It started simply enough, when a fight between Superman and Mongul smashed into a small town in the Pacific Northwest, and changed the DC Universe forever. Not by what the fight destroyed, but what it uncovered: her name is Naomi, and she’s one of DC’s greatest secrets. At least, she was.
From the moment Naomi McDuffie burst onto the scene (following Brian Michael Bendis’s arrival at DC Comics), readers knew they were in for something special. What they could never have guessed was how this young girl’s Superman-esque origin story would turn out to be much, much more. Alternate realities, cosmic battles, and when it was all said and done, one of the most refreshing and inspiring DC heroes in years. And now that Naomi’s origin story has been collected in hardcover format (available in stores now), Screen Rant had the chance to speak with Brian Michael Bendis, David F. Walker, and Jamal Campbell about their incredible Wonder Comics mascot, and what her future may hold in DC’s Universe.
I’m so glad I get to speak with you three now that the secrets are out. Because Brian and David, I believe you said early on that starting with Naomi as a new character, and telling the story from her perspective was the only was you ever planned to launch her character. Now that we all know how wild, cosmic, and random this story of Rann, Thanagar, and a parallel Earth really is, I get to ask: how did that part of Naomi’s story take shape?
I can honestly say if you removed the dialogue from the first issues, the artwork alone conveys so much of who Naomi is, her curiosity, her family, her desperation, the sense of something you can’t quite put your finger on… you could understand the heart of the story just as easily. So while we don’t have the time to run down Dee, Rann, Thanagar, and the world of Naomi’s parents, can you speak to your inspiration for the moment Naomi’s world cracks open, and this small town story becomes a gigantic cosmic universe of its own?
Brian Michael Bendis: We were definitely telling a story about adoption, and a modern story about adoption. I have a lot of adoption in my life, a lot of different kind of stories. It was funny, years ago when I adopted my first daughter someone in the adoption community said to me, ‘You should tell stories with adoption in it. It helps normalize it. People still don’t get it.’ You know, more stories about adoption where it isn’t like the adopted child is imprisoned under the stairs. But a real story about an adoptive family, there’s a lot of truth there. Now that I’ve lived that life and also share it with so many other families, their truths, we wanted to get there. Get into the idea that everybody had a secret. It was very exciting.
David F. Walker: We obsessed over what each and every one of those secrets was going to be. From not just what was Naomi’s secret, but what was her dad’s secret? What was going to be Dee’s secret? Early on we talked about a lot of stuff, and one of the things we talked about was, ‘Will Naomi’s secret be totally new and fresh, or will it be rooted in classic DC lore?’ We decided she is going to be new and fresh, but we can keep some of these supporting characters in there. Even then we still obsessed, right? I remember at one point Brian saying to me–it was the sternest he’s ever talked to me, it was like he was talking to one of his kids–he says, ‘We need to figure out where Dee is from, and we need to figure it out right now.’ And I said, ‘Okay?" Brian is one of the most laid back parents you’ll ever meet, so I seldom see him getting stern…
BMB: That was stern to you? That’s hilarious.
DFW: And he says, ‘He could be from anywhere. He could be from Thangar, I don’t care. We just have to figure out where he’s from.’ And I immediately glommed on to, ‘Well that’s what he said, so clearly that’s what he wants. Even if it’s on a subconscious level.’ Then I had so much fun because I love Hawkman and I love some of those classic stories. And I thought, ‘Oh, let’s have it be something no one’s ever seen before.’ So that way even if there’s something familiar, we can make it something new and interesting. Hopefully.
BMB: I also like that it’s just a story where you don’t have to know anything. ‘Oh my God, dad has a secret!’ And tells you his secret, and you know everything you need to know about his secret. Then you go to the comic book store and go, ‘Oh wait, the Rann-Thanagar War was a thing? There’s a whole thing?!’ That’s the best kind of comic book sharing universe you could do. Where someone gets shocked and delighted.
I mean I’ve seen the Rann-Thanagar War, but this clearly felt like your own spin on it. Is that thrilling or nerve-wracking, being given the chance to do that?
