Man of a Thousand Comic Books

Chuck Dixon

by Christy Kallies (christy@sequentialtart.com)

In comics today when it seems that some creators are unable to produce one quality book a month, Chuck Dixon produces three: Nightwing, Birds of Prey, and Robin. After writing comics for years, he’s become most associated with the various Batbooks, including a successful run on Detective Comics. Chuck agreed to talk to me about how he got his start in comic books and gave away some tidbits about some upcoming storylines.

Sequential Tart: Did you read comics as a kid?

Chuck Dixon: I don’t even remember my first comic. Probably long before I could read.

ST: Well, which comics did you like when you were a kid?

CD: Umm, the DC war books, anything Batman, especially the annuals with the old stories, and Fantastic Four was a big favorite.

ST: How did you break into comics?

CD: After many, many, many years of trying. I would take a run at it every now and then and get horribly disappointed and basically mope around for about a year and then come back. Finally I got a book at Comico called Evangeline. That was my first major book.

ST: When did that come out?

CD: 1984.

ST: You seem to write a lot of Batman related books. Is he your favorite comic book character?

CD: Yeah, I guess so. I kind of backed into writing Batman. I did the first Robin mini-series and it sold well, and I became a Batman writer. I never thought I’d ever write Batman, but I get along well with the editors. They like what I do, so I guess that’s why I write a lot of Batman (laughs). I used to write a lot of Conan when the editors liked what I did on that.

ST: So, what is it that you like about Batman?

CD: It’s like the ultimate male fantasy. He had the coolest hideout in the world. The coolest car. You’re the coolest guy (laughs). And everybody’s scared of you. I think that’s a secret among men. We all want to be feared (laughs again).

ST: And Batman’s got it all.

CD: Oh, he does. He does, except, you know, he’s so morally tortured.

ST: Ok, how did you come up with the terrific idea of pairing Black Canary and Oracle?

CD: Well, it was Gordon Gorfinkle’s idea to put them together. He thought it would be kind of neat to have Black Canary in these diehard situations where she’s getting advice from Oracle the whole time. Where they would have this running dialogue. And that’s how it started. The chemistry just kind of fell into place from there. So, he came up with the idea, and it was my job to make it work (laughs).

ST: You’ve made it work.

CD: Yeah, it works for me, and I know it’s going to work for the reader when it’s coming very easily for me. Their relationship…It’s sort of like I didn’t even write it. It’s more like I discovered it.

ST: It is really terrific, they have wonderful chemistry together. It’s kind of an odd idea writing a comic book where the two main characters never meet and really don’t even know each other, but they’re each other’s best friends.

CD: You’re right. That’s the hook for the series, because usually a book about female characters starts out behind the eight ball. They just consider that the sales will be a little lower, because for some reason it’s a harder sell to male readers.

ST: Okay, well that leads into another question: In previous incarnations of both the Justice League and the various Bat titles, Black Canary and Batgirl have been portrayed, on occasion, as almost female sidekicks, necessary to the books to maintain the gender status quo. As a result, they ended up being saved, guarded, or used as plot devices. You’ve written them as strong, self-reliant characters. What is your inspiration for writing them this way?

CD: One of the beauties of writing either children or women is that they’re perceived as underdogs, and then they have to show that they’re not. And there’s not anything cooler in the world than having someone think you can’t do something, and then it turns out that you could do it much better than they could. So they always prove their worth in any adventure. I write Robin the same way. I mean, he used to be the Boy Hostage. I never write him that way. You know, I’ve written a lot of female characters, female leads for books, and to me there’s this great appeal, that all the bad guys think, "Well, it’s a woman. We’re not going to have a problem now." And then, of course, they have more problems than they ever thought they would. I like stories where the characters in the story don’t know what the main character is about, but the reader does. So, you know that the bad guys are in for a bad time. An example is Alien: Resurrection. It’s such a fun film, because no one understands that Ripley is something of another world, except the viewer, and that’s the fun of the movie. So the big toughs start pushing her around, and she starts busting them up (laughs). There’s a lot of fun there.

ST: Can you reveal a couple of clues about the identity of Oracle’s online buddy?

CD: Yeah…No. I don’t want to do that, because I’ve been in the Birds Of Prey message board, and they’re having such a fun time trying to guess, that I don’t really want to throw any more clues out than are already in the book.

ST: Okay, Possibility that it’s someone working for the Pentagon?

CD: Umm…I don’t want to say anything. The guesses so far have been so varied and so wrong, (laughs) that I don’t want to give them any more to go on.

ST: According to the JLA Secret Files, Oracle has a day job, but we rarely see her away from her computer. Will we see her more active in the Birds Of Prey ongoing?

CD: I don’t know where that came from, to tell you the truth. That she’s what? A librarian? I don’t know where that came from. And with Gotham in No Man’s Land, there’s no library any more, so I don’t know how in the world she has time to do what she does. You know, guide Canary’s career and the JLA and answer virtually ever hero in DC’s questions, and the occasional call from Catwoman. I don’t know how she handles all that, but with No Man’s Land, that’s sort of thrown out the window.

