@’s by Bryan Hitch
Co-creator of AMERICA’S GOT POWERS!
In a career spanning 25 years and which with penciling ACTION FORCE and TRANSFORMERS stories for Marvel UK, Bryan Hitch is arguably one of the most popular artists working today with career highlights that include THE AUTHORITY with writer Warren Ellis, the aforementioned THE ULTIMATES with Mark Millar and CAPTAIN AMERICA: REBORN with Eisner award winner, Ed Brubaker.
RUSS SHEATH (RS): Lets go all the way back to the beginning and talk about the evolution of AMERICA’S GOT POWERS.BRYAN HITCH (BH): Mark (Millar, writer of KICK ASS, THE ULTIMATES and the upcoming SECRET SERVICE) put us together when we were on holiday. Jonathan was in Florida and me down in Dorset, when he called back in Summer 2010. Jonathan had various ideas for projects we could do together and we had a nice chat and agreed that we would meet and discuss a project when we were back from holiday. We met and started discussing another project casually, at the time I was still under contract at Marvel so we knew it was either going to be an Icon project or we’d have to wait until my contract was up at Marvel.
Christmas came and went and we had another meet up and a longer plot session about this other project and I was literally on the way out the door to go home when he said ‘I’ve got another idea, its called AMERICA’S GOT POWERS and its pop idol for super heroes'! I looked at him and said ‘why the fuck didn’t you tell me this six months ago, THATS IT’! You just know when something feels right! When Warren (Ellis) said lets do the Authority or when Mark said Marvel want us to do Ultimate Avengers, something clicked. You are never quite sure what it is.... it’s an ‘X FACTOR. I got it immediately, it was very modern and a great title, it’s a statement that there’s super powers in America as well as the title of a TV show. It’s a great, universal umbrella of a super hero universe.
RS: Tell us a bit about the stories origins and how it evolved?
BH: I’ve always had this idea about talent shows and that they are the modern day version of the old Roman coliseums. They parade people in front of a large mass audience for entertainment with people you care about or don’t care about and you either vote for them or don’t vote for them, they live and die at your leave.
What we said was AGP is POP IDOL meets SPARTICUS and GLADIATOR. There have been super hero talent shows in comics before, LEGION OF SUPER HEROES has done it and TEEN TITANS has done it. Legion and Teen Titans were two of my favorite titles growing up and I loved the group dynamic and that they were teenagers, but in AGP the talent show isn't the story any more than Manhattan or the radioactive spider are the story in Spider-Man. This is the story of Tommy and to a slightly lesser extent his brother Bobby and the story spans quite a large time frame. We start in the modern day and then see 17 years previous and what happens in those seventeen years, that’s the story, not the talent show itself. The talent show and the arena games aspect is only a small part in the history of these kids and the effect they are having on the world.
It’s a very big scale story, a world changing story, told from the point of view of two brothers.
RS: So, tell us what prompted you to leave a successful career and go the creator owned route with your own title?BH: If you look at people like Stan Lee, Steve Ditko and Jack Kirby and ask ‘whets their legacy’? You automatically say Fantastic Four, New Gods, Spider-Man etc.
That’s part of their legacy, but what they actually did was to leave new stuff behind. Those are now owned by a company and a corporation, but if you are talking about legacies what they left was their creativity. Since then all there has been is recapitulation. With THE ULTIMATES all we did was a new version of The Avengers, it was built on other peoples shoulders. We’ve all got a Superman story, a Batman story or a Thor story and you could spend a happy career doing that but the truth of the matter is that my family won’t see royalties from my work after I’m dead, so what legacy do I leave them? I’d rather leave them a legacy than leave Marvel a legacy. Marvel’s been great to me. Quite honestly I’ve been able to indulge myself drawing any Marvel character I like with the best writers that Marvel have, not just drawing as a career but doing whatever I want for ten years has been tremendous. But, at the same time the people who will benefit from that work the most are the corporation that owns it. What I can do with the rest of my career is leave a legacy that my family will benefit from for generations and from characters that I have created or co-created. One could imagine this stuff being out there for fifteen or twenty years, with people making an AMERICA’S GOT POWERS movie, or it getting remade and relaunched as another comic. The people who benefit from that will be my children and grandchildren, not a corporation. I’m getting to that point in my life where that’s more important to me rather than drawing Superman or Spider-Man, as much fun as that would be. It really does feel that this is a huge opportunity that I want to seize with more than two hands. AMERICA’S GOT POWERS is the tip of a huge iceberg which for me is part of a ten year plan. Explosion doesn't even cover it. I know what’s coming out this year, even if no one else does yet, AMERICA’S GOT POWERS is just the first of three projects. I’m working harder than I’ve ever worked and none of it feels like it’s a labor, its just wonderful.
