Geoff Johns on DCU #0 & the future of the DCU:

I really think #0’s going to have a strong tone and set the stage for where we’re going to take the DC Universe. For me, #0 is the next phase, and a really damn good one.

We worked really hard to design it as an entry point to the DC Universe for anybody. Even though we’ve got complexities and histories and tons of characters, DC Universe #0 is really an entry point for everybody. We’re trying to make it a place for current readers and older readers who maybe haven’t read comics in a while or readers new to the DC Universe – the book is designed as a springboard for all of this coming stuff. It gives a sense of where the characters are going, who they are, and what their journeys are going to be. And it’s drawn by some of the best guys in the business.

For me, #0 is putting the stake in the ground and saying, “Okay, we move forward from here.”

And I have to add that it’s really great to be back in the thick of it like this. Grant and I have been out of the center of it all for a while, and it’s really exciting to get back into the center. 52 was unconnected to other things, and after that, we took a year off from that kind of stuff, have done our own books, but now it’s all about getting back into the mix – into the center of it all again.

We’ve talked about Superman a lot, and the goal with Superman in 2008 is to take what we did with Green Lantern in 2007 to Superman. That’s the goal.

Between Green Lantern, Justice Society of America, Action Comics and the other books I’ve got brewing for ’08 and ’09…and working with Gary Frank, Ivan Reis, Dale Eaglesham, Scott Kolins, Ethan Van Sciver and another legend around the corner…I’m psyched to continue working for the company that made me fall in love with comics.

I believe in DC Comics. I believe in the characters and have since I first discovered this wonderful universe. I believe in where we’re going and what we’re fighting for. You know, we can’t take our readers for granted. We screw up, we lose. We gotta learn from our mistakes and the mistakes others make. We gotta fight hard to create better books every month that are worth your time. We love a good challenge so we’re happy to do that. It keeps us honest.

I just got some pages in for a big project that’s coming up towards the end of ’08 that are just stunning. It comes down to being very content and satisfied, and striving to up my game further and make my comics better while working with the best artists in the business. I am constantly trying to see how I can improve. I’m trying new things like the trailer at the end of Green Lantern. I want to experiment with the fun of a monthly book beyond the 22-pages we’re given.

On Superman and the Legion:

I believe that Superman’s connection with the Legion makes both concepts stronger, which is why I’m doing the story in Action right now. Clark Kent didn’t have a group of friends when he was growing up in Smallville. Sure there was Lana, but he didn’t have a group of friends where he felt like he was one of them. He had great parents and wonderful people he knew, it was tough for him. But when the Legion showed up, and he went to the future with them as a kid…a lot of them were aliens who looked human that came to earth. Suddenly, Clark was just “one of the kids” after being so different. I think that helped him relate to other heroes.

Even though people really look up to him, he sees himself as part of the community. His experience with the Legion – being a member of a group of heroes – helped teach him a lot of that. And on the flipside, the Legion was built off of what Superman did – this alien who came to Earth, and the Earth giving something to him, and him wanting to give back to the Earth. It’s the same kind of thing – the Legion is stronger for having interacted with him. They helped to make Superman who he is, and as a result, they’re stronger.

On the Future:

Right now, I see myself staying on those books…I can’t say exactly for how long, but it will be at least through ’08, and probably into ’09. With Action Comics we have Brainiac this year to start. In Justice Society of America we have the conclusion to “Thy Kingdom Come” – the team’s about to go through some rough growing pains. You’ll see the “society” splintered by Gog, an attack on the Rock of Eternity gone horribly wrong and you’ll meet the Justice Society Infinity mid-year.

I’ll be moving on from Booster Gold after #11 (which is twelve issues including zero), to make way for two mini-series for this year – one being The Flash: Rogues Revenge with Scott Kolins. The other to be announced soon, but it’s the hardest thing I’ve had to tackle in my career – which means working on it is a joy while I drive myself to the edge of sanity

Grant Morrison on Final Crisis:

It’s the apocalypse. (laughs) Basically, this is it. This is doomsday for the DC Universe.