Jamal Campbell: Yeah, I think it’s just the fact that we spent those two and a half issues just building the town, and her family, and her normal life. You get to be familiar with it. You know her through that stretched amount of time, so when it explodes and we get to go to all the crazy stuff that happens after, it’s still rooted in that small town, in those relationships. In that thing that we spent so much time building up and getting familiar with, and starting to love. It just means so much more because it’s happening to someone you know now. You can relate to them so much harder that way.
You obviously knew what Jamal was capable of visually before building out that part of the story and the mythos, but how did his style inform the way you two went about developing your part in telling this story?
JC: Um, both? [Laughs] I’m a person who… I’m always up for creating something new. I don’t want to see the same old–if it’s happened before, I don’t want to do it, I don’t want to see it. I want to constantly evolve, and explore new things. So getting to take that piece of DC history and turn it on its head just slightly, where you start to see something you haven’t seen before, with these secret Blackhawks that you haven’t seen before. But once you see it here, it’s like, ‘Oh yeah, that would happen. That does make sense that this would have taken place in the same war, and the same events, and how that leads up to what’s happening with Naomi. It’s super exciting.
Well that’s the perfect lead-in to my next question, which is the introduction to Zumbado, the kind of villain superhero comic fans, fantasy fans, video game fans, would all dream of, but it’s still very much an intentional introduction. So from all of you, can you speak to your goal with creating this figure. Who is probably the most ’new’ part being introduced into the DC Universe we know. He is an unforgettable guy.
DFW: Well for me, it was just Brian constantly reminding me we can do anything we want, and me sort of very cynically going, ‘Well I bet we can’t do this.’ And then we got to do it! So I have to say that creatively, this has been one of the most rewarding projects that I’ve worked on. Not just because of the team that I’m working with, but because of what we were able to do. It was so interesting because the fan reaction was always… there were so many people who reached out to me who were expecting the expected, if that makes sense. I remember, because a big thing was this point where everybody was convinced Naomi was a Lantern of some sort. It was non-stop, and everyone kept asking me. This is around Issue #4 or so, and I would say, ‘Okay, up to this point have we done anything that you expected us to do?’ Then they would get this disappointed look like, ‘Ohhhh noooo.’ That means she’s not!
But then I honestly think the fact that she wasn’t what people were really expecting is what made people love her so much. And Brian really was constantly reminding me we can do this, we can do something new, let’s really do something new, let’s do something that’s additive. There were moments where, Brian can say it better, but there were moments where I was feeling kind of skittish. ‘I don’t think we’re going to be able to do this.’ And every time he would say, ‘Well we won’t know until we try.’
BMB: My magic trick as a writer, and I say it everywhere I go, is that I write into the artist’s world. I don’t write like, ‘Here, draw my world!’ I’m all in on you. Whoever I’m working with, I have trust in their choices, and their feeling, and the tone the art puts out. Then I try to write a script that can get the most out of that person. With Jamal, he’s in such a fantastic place in his development as an artist. And I know it. So every day we think we’re trying to write the best for him that we can. Even recently I saw some designs for something else he’s been picking at, and I literally turned to David and went, ‘Oh we gotta do better by him!’ That’s why I’m so excited to get back to Naomi. I feel like we can offer him even more opportunity to push and push and push. That’s all i’ve been thinking about, as far as what we’ll do next. I’m almost like, even though we’re waiting for him to finish Far Sector to get to Naomi, i’m actually very grateful for it. Because every page I see of Far Sector makes me think about how far we can push the next Naomi book. I know Jamal is starting to sweat right now.
BMB: But I personally feel like that’s the one place I want to push even harder.
Now that this entire first story exists in one book that can, and will be handed to younger readers who might not know comics are for them, or that comics can be about them, what does that feel like, now that it’s said and done? Are you proud of what you succeeded with here, or thinking more about what comes next?
DFW: He is. That was… I think part of what went into it, and Brian and I talked about this, was if Naomi is going to be a truly impressive hero, then we can’t short-change the villain. We might not see much of him in this first story, but the threat of him coming back has to not only define her, but define where this sequel is going to go. Where the follow-up is going to go. There was a lot of that discussion going on. It was a very odd thing, and you’re the first person to really ask about this. People ask about creating the hero, creating the supporting characters. But then they don’t ask about that villain. Brian and I were very much saying if we’re going to be additive, we’ve got to be additive all the way. We can’t have her villain be somebody we’ve plucked from the pantheon of DC heavies. It’s got to be someone new.
