Gail Simone and Ethan Van Sciver Interview on Newsarama

Yesterday Newsarama published a fantastic interview with Gail Simone and Ethan Van Sciver about the new Firestorm series!  They discussed their writing process, why they chose to write Firestorm, the characters of Ronnie & Jason, the tone of the series, visual character designs, Yildiray Cinar’s contribution to the book, and much more.  Click here to read the entire interview.

There were a few tidbits shared about the content of the series.  When asked what she was hoping to do for the character, Gail Simone answered:

Simone: It’s surprising, it doesn’t matter if you’ve read every issue of Firestorm, or never read an issue in your life. This is the ground floor of one of the most compelling books I’ve ever been involved with. It’s a rule breaker. This book is going to be one of the foundational titles of the DCU, and Firestorm’s powers shift the entire balance of power on Earth. Every hero will have to take the Firestorm Protocols into account, no matter where their base of operations are. They have to address Firestorm, not the other way around. Not to mention that there’s a scary as hell by-product of Jason and Ronnie getting powers, essentially what happens when Conan the Barbarian mates with nuclear reactor. And there’s more, lots more. The Firestorm Protocols leave a mammoth footprint on the new DCU. If Firestorm farts, the JLA knows about it.

Gail continued when asked about Ronnie & Jason:

Nrama: Gail, how do you distinguish between their personalities? How would you describe Ronnie and Jason as you plot these stories and write their dialogue?

Simone: This has been the element that everyone at DC has been so excited about, Ronnie and Jason, and a new character, Tonya, who was an innocent bystander who is unfortunately caught up in their nightmare. Ronnie and Jason almost instinctively don’t like each other, and the horrendous circumstances make that worse. It’s two kids, neither of whom is completely right or wrong, who both suddenly have their hands on the nuclear football. Every book I do, I’m trying to find the key, the Rosetta stone, that unlocks the language and the rhythm of the book, that expresses its soul to the reader. With this one, I took a lot from Ethan’s son and my son, both teenagers, who could not be more different. And I took all the villain dialogue from Ethan, who actually talks a lot like the Red Skull in private.

You may read the entire interview by clicking here. It’s really worth your time!

Also featured in this interview was an amazing new page by Yildiray Cinar from The Fury of Firestorms #2!

What a great interview, and what amazing artwork!  I can’t wait for this new series!

My thanks to Ken Deemer, Brandon Leonard, and Keith Baker for sending me word of this interview!

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