The time many of us has feared is nearly here. Grant Morrison's run on ACTION COMICS has almost ended. Lucky for us, he decided he wanted an extra issue to tie up all the loose ends to his story. While ACTION COMICS #17 is on sale this month, we'll still one more issue, with extra pages (issue 18 is on sale March 6).
We asked Grant some questions on ending his run along with some questions about the mention of Doomsday as well as what we can expect from him after this.
Comic Vine: When did you decide you needed one more issue to finish your story?
Grant Morrison: A few months before ago. I needed one more issue and then added ten more pages at the last minute. So over the last few months I felt the story needed more room to breathe.
CV: Have you told all the Superman stories you've have in you or are there still more for later?
GM: Nah, I've told everything I've got right now. But as I've said before, never say never about these characters because. I've really said enough for a while. But there's still the black Superman from Earth-23 in there but I've said pretty much all I've got to say for the moment.
CV: Did the ending of your story change or evolve at all since you started writing ACTION COMICS #1?
GM: Oh sure, when I first started doing ACTION COMICS #1, I thought I was only doing six issues. The basic story I was telling was how Superman went from being the young jean-clad social crusader to finding his alien space suit. And that was it. But it kind of grew once I did the two fill-in issues and they suggested other story possibilities. The story sort of just grew on its own. I had no idea about the ending when I started issue 1. Certainly by issue 9 I started to realize what was going on and what needed to happen.
== TEASER ==
CV: Will we get answers about the mention of Superman's first death, Doomsday or the statue with Superman's pre-New 52 costume?
GM: All those things, I wanted to show that they had happened. I didn't think it was actually important to show the actual event. I think it's important for Superman's origin to show that he once died. If some other writer down the line wants to tell the story, it's theirs to tell. This story is more about suggesting what went wrong and moving forward it's showing a situation where he's facing something even worse than Doomsday.
CV: Is the solicit for issue 17 with "Superman fighting to save all of creation" now moved to 18?
GM: Certainly, he fights for all creation, in fact, we all get the chance to fight for all creation in #18.
CV: Will your story in 18 be an absolute ending to your story or will there still be open plot threads left?
GM: No, this is a complete ending to my story but unlike something like ALL STAR SUPERMAN, which was a complete book with a beginning, middle and end, this is an ongoing monthly comic. I didn't want to do a complete ending and mess up the next issue. It's clearly an ending to my story.
CV: Is your run on ACTION going to tie into MULTIVERSITY in any way, especially with Earth 23 seen in issue 9?
GM: Yeah, the black Superman is one of the major characters of MULTIVERSITY so he has room to play in that as well. Even the box, the transmatter cube that was sort of assembled becomes a major plot point in MULTIVERSITY. That's how one starts to communicate with one another. It was based on an old…that's what they used in the JUSTICE LEAGUE in the 1970s. They had these transmatter cubes to go between Earth-1 and Earth-2. What you saw in ACTION COMICS 9 was the beginning of that technology starting to resurface in the mutliverse. I always like to run lines from each of my projects into the other.
CV: Do you have other characters you'd like to take on in the future?
GM: Nothing right now. MULTIVERSITY covers a lot of things. I'll have a lot of characters I haven't done before. And then there's Wonder Woman which is the one thing I did want to do. After Wonder Woman, I don't know. There's nothing I can think of or that I'm drawn to. If an idea comes up then an idea comes up. I may wake up one morning with a Doctor Fate story and then suddenly desperately want to write Doctor Fate. You never know.
CV: Thanks so much. I'm sad to read your ending but I'm excited.
GM: I hope you enjoy it.
ACTION COMICS #17 is on sale February 20.