BMB: She finds herself obsessing about Superman, and originally thinking that she’s adopted. And that’s true, but the deeper thing is that she comes from a world where their Superman destroyed it. Just ate it. So it’s not an abstract idea that this power can corrupt, it’s a reality. It destroyed her life, so it’s as real as it can get for her. And that same threat is coming towards us. It’s not her fault, but it’s not not her fault. That’s the most ‘Peter Parker’ you can do without feeling the Uncle Ben moment [Laughs]. Is that feeling that this isn’t totally my fault. But it’s not not my fault! So I have to do something. Those parts of it got very exciting to us.
Also just dropping new villainous voices in the DC Universe was one of my personal mandates when I came in. I had read so many histories of DC and you can see a cycle sometimes. They are good cycles, but you can see a lot of Lex Luthor and Joker over and over and over again. Those stories are amazing, but it just seemed to me that maybe the universe is actually begging for a few more flavors that are more modern. And can speak to a more modern terror. So Zumbado is one of them, Leviathan is another one. I’m grateful that people are appreciating that. Because it is very hard to do!
JC: Lucky for me there wasn’t too much instruction, which just meant I can go wherever I wanted to. My goal for Zumbado was he is the giant Superman-level threat who wants to take over your planet, or destroy it if he can’t take it over. So he has to be able to stand among Darkseid, and Mongul, and these huge villainous embodiments of evil. And that’s really every part of his design, from the gauntlets on his arms that emanate light, but are also kind of gross. To him constantly emitting a black mist from his mouth so you can’t really see his face. I just wanted him to emanate evil and terror and darkness. The darkest, most disgusting, evil parts that just sit in the back of your mind that you don’t want to look at. He’s the embodiment of that.
BMB: I think the only note you got from us was a theoretical note. There was a movie that had come out, and my son turned to me and said, ‘Who is the villain?" He couldn’t tell from the designs of the characters. And it was a movie that you damn well should be able to tell who the villain is, it wasn’t like a family drama. If it’s a big sci-fi movie, you should damn well be able to point to Darth Vader. But he couldn’t. And I realized that is something that’s missing in our culture lately. There’s a lack of big villains because people don’t really design the nightmare, right? I think that’s the only thing I put to you. That idea of, ‘Boy it would be nice if anyone could point to that villain and say that is scary.’
Naomi: Season One is available now in your local comic book shop, bookstore, or from online retailers.
BMB. It can be both.
DFW: For me it’s both, but it’s more of what comes next. And, ‘Don’t mess this up, because you got it right the first time!’
BMB: [Laughs]
DFW: I really feel humbled and honored that people have responded the way they have, and embraced her the way they have. I’m excited about what comes next. I just got back from New York Comic Con not that long ago, and the response there was so incredible. Every show that I’ve been to at this point has been so incredible. This feels good. It feels good to be part of something that is bringing people a sense of joy and happiness.
BMB: I used to–just personally–I wouldn’t allow any of the joy in. Just keep going back to work. But Spider-Verse was such an enormous, overwhelming experience like you just described, that I would be a fool not to allow it in and take it. It always felt like it’s too self-congratulatory to even accept someone’s compliment, you know? But when you put out work that’s supposed to connect with people, you have to let the connection happen. That does happen, and it’s so beautiful. So having experienced it once with Miles, I felt like it would be almost selfish or arrogant to even imagine it would happen again. It happened with Jessica, it happened with Miles, it’s happened to me a couple of times. I of course would love it to happen again, but you’re a fool to assume it could! Right?
But the fact that it did happen, and it happened in the DC Universe, is a real magical thing that… I can’t even relate to you how seriously I take it. That’s why I’m answering so weird. But the point is that Naomi was created during the Spider-Verse stuff, I never just bask in it. It’s always about what’s next. Everybody in comics I ever admired, that’s how they behaved. What’s next?
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