The second volume of BATMAN: EARTH ONE by Geoff Johns and Gary Frank is now on sale. As with the Earth One books, these two are taking the familiar ideas of Batman and reinventing them in new and fascinating ways. This isn't the Batman you've read many times before. The second volume is a great read with some nice twists.
With the release of the second volume, we spoke to both Geoff and Gary to find out more about the book and where the ideas come from to mix things up a bit. We also find out when we can expect the third volume.
COMIC VINE: How would you describe Batman at this point?
GEOFF JOHNS: At the start of the book, he’s pretty determined but not quite completely self-aware yet. He’s definitely taken a turns since volume one where it was all about his parents. Now he’s trying to make it about something bigger. He’s not utilizing everything in world, and that includes his relationship with other people. He’s definitely not a detective when we meet him.
This book really teaches him how to become a detective. We see that evolution in this book. It’s all about answering the greatest question of all—who is he? Who is he going to be? Like all of us, when we open the book, he definitely has a drive but he might not be as open to other people, including his own feelings, if he’s being honest with himself.
CV: Did you have any concerns with how the hardcore Batman fans would react to seeing this version of Batman who isn’t at the absolute top of his game, like we usually see?
GJ: No, because, quite honestly, if they wanted to read that Batman, they can. There’s fifteen books of that Batman published every month. There’s awesome stories and trades out there they can read. This is more an evolution of a man more than even a “Batman.” Gary and I are trying to take our time with it. If we just do what everyone else is doing in the books, as good as it is, if we just try and copy that or try to do the same type of story or Batman, I don’t find that really interesting for us. As a creative team, we really need to find our own angle on Bruce, Alfred, Gordon, Harvey Dent, and introduce new characters like Jessica Dent and introduce new themes and aspects of Gotham, like the Arkham connection. For us, the subtleties, nuances, emotional depth, and journey is what it’s all about.
The moment we have a Batman who’s exactly where the Batman is or is exactly like the Batman in the mainstream Batman books, I’m not sure if we’d be interested in telling that story. I’m not sure why it’d be called “BATMAN: EARTH ONE.” The whole point, for us, when we started this journey was kind of reinventing Batman and his world in a slightly different way. We want to tell an emotional story. Beyond everything else, we wanted it to be emotional. We wanted our Bruce Wayne to be very emotional. We wanted our Bruce Wayne to have things to learn. We wanted our Bruce Wayne to have to grow. We wanted all of the characters to be just a little bit different. How could we surprise people but stay true to the Batman mythology?
There’s some people who probably want a Batman who’s way ahead of ours, in terms of skill set and experience but that’s not what we’re setting out to do with these books. We’re really setting out to tell the journey of a different type of Batman and Bruce Wayne.
CV: Gary, what’s your inspiration in the designs for Batman?
GARY FRANK: In terms of Batman himself, the overarching theme is already established. The idea is he’s a man. We’re not trying to draw a superhero. He’s not an animated kid’s toy. He’s a man and he wears a ‘work suit.’ It’s very important all the time to remember he’s a human, hence the fact we keep the eyes visible so we can convey what he’s thinking and feeling directly to the reading without having to describe it. It helps keep people connected to him as a human being rather than see him as a superheroic cipher skipping across the page, beating people up.
CV: Without giving away who else shows up, what’s the discussion process in designing the other iconic characters?
GF: It’s kind of hard without giving anything away. We can talk about Croc since a lot of people have already seen him. The idea is he’s not a monster. He’s a man as well. They’re all humans in this book. He’s not nine feet tall. He’s not super-strong. He doesn’t really have anything to do with a crocodile. We take that as the starting point and do a version of Croc which is a human version. Hopefully when people are reading it, they’ll connect in similar sort of ways as they do with Batman as a human being staring out through the mask. We have a new way of taking the character on and it’s a new way to look at him.
CV: When you guys were working on Volume One, how much of this part of the story was mapped out? Do you have a big plan where all this could go?
GJ: Gary, how much of this one did we have? I think we knew some aspects of it, at least emotionally. I think when we were working on book one, we were pretty focused on that book specifically. We always knew Riddler was going to be set up for the second volume. I knew that was going to be the final page because Riddler felt like an opportunity for a character that hadn’t had a lot of exposure to come in and be a central point to explore with who Bruce Wayne is as a character. It’s all about asking questions and book two is all about asking questions about identity. We knew that was where we were going but I don’t remember if we knew much beyond that in terms of the exact story. Where as now, we’ve actually plotted out the next few volumes together. We really know where we’re going for the rest of the run.
GF: The end point is much more clearly defined than the next few steps. It’s now a matter of getting there.
CV: There are some basic similarities in the other characters we see but how do you decide to make little tweaks to certain ones?
GF: These things just come from conversations and chatting about things. You throw enough things backwards and forwards and suddenly you get one of those moments of “Oh, wouldn’t it be cool if…?” Those things just grow and grow. Before you know it, if it’s a good idea, it tends to grow organically into what’s already there. Then it takes you a little bit further. Things like Croc or Jessica Dent, all of these things came from just spitballing and just chatting about things.
GJ: It’s hard though because there’s a lot of readers out there that are reading great Batman stories and have read great Batman stories for years. Gary and I really, if we’re going to spend our time on this character and this world, we want to do it in a way that’s engaging to us on a creative level especially because these books take a long long time. There’s a lot of work and we’re dedicating our creative life to these in a very big way because they are so long and massive. We hope that people are, at the very least, surprised by some of the changes but they also feel natural and organic to the story that we’re telling. We hope they’re emotionally engaged with these versions of the characters.
GF: They also feel like they’re going to fit in if you have a clear idea of what the book is supposed to be. So much of the Batman books are about the identity of Batman or the identity of Bruce Wayne and building that and letting it grow. If you have that floating around in the back of your mind, it tends to kind of inform the ideas that stick. You could have the coolest idea in the world but if won’t gel if it also isn’t something that serves that broader idea. As long as that’s floating around in the back of your mind, I think it kind of colors the ideas as they come through.
CV: Will we ever see other heroes show up like Earth One Superman or the Teen Titans?
GJ: For us, as far as Batman goes in our world, Batman has such a huge cast of his own characters that we’re focused on that. We have a beginning, middle, and end for our Batman story. There’s a lot of other characters that will be introduced in the BATMAN: EARTH ONE series. For us I think, and you never say never, but for us, for now, we really are focused on that.
GF: I don’t see how any of those things could serve what we’re trying to do. If there’s a way that Superman showing up can kind of serve what we’re trying to do and not be completely destructive…you don’t bring Superman into a story like this just to say, “Let’s have a team up.” But wouldn’t it be cool if Superman showed up? Why would it be cool in this book? Why would it make sense in this book to have that happen?
GJ: We have so many other characters, aspects of this world, and Bruce’s adventure to explore right now. That’s where we’re focused right now.
CV: When’s the next one coming?
GJ: We’re deep into the third one right now. We’re really excited about it. We went straight from the this. We did some work between volumes one and two but we jump right from volume 2 into volume 3. I suspect it’ll be out early next year. We’re already way into it and have been working on it since the beginning of the year now. It’s going well.
Be sure to pick up BATMAN: EARTH ONE Volume 2, on sale now in comic shops and every else on May 12.
Here's more preview pages of what you can expect.
