Monday, April 29, 2013
Gold Exchange Doubletalk with Justin Gray
Justin Gray must feel pretty loved right now. He was interviewed by both Russ Burlingame at ComicBook.com and Newsarama.com last week about All-Star Western #19.
Vanetta Rogers interviewed both Gray and his co-writer, Jimmy Palmiotti, for Newsarama.com. The focus of the interview is very much on Palmiotti and Gray's plans for the future of the series (which has been losing more than 500 readers each month for some time now, currently down to under 17,000 per month and fast approaching cancellation). But there was still some room for some Booster news.
Newsarama: How did All-Star Western end up being the spot where Booster Gold would return to DC Comics?
Justin Gray: We needed to shake things up. Booster is the only time traveler operating currently in the New 52, and his story is that of a man hurtling through time for reasons unknown. He's not fully aware of the reasons behind this and so it felt like a great opportunity to pair him with Jonah Hex in a way that would get people talking about All-Star Western.
Palmiotti: We constantly like to keep All-Star Western on the cutting edge story-wise and loaded with ideas that we think really challenge the characters. Getting to be the book that reintroduces Booster again was even cooler for us. Once again we get a chance to turn more people onto the book, and that is a win-win situation for us on all counts. The crew at DC and our editors have been working long and hard on making this happen for us and we think we have a story that lives up to any hype we might have out there.
Meanwhile, at the New Look ComicBook.com Russ Burlingame resurrected his "Gold Exchange" column to put some questions to Gray, who genuinely appears to be a big Booster Gold fan.
ComicBook.com: There are few characters more entwined with the DC Universe than Booster, at least as he's been depicted in the recent past. His future is totally dependent on the "history" that unfolds in our titles every month. Hex is at the other end of the spectrum; his life would be only minimally impacted if Superman never had his coming-out party. Do you think that makes an exploration through time with these two particular characters even more interesting than the average mismatched duo?
Gray: Hex takes everything as it comes with an angry scowl and hand on his gun approach. I think any time you put characters together that are dissimilar, with very pronounced view points, methods and ideologies that you're going to have a good time.
A lot of times you have such similarities in characters that they become swappable costumes. I believe Booster being around Hex actually makes him more heroic in ways that would be overlooked and sometimes overshadowed by standing in a crowd with other heroes. He is essentially the only pure hero in the book at this time.
In both interviews, Gray sidesteps questions of how Booster got to the past and where he will be going next. It looks like readers will have to pick up All-Star Western #20 next month for more answers!
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