GKO: MADHOUSE
Here you will find our rambalings on all area's of Batman, interviews and speical features!
Tim Callahan: What kind of Batman comics have you been reading or rereading to get yourself in the mindset of a guy who recently landed the gig writing "Detective Comics"?
Scott Snyder: I've been re-reading a lot of my favorite Batman mysteries, from "Long Halloween" to "The Man Who Laughs" to earlier stuff I have at my folks' house, like Mark Waid's "Detective Annual" #2 - it's this spooky KKK story. "Gotham Central" - the whole series. But I've also been re-reading a lot of Grant Morrison's big run. Not for factual stuff or continuity, but because I love how he works these broad themes into a story, these big concepts and over-arching ideas about Batman - his own mythology, you know? I felt like if I was going to take "Detective" on for a good long while, I'd need to develop my own sense of what my big story was, not just the plot, but the ideas and themes, what my own interests and beliefs about Batman were first.
Callahan: How is that similar or different to the way you worked on your previously published comics? Does the Batman mythology lead to different kinds of stories or a different approach?
Snyder: Honestly, it's not different from how I approach "American Vampire" or how I approached "Iron Man: Noir." It's pretty much how I always go about writing a story, I guess. First I think of a premise or situation that I myself would really like to see - like with that character, and then I try to spend some time figuring out why that particular scenario is interesting to me - why it's exciting or disturbing to me, personally - and once I feel like I have a handle on that, I try to push the story in that direction. For example, the upcoming cycle of "American Vampire" (issues #6-9): I knew I wanted to jump a decade or so after the 20s, to broaden the reach of the story and the cast (human and vampire), so I tried to think of where I'd like to see Skinner and other vampires at work in the 30's.
I considered Chicago, the Delta, a couple other places, the one that kept coming back to me was Las Vegas. Vampires in 1930's Las Vegas. So then I try to figure out for myself why I personally like that combination, to figure out why it's interesting to me (beyond just the coolness of vampires in suits in the casinos and hotels of the 30's). So I started digging and I realized that I liked vampires in that place at that time, because the city itself is really exciting to me just then - it's still 1/2 cow-town, but it's growing so rapidly, and the blueprint of the Las Vegas we know today is already visible. It's a city caught in between two phases, with the Hoover Dam being built down the road, the Depression everywhere else but there, this huge, expanding red-light district... Basically, in the 1930's Las Vegas is becoming a city that's completely at odds with its natural setting - this pleasure island in the middle of a massive desert. There's something alluring and glamorous and enticing about the city, but also something unnatural and creepy and predatory. So then I start to see - I like vampires in 1930's Vegas because there are these weird, fun parallels between the city and these monsters. And so then I start figuring out a way of plotting a story that will let me really get into that stuff, not so much in analytical or intellectual way, but in a personal way - constructing a story with a character at the center who'll be feeling these things, struggling with them on a deep, emotional and psychological level. So that's how Cash McCogan was born... He's the star of cycle 2.
Don't get me wrong, all the characters from cycle 1 play big parts - Pearl, Skinner, Felicia Book - but Cash is the narrator and protagonist. He's a young chief of police in 1935 Las Vegas. His father, chief Augustus McCogan was killed less than a year before the story starts and so he's inherited this job, the responsibility of managing this city that's growing at a completely insane rate. And then the bodies start showing up - the bodies of prominent Las Vegas citizens, drained of blood. This mystery leads him down the rabbit hole into the world of American Vampire - where Skinner and Pearl are waiting, along with ancient vampires, European vampires, gangsters and lawmen... Man, this is a long answer! I just wanted to show you in some kind of concrete way how I build a story.
It was the same with "Detective." I tried to picture some scenes I'd love to see, and then I went about figuring out why those scenes were compelling to me, building a big, really aggressive story that pushes Batman into that territory, if that makes sense...
Check out the entire interview here.
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