ST: Will we be seeing a reaction from Black Canary to Oliver Queen’s (Green Arrow) return from the dead?

CD: Yeah, but we’re all going to have to wait and see what form that takes. That’s in the hands of Darren Menchenzo and Kevin Smith right now.

ST: Both women have suffered serious trauma in their lives. Do you plan to deal with that in future stories?

Yes, but not as an angst thing, where they’re constantly thinking about it or worrying about it. They’re strong women. They’re going to fight to recover. Not that it’s not going to affect them, or they’re not going to remember it, and it’s not a negative thing for both of them, but I want to see them overcoming it. Coping with it.

ST: Does it bother you that the Black Canary lost her scream?

CD: Actually, we’re bringing it back electronically in a few issues. Oracle creates a thing for her, so that she can bring it back electronically. A lot of fun.

ST: Moving to Robin, making Spoiler pregnant was an interesting plot twist. How did you manage to get that introduced?

CD:  Well, Scott Peterson came up with the idea, and he didn’t want to propose it, because he thought Denny (O’Neil) would shoot it down coming from him. But he said, "Coming from you, he’ll trust you that you’ll handle it right." So, I proposed it, and Denny loved the idea. And we thought, you know, I don’t like to do issue books, but teen pregnancy is more than an issue. It’s an everyday reality in the lives of teenagers now, and to ignore it would be to distance our book from reality even further than comic books are already distanced. And it was kind of a neat character thing for Spoiler, to see how she would handle this.

ST: What kind of feedback are you getting about it?

CD: I haven’t seen anything. Except that it’s made the Spoiler even more popular.

ST: Is Spoiler going to be retiring?

CD: No. In fact, I just wrote a story where her mom finds her costume. I thought her mom would go through her closet after she had the baby to put the maternity clothes away, and so she finds the costume while doing that.

ST: So, Spoiler’s staying in Gotham?

CD: She’s in Gotham Heights, which is outside of Gotham. It’s across the river, so the suburbs are pretty much status quo except a lot of people have moved away.

ST: What do you think of all the changes the Bat books are going through because of Cataclysm and No Man’s Land?

CD: No Man’s Land is interesting. I’m anxious to see what the fallout is. Every ten years or so, you’ve got to do something with Batman to shake up the status quo, and this is really shaking it. So, we’ll see what happens. It’s a grand experiment. But nobody knows what the readers want. They never have (laughs). We’ll see how it plays out.

ST: There are so many Bat titles. How do you manage to keep all of the main events straight, like Cataclysm or No Man’s Land?

CD: Well, we have story conferences, and everyone has a say, and we’re given a "spine" of everything we’ve talked about, and basically a general direction to go in. The editors catch anything that falls through the cracks.

ST: How much do you let that affect your writing?

CD: Not a whole lot. The "Bat" guys are, as Denny says, storytellers, not writers. Which sounds high fallutin’, but basically storytellers are less disciplined (laughs) and he knows it. He allows us a lot of room to go back and forth and vary. So, we’re not enslaved to "this has to happen now, this has to happen then." We’re just given a grand scheme of where it begins and where it ends. How we get there is up to us.

ST The Huntress is an intriguing character. Have you considered writing something about her?

CD: I’ve probably written more Huntress than just about anybody over the last few years. I’ve written a mini-series and a few other things. She’ll be appearing in Nighwing again in a No Man’s Land related story, and she is an integral part of No Man’s Land as well. I really like the Huntress. She’s a terrific character, because she’s really a tremendously flawed character. She’s someone who has not overcome her past or the traumas of her childhood.

ST: Joker: Devil’s Advocate was a terrific story. What was the inspiration for it?

CD: Basically, it just was the question: "What if the Joker got the death penalty, and Batman found out he was innocent?" It just grew from there. Then Graham (Nolan) and I went and plotted it. That’s another one that just sort of wrote itself. I’m so glad I had ninety-six pages (laughs). I really had a lot of story there.

ST: On to Green Arrow. Connor Hawke was ¼ black, but showed little to no racial stereotyping. Happy accident or deliberate plan?

CD: I don’t really like racial stereotyping, plus his dad was living in Idaho (laughs). I don’t think there is a Idaho black stereotype. I always like standing that stuff on its head and not doing the stereotype. Of course, Connor never had any kind of exposure to anything ethnic. His mom was involved in basically a California commune community, so he was divorced from reality.

ST: How did you feel about the Green Arrow series ending?

CD: Well, we knew it was going to end some time, because when they offered me Birds Of Prey, I said, " I can’t do five monthlies." I had four at the time. So, we were going to gracefully end the Green Arrow series and then hopefully bring it back again later. I ended up writing about five more issues than we had planned so we could set up Kevin Smith’s run when it starts. It’s the first book I’ve ever left of my own volition. Usually I’m fired or the book is cancelled (laughs). It was very difficult, but Darren, the editor, assured me that I wasn’t running out on him. I still have a lot of affection for the characters.

