Summary
It’s only been a few weeks sinceDC Comicsannounced its upcoming initiative, DC All In. The ambitious new push won’t just see a shake-up to the main continuity with new creative teams, but it will also usher in the new reality that has every fan talking, the Absolute Universe.
One of the people leading thecharge for DC All InisSupermanwriter Joshua Williamson. During DC Comics’ announcement, it was revealed that Williamson, along with Scott Snyder, Daniel Sampere, and Wes Craig, would be kicking off thisnew era for the DC UniversewithDC All In Special #1. Screen Rant spoke with Williamson and Sampere about the upcoming one-shot and what lies ahead for the DC Universe.
Screen Rant: Josh, you have spoken so much about DC All In. I hate to make you repeat yourself, but what does All In mean to you?
Joshua Williamson: Well, let me talk about its origin. Scott and I had been talking about this idea, the dual stories with the core line and with the Absolute line why we were talking about that, for about five years. And then we really started talking about two years ago. So the idea was “If we’re going to do this, it can’t feel like they’re separate. It’s one story.” right? And then we started talking about all of us, like “We’re all in this together.”. And we started saying this all the time. We all say it and that’s what it meant from top down. It wasn’t an initiative. It wasn’t a reboot. It wasn’t a relaunch. It was a moment in time where we were able to say “W’re all in this together doing the same thing.”.
You and Scott Snyder have both brought up New 52 and Rebirth when talking about DC All In. Did you guys have the reception of both these initiatives in mind when you we’re trying to craft what DC All In was or what it needed to be?
Joshua Williamson: Yeah, we both worked on them. Scott worked on New 52, I worked on Rebirth more than he did. So we worked out what worked for those. New 52 was about being new and Rebirth was about embracing the core and the classic. And we were like “How do we find a way to do both at the same time?”. We started really evaluating both and looking at them and saying, “What was the key elements of both that we liked and how do we apply that here?”.
We’ve got theDC All In Specialcoming up, which is a dual narrative itself. It’s a flip book, so we get two stories in one. Do you guys want to talk about the story you’re crafting, especially in the wake ofAbsolute Power?
Joshua Williamson: It’s a story where Superman is thoroughly evaluating what the DCU looks like right now. But it’s a moment of happiness. There’s Superman saying to everyone “We’re all in this together.” We’re all in this together. And I always make this joke, Superman is going around all the DCU saying “We’re all in this together because Danny has to draw every hero.”.
Daniel Sampere: It’s literal. It’s literal in that they are ‘all in’ the same room(laughs)
Joshua Williamson: It will definitely have an impact on every DC book for the next two years. We really do have this massive plan. There’s a character that talks about this in the book where he says “This is a moment of peace and prosperity”. It is a big moment of celebration. But some things happen that create catalysts that will then bleed out across the line. And there are massive ramifications from some stuff that happens in that issue. And then Danny just draws the crap out of it and draws some really big surprises. There’s some stuff in there. I think people are going to be like “What the hell is happening?! What is that? What is this?”. There’s some there’s some big time surprises in the book.
Daniel, as an artist, do you want to go into the technical aspects of working on the flip book style for DC All In Special and what it was like for you?
Daniel Sampere: I didn’t know what flip book was. So they explained to me and I was like “This is a great idea, but it seems complicated.”. You have to do a double cover. But it needs to be flipped. But it has to work when looking at it both ways at the same time and just looking at it on one side. I’m happy how it turned out.
Joshua Williamson: We had a lot of communication, a lot of whiteboards. I wrote the outline for all of it. I literally had to write down what happens on every page of both sides to see how things would link up and how it actually works out? But there are reasons that they connect and how they connect. It was a very interesting process.
At theAbsolute Powerpanel, Scott talked using All In to drive traffic back into comic book stores. This seems like something you’re gonna want to hold in your hands, not digitally. Is that something you guys had in mind for the special?
Joshua Williamson: That was something I thought about years ago, where I really felt like this special was something I wanted people to buy in the stores. Even before we knew what the special was, I was like “This is something that we want to give people in the stores, how do we do that?” So we started with a flip book and it was really interesting.
During Dawn of DC, you were handlingSuperman,Green Arrow, andBatman and Robin. You’re stepping back a little bit, putting all this all your energies intoSuperman. Yeah. What does that mean for you during All In?
Joshua Williamson: I feel like I’m re-prioritizing that book. I was definitely feeling a lot of burnout the last couple years, I was getting very tired and exhausted. It was hard because I love Green Arrow and I love Damian so it was hard having to say goodbye to these characters, then just put all my effort into making sure that Superman was what I wanted it to be. But it’s funny with Superman because I almost have too many Superman ideas, So I was like “I gotta make sure this one really, really works”.
Daniel, you’re still working with Tom King onWonder Woman. You’re focusing on the Sovereign narrative right now. But in the All In era, is there anything you guys are really excited to start building towards?
Daniel Sampere: Yeah, starting in October. It’s going to start a new arc. It’s a continuation of the Sovereign story. I think it’s already safe to say that Trinity is going to be born. And things are gonna get pretty intense. It’s gonna be really really awesome and things are gonna be shaken a little bit for Wonder Woman. We already are talking about future plans for future stories. We’re having so many new ideas. Things are looking great.
Skipping back toSuperman, Josh, you’ve had Lex Luthor as a huge part of your story. It’s become clear that a real change has occurred in him. You’ve also related this change to fatherhood and his relationship with Lena. What can you tell us about Lex going forward?
Well he’s still who he is, but his memory was erased during “House of Brainiac”. That story is far from over. Yeah, I have a lot more going on with him. I wanted to ensure that we keep up on that journey with him and Lena now that she’s taking care of him. It’s hard to not say much, but the story’s far from over.
Waller has been this big threat throughout the Dawn of DC, but with DC All In, we’re shifting to Darkseid. Do you want to talk about that big change in overarching villains?
About three years ago, we had this conversation about how all our villains were big cosmic villains and how we haven’t had a human villain in a while. We’ve had a human villain for two years, now it’s like “Who’s the greatest DC villain of all time? We’re going into this big story. Who’s the greatest villain of all time?”. And it’s Darkseid. But there’s some huge twists and turns with Darkseid coming, I’m hoping we surprise people when they get all in.
DC All In Special #1is available on October 2nd from DC Comics.
