This was another great annual, Charlie. I like the combination of different vignettes with one main story. Seeing more of Hippolyta helps round out her presence in the story, and I liked her vignette with Phillipus.
I really enjoyed the format of January’s
Justice League Annual, and while I couldn’t rally the troops as I managed then, I still wanted to have multiple stories threading between each other, so I was forced to go at it myself! I’ve said it before, but I’m glutton for punishment.
I knew that after the conclusion of “
An End to the Age of Wonders”, I’d undone a major DC2 event in bringing Hippolyta back… and I knew I wanted to address that sooner rather than later. She died in the second or so issue of
Wonder Woman, over a decade ago now! So, these stories were an effort toward that. Also, I wanted to reset the status quo again for the character,s and perhaps bring Diana into line with how she’s currently portrayed in the films and mainstream comics.
I was torn with the relationship between Polly & Phillipus and Polly & Ted. Both are important to portray, but at the same time… what depths are there between each pairing? If you’re an immortal beauty living on an island of immortal beauties… who is your best friend and what does that mean?
It does feel like the Amazons deserve, or would do well in, a constitutional monarchy but I find it a little ironic that this was prompted by divine intervention rather than the people!
This narrative shortcut was a side effect of time constraints, unfortunately. I plotted out what I broadly wanted to happen; Hippolyta making the decision by herself, and then there being machinations on behalf of an old enemy to try and turn this change in political landscape to their own gain… but I was really under the gone with the deadline!
I feel like I rushed this one quite a bit, so I’m not as happy with the end product as I could have been. And really, this could have comfortably been a six-issue arc, if not longer, similar to my deluge of story over in
Adventure Comics Annual.
I wanted to do so much more--!
In the main plot, Constantine is up to his underhanded tricks, a difficult character to pair with Wonder Woman but it worked.
One of the other parts of “
An End to the Age of Wonders” that needed addressing soon after was the fact that the entire world knows that every god and devil is real. What does that mean?
We’re seeing the first volley of that story unfolding in the first “season” of
Hellblazer (the next issue should be out next month) but I wanted to tie the two characters most important to that thread together-- the instigator in Diana, and the investigator in John.
Writing John is really easy for me, but I am making a concerted effort never to go into his head. You should never know what he’s thinking, only what he’s saying. That’s why it’s important to have other characters around him who are relatable and able to interpret his schemes for whatever they’re worth. Diana is great for that, because of her own relationship with the truth. They’ll be meeting again before this metaphysical game changer is resolved-- if it is ever resolved!
I didn't realize he was in cahoots with the succubus! Nice twist!
Phew! I’m glad it came as a surprise to you!
Anyone who’s familiar with Garth Ennis’ run on the series might be familiar with Ellie, the succubus who plays a larger role in some of the major stories that Ennis wrote and made appearances since in the original Vertigo run (I’ve not read any of the New 52 / Rebirth runs).
Mainly, I was trying to come up with someone-- a monster-- to use, and I always do a deep dive on mythology when I work on anything occult-related. Instead of pulling on something new, I fell back on using a not-so original character, especially when I saw the opportunity to use someone whose presence I always enjoyed as a reader. Finding out that she was actually called Chantinelle was a great little twist I could pepper in there, so I’m really happy it landed.
One of the interesting things is that this isn’t the end of this particular thread for John. You might not even see it address in
Hellblazer, but in a different title that’s currently running… I think it’s important to note that no matter what he does, or the good he manages to do in the meantime, but John Constantine is not a nice man. So he does unsavoury things… for the highest bidder.
Interestingly, their rendezvous point is a place I accidentally stumbled upon when I was walking through London one night a few years ago. It stayed with me because I slipped and concussed myself on a bench. Fun story!
But I loved that Wonder Woman was already working on the 'girly murder gang' and we got to see Cassie in action.
I didn’t want John coming up and mansplaining something to Diana in her own book. He’s very much the Pied Piper in
Swamp Thing[/b] and other series, leading protagonists around by their noses, and I wanted to echo that relationship here, but with a twist. Of course Diana knows what’s being done in her name. And
of course she’s doing something about. She can play games too.
Bringing Cassie in also made the most sense, as I wanted to deepen her relationship with the DC2 at large, what with the recent launch of
Young Justice[/i]…
If I had more time, I would have done more with the girl gang, but the direction it took was due to the time constraints I found myself under, so for better or for worse, this is what we ended up with!
I'm ready to see more of Wonder Woman and Batman now that Diana is in exile; this is a very exciting next step for the character.
I wanted to spread the Justice League characters around a bit, as I found the roster’s home bases very America-centric. If they were running around as the JL
A that kind of makes sense, but they should be an international strike force of sorts, so relocating Diana to London-- where Brian Azzarello and Cliff Chiang established her in the New 52 relaunch-- was a concerted effort toward that. Obviously, we’ll not get to see as much of her there as we might if a solo series was running, but I like the flavour it adds, and it contributes something different to the Bruce / Diana relationship.
P.S. That cover is gorgeous! Great style that works well for Constantine and Wonder Woman with subtle framing. Fantastic.
Ibarra is a great find and I’m working with him on some other stuff! That piece was fantastic, delivered better than I envisioned it, and I’m glad to have him on the DC2.