And it’s not – I mean, a lot of people are speculating it’s going to be a big continuity reboot, but I don’t think we need any of that stuff. We’ve done all that, and this isn’t about a reboot, it’s about creating a big, epic storyline for the whole DCU. There may be some things that come out of it that change the universe, but it’s not a reboot and it’s not about fixing continuity gaffes. It’s a story about characters.

This is about the DC Universe under the greatest threat that it’s ever faced. It’s the ultimate annihilation of everything they hold dear. (laughs) Everyone will be quite shocked when they see what happens to some of their favorite characters.

The Green Lanterns are a big deal in it. The Alpha Lanterns, which I created for Final Crisis and Geoff then developed into the latest Green Lantern, those guys have a big role to play. The Green Lanterns are quite essential to the whole book. Superman and Batman, obviously, are going to be a big deal. Wonder Woman is a big deal.

The Question. Frankenstein. Mary Marvel…we’re going to take what’s been happening to Mary Marvel beyond all acceptable limits. I think fanboys should enjoy that one. There’s going to be a big definitive battle between Supergirl and Mary Marvel. Some seriously badass super-animals…There’s a ton of stuff that I don’t want to go into details about, because it’s too good to spoil! I’d love readers to just come to issue 1 with no real preconceived notion of what they’re going to get (ha!)…

On All-Star Superman :

It all starts folding together in the final three. Issue #10 is Superman’s last will and testament. It’s basically what he does on one of the last days of his life. Issues #11 and 12 are what everyone’s been waiting for, I hope, the ultimate confrontation between Superman and Luthor. And in this one, it’s Luthor who has the powers and Superman who doesn’t. Brains vs. brawn, but the other way around.

Issue #12 completes the story – it also kind of functions as the last Superman adventure ever, so we want to give him a good send-off – I think the wrap page is one of the best endings I’ve ever thought of (laughs). So yeah, I’m very pleased with how that whole book has worked out.

After that, there’s been some talk about doing three two-part All Star Superman specials with some unusual artists who’ve never drawn the character before. While I was writing All-Star, I came up with a couple of ideas that didn’t really fit into the main book but they still had strong ties to the All-Star Superman universe, so we’ll see if we can work it out with the guys I have in mind.

There’s a story called “Son of Superman” with an All-Star re-imagining of the Super-Sons concept. [There’s also] “Men of Tomorrow,” which is a huge, generational Superman Squad cosmic epic, and an idea for a flashback story to the All-Star Superman’s first year in Metropolis called “Superman vs. Satan!”

Dan DiDio on DC Universe #0:

This is the launching pad for everything that is to come.

Originally, we were going to do Countdown to Final Crisis #0 - that’s what Countdown has been counting down to: 51 to 0 – 52 issues in total, a year’s worth of work. Ultimately though, what happened was that when we were looking at how #0 was being created, we realized that in collecting Countdown to Final Crisis, it would be hard to collect the #0 issue, because it would leave us on a cliffhanger at the end of the book. We felt that probably wasn’t the best way to end a book, so we decided to end all the Countdown stories with #1, and therefore make the #0 issue separate. That’s when it became Final Crisis #0.

Then, Grant was involved in the writing of Final Crisis #0 of course, and Grant wanted Geoff to co-write it with him. But as we were building the book, we realized that the story wasn’t contained to the stories that were flowing into Final Crisis, involving New Gods and Monitors, but really touched upon so many major events going on throughout the DCU including: more hints to the Black Lanterns story, what’s coming up in the Batman storylines, Superman’s upcoming stories and Wonder Woman as well. Because it started to expand outside of Final Crisis, we repositioned the book one more time, and now it’s called DC Universe #0

And since this is becoming more of a springboard to all of the DC Universe in 2008, we wanted to make this much more accessible to all of our fans and separate it out from Final Crisis and Countdown so it can really stand alone on its own feet. As such, it’s going to sell for 50 cents – 24 pages by Grant and Geoff, with art by a wide variety of folks including Ivan Reis, Carlos Pacheco, Tony Daniel, George Perez and Aaron Lopresti.

you’ve got Final Crisis running, you’ll have “Batman: R.I.P. in Batman, along with another major and separate storyline in Detective. There will be a major storyline building off of the Brainiac image that we’ve been showcasing around, feeding into the Superman stories which will feed into an important turning point in Superman’s life before the year is out. There’s also a big, epic-style Wonder Woman storyline coming from Gail this summer as well - along with the two miniseries, Rann-Thanagar: Holy War and Reign in Hell, and of course Trinity.