ST: How did you get involved with the mini-series Conjurors?

CD: Ally Morales just proposed doing an Elseworlds about magicians, and I was in the offices and went away for about five minutes. I came back right away with the idea that I had about magic being the gifts from creatures from another dimension. It was a lot of fun.

ST: You wrote some Conan books for Marvel. Are you a big fan of Conan?

CD: I was when I was a kid. I read a lot of them. I liked the original Robert E. Howard stuff.

ST: Did Marvel approach you to do that story, or did you pitch to them?

CD: I got hired by Larry Hama to do backups for Conan: The Conqueror, and then I kept campaigning for about a year to do some Conan leads, and eventually I got the book as a regular.

ST: How did you end up writing the story of Gen 13’s fathers (Team 7)?

CD: The guys at Wildstorm thought that from reading some of my stuff, that I had a handle on the military type story, and that’s what it was. Team 7 was an elite military unit, so they phoned me, and I said yes (laughs).

ST: With the Ravens appearing in Birds Of Prey, and Cheshire being one of the Ravens, will we be seeing an appearance by Arsenal in that book since Cheshire and Arsenal share a child?

CD: There’s nothing planned right now. I’m going to leave that to Devin Grayson to figure out that relationship, because she’s going to deal with them more regularly over in The Titans. I do have a Ravens Special planned, though.

ST: When will that be coming out?

CD: I don’t know. We’re talking about artists right now, but I’m not sure, because it’s not written. You’ll see at the end of the current Birds of Prey storyline, that there’s a lot that has to be explained, and we want to explain it in a special.

ST: You recently signed an exclusive contract with DC Comics. Will you miss doing the occasional work you did for other companies?

CD: I haven’t been offered a lot of stuff at Marvel in the last couple of years. The thing I’ll miss the most is, I’ve written two Simpson’s stories, and I had to tell them that I wouldn’t be doing anymore, for a year anyway. And of course, as soon as I signed this, Dark Horse offered me something (laughs), but I had to turn them down.

ST: How do you manage to produce so many quality titles a month?

CD: Everyone asks this question. I don’t know. I’m not sure about the quality part, but as to how I produce so many pages, I don’t really know. I don’t feel like I really work that hard at it. I just stay way a head of schedule. That’s probably the really helpful thing. I don’t have an issue due until sometime in May now. And Birds of Prey, I don’t think I have to do another issue until July sometime. I really got on a roll with Birds of Prey. I couldn’t stop writing it. Before Greg Land ever saw the script, I had done most of the first year.

ST: I have to say that his artwork is absolutely fabulous.

CD: I always say, in answer to that, it’s getting better with every issue. I’ve seen up to issue six, and he just gets better each time. He’s a joy to work with.

ST: What comics do you read regularly?

CD: Not a whole lot of comics. I have to read books to keep up with what I write. True crime stuff and things like that. I generally read everything that Larry Hama does. I keep up with the Bat books. I’ve been doing a lot of crossover stuff, so I’ve been reading like…Flash, Green Lantern, things like that.

ST: But you don’t read any other titles regularly for pleasure?

CD: Not really. I cherry pick. I get the comps (complimentary issues), and I go through all of them. Kelley Puckett’s recent Legends Of The DC Universe story about Robin and Superman, I thought was one of the best stories I’ve read in years. I just kind of pick around. It takes me a long time to catch up with stuff. I’m reading three paperbacks from three years ago (laughs). Just a few months ago, I caught up with Superman/Aliens. I paid Dan Jurgens a compliment. It seemed to come out of the blue. He was like, "That came out years ago!" And I was just catching up with it now.

ST: What work are you most proud of?

CD: The ‘Nam issue number 66 I think is the best thing I’ve ever done. It’s as if God moved into me and made me write the story (laughs). I felt like I really didn’t have anything to do with it. It just seemed to write itself. There are other things. Some issues of Knightfall, and Punisher: War Zone 1-6. And a mini-series form Eclipse called Winterworld.

ST: Any new projects you’d like to talk about?

CD: I’m doing a Batman searching for the Holy Grail. Actually, he’s not searching for it, Bruce Wayne is given the Holy Grail. It takes place in continuity. It’s not an Elseworlds, and it’s going to be this year’s hardcover from DC. John Van Fleet did the artwork. It’s a painted book. We just found out that it’s going to be the hardcover, and I have to write additional pages to bring it up to the right page length.

ST: Is it called Batman: Searching For The Holy Grail?

CD: You know, I can’t remember what they ended up calling it. I wrote it a while back. Painted projects, you write them and then forget them (laughs). I haven’t seen it for a long time. Ras Al Ghul is involved, as is Catwoman, and it does take place in continuity, rather than those Elseworlds cop outs (laughs).

" ... every ten years or so, you've got to do something with Batman to shake up the status quo ... "

" ... [The Huntress] is a terrific character ... she's really tremendously flawed ... "

" ... I think that's a secret among men. We all want to be feared ... "

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