RS: One thing that’s always struck me when I’ve read your responses in interviews and with your work for television and cinema is that you seem to enjoy the design aspect of your work. Did you enjoy having something new and so vast to sink your teeth into for AGP? Do you have a design ‘process’?
BH: My process, more or less, is to let it sit and percolate in the back of my mind. That’s kind of how it went with THE ULTIMATES, although I did a little bit of design on the characters up front. I’m not very good at doing up front design because it’s boring. It’s the difference between being a typist and a writer, the writing goes on in your head and the typing is how you put it on the paper so other people can read it. The actual process of writing and creating a story doesn’t happen on the paper, usually.
I never had any issues redesigning Thor or Captain America because we were given free reign and told to do what we liked in those early days. I had the feel of the book in my head and I pushed those ideas around in my head so we had an ‘Ultimates shot’ rather than an ‘Avengers’ shot or an ‘Ultimates design’ rather than an ‘Avengers design’.Where that kind of stuff becomes difficult is when you have no ideas for it.
I was recently asked if I would do covers for the BEFORE WATCHMEN book and originally I thought ‘cool Watchmen’! It’s one of those great projects, but when I sat and thought about it, I found that I actually have nothing to bring to this. The only version I have seen of those characters is Dave Gibbon’s and anything I did would seem like a half-arsed Dave Gibbons. it’s not like I couldn’t draw a cool Watchmen picture but at the same time why would I? As far as I was concerned Dave had drawn all the cool Watchmen pictures and I’m not contributing anything to it. That’s the best way I can answer it.
RS: So, AGP issue 1 is out on Wednesday 11th April?
BH: This week is AMERICA’S GOT POWERS week! We are signing at Forbidden Planet in London on the 14th and then at Big Bang Comics in Dublin on the 21st. It’s the perfect antidote to the short stories that are over priced. This is a long story that is under priced...what more could ask for. Great story, great art, great price. It’s double the size of AVENGERS VS X-MEN for a dollar less, it’s a bloody bargain. We want as many people as possible to buy this and try it and feel like they’ve had a great reading experience.
RS: What is it that excites you the most about AGP?
BH: At one time X-Men, Spider-Man and Avengers were new things that people needed to try, this industry really thrives on new stuff. I think we’ve created a really good book, I think its well written and some of the best work of my career to date. Its got heart, soul and passion in it. It’s 38 story pages, we’ve given you an issue free almost, the story ended up being this big and we don’t feel you guys should have to pay for it. I’ve been doing this for years where I put extra pages in because I thought the story needed it. For the years I worked at Marvel I didn’t draw 22 page comics, even when Marvel dropped the page count to twenty, Brian Michael Bendis and I were doing 22 and 24 pages. We were still putting extra pages in for the price you were paying. Almost every issue of ULTIMATES was 26 pages. One issue was 41 pages, it was as long as it needed to be. At the movies you pay the same ticket price whether your movie is an hour and a half or two and a half hours.
The final high you get is to get it into people's hands and to get that feedback and enjoyment. I like that very much. it’s always very exciting. We created this from absolutely nothing but this is something very different and a whole new level for me and I’m very excited. I’m already working on what you will see next. When it starts getting towards the final issues of AMERICA’S GOT POWERS you’ll start hearing what comes next.RS: There’s quite a nice collaboration between you and Mark Millar, with sharing cover artists on each others books?
BH: We started a cooperative. I do covers for his books and his guys (currently Dave Gibbons on SECRET SERVICE, Leinil Yu on SUPERCROOKS) do covers for mine. Leinil’s done a cover for AGP #1 and Dave’s done a cover for AGP #2 and I’ve done a cover for SUPERCROOKS #2. So why not help each other out!
RS: With your work on THE ULTIMATES so heavily drawn upon for the Marvel movies, are you excited to be seeing THE AVENGERS in a few weeks?
BH: I’ve heard from several of the directors or potential directors of the Marvel movies that THE ULTIMATES is the first book that Marvel sends them to read which is wonderful because Mark Millar and I set out to do a ‘Marvel movie’ those ten or eleven years ago.
Joss is a friend. Some of my kids just love that stuff and there’s interest in seeing it having recognized moments from THE ULTIMATES in the trailers. It will be interesting to see what was used and how it was used, it’s not a direct adaptation of THE ULTIMATES but there’s quite a lot in there. It’s going to be really interesting to see whether the audience responds to the film because they’ve been building to this for years. This could be a massive thing for Joss and one always wants ones friends to be successful. He’s a huge comics fan and a hugely talented guy. I’m very keen to see it.
RS: Thanks to Bryan for his time. Follow Jonathan on Twitter @wossy and Bryan Hitch @thebryanhitch . AMERICA’S GOT POWERS is released on 11th April published by Image Comics.
Follow Russ Sheath @russwords
Proofs, co-edits & common sense provided by Sleazy G