As we’ve set it up, all of our key franchises are involved in major storylines in their own series, and for the bigger picture, we’ve got Final Crisis and the miniseries. We don’t want anything lost in the shuffle, so every book has to stand on its own, and feel as important as the biggest book we have.



Final Crisis is seven issues over eight months. It has a natural break built in between two of the issues. During that natural break, there will be a series of specials dealing with Final Crisis and the events of that natural break in the story.

There will also be two other supporting series for Final Crisis, one of them is a five part story, one of them is a six part story. That is the full extent of Final Crisis. So we will not see Final Crisis crossing over in any appreciable manner with the rest of the line. All of the other monthly books will continue on the stories they’re telling, with their established creative teams for those series.

If we go any further or any wider…wait – you know what? I don’t want to be called a liar seven months from now when we add one more special or something, let me couch that – at this point, there are no plans to extend Final Crisis past that initial conceit, because we feel that what we have planned covers all the major story elements for that storyline. If we have to go any wider, when we will create a special, but we will not incorporate any of the Final Crisis storyline beats in any of the monthly series.

Plans for the 50th Anniversary of the Legion of Super-Heroes? "You will see the Legion of Super-Heroes, you will see the Legion of Super-Heroes, and you will see the Legion of Super-Heroes in the DC Universe #0" Bob Wayne said "it was as if there were two or three Legions operating."

Dan DiDio has commented that George Perez will be involved with the Legion in the near future. No clues about whether this means interior or cover art. I'm betting Geoff Johns will be launching a new Legion book (he's also been treading lightly about some mystery project).

All I have to say... those shadow things look like the Anti-Monitor's Shadow Demons... more on this soon!

The myriad changes that have shaken the DC Universe in recent years will seem like mere prologues to DC Comics’ Final Crisis #1 (MAR08 0124, $3.99), the first, extra-sized chapter in an electrifying, seven-issue limited series by Grant Morrison & J.G. Jones and a March PREVIEWS Gem of the Month.

The shattering events of Infinite Crisis and its companion weekly series, 52 and Countdown, have consistently been well received with every chapter, and have built high anticipation for this limited series. The limited series follows through with colossal action and destruction as the villain Libra threatens the entire Multiverse with an army of the DCU’s most terrifying super-villains. But what is Libra’s ultimate plan – and which characters and worlds will survive to find out?

The 40-page, full-color issue is set to ship with two Jones covers on May 28. For more Crisis action, readers should also search out the 32-page Final Crisis Sketchbook (MAR08 0125, $2.99), which contains behind-the-scenes sketches, designs and notes from the creators and is scheduled to ship on May 14.

This weekend at DC's RRP meeting, it was officially announced that DC’s third weekly series, Trinity, will begin in June. The book's lead story, starring Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman will be written by Kurt Busiek, with art by Mark Bagley.

"The series will follow Countdown, but, as with Countdown and 52 which came before it, will be unrelated to the previous weekly series. That said, Trinity will be “apart,” that is, occurring in the DC Universe, but not tied to other events happening in the DCU."

You can catch DC Universe #0 (the bridge between Countdown to Final Crisis #1 & Final Crisis #1) which will sell for 50 cents (!) should be on sale at the end of April. Also,two new, 6 issue miniseries: Rann/Thanagar: Holy War (starting in May) and Reign in Hell, starting in June.

This doesn't look good...

Inspiring. Can't wait for this one, its gonna be big...