refinement , does Morrison worry about getting it improper ? Or about appropriating aspects of someone else ’s culture , without infer their real context ?
“ The good you may do is test and be sensitive , ” Morrison says . “ I love other cultures . I want to plunge myself in other thing . I require to change myself and be metamorphic and smooth . And it ’s intemperate to do . ” Morrison says he does n’t make out “ every individual ’s experience . ” All he can do is mull over the people he conform to and the experiences he has , and “ endeavor to be honest about that . And if I get it ill-timed , then all I can do is apologize . But at least I think we have to acknowledge it . Because if we do n’t recognise it , we ’re turning our rear on everyone . ”
Writing about other cultures is “ a very difficult tightrope , and sometimes you fall off it , ” adds Morrison . “ But frankly , I believe it ’s significant to immerse yourself in other people ’s experience as best you may , to judge and understand it . As a originative person , you desire to reflect that . ” He ca n’t say you how China feels to a tyke growing up there , but he loves Shanghai ’s indy vista and its bands , and “ I can blab out about it on that level . And sometimes , an foreigner ’s perspective is helpful . ”
We ’ve been hold off days for movies of We3 and The Invisibles . As for We3 , “ I wrote the screenplay 10 years ago . James Gunn , the Guardians [ of the Galaxy ] managing director , is desperate to do We3 movie . But it ’s been snarled up in a crew of unlike evolution thing . You know , distinctive Hollywood stuff . ”
As for The Invisibles , it ’s been copy so much elsewhere that there ’s in all likelihood nothing left to adapt . Morrison sees turn and pieces of it everywhere he look — there are bits of it in True Detective and Kingsman , for example . But he does n’t mind , because the comedian “ is just what it was , and it was there at the clip , ” and it represents something that was important at that second .
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