|
RON MARZ ON THE RETURN OF CYBERFORCE
by Newsarama
March marks a return for Top Cow. While more recent fans of the studio may know it for Witchblade and Darkness, back when things were just lunching, Image was a barely crawling infant of a company, and Marc Silvestri was that young buck, best known for his Uncanny X-Men work more than anything else, Cyberforce was what it was about.
The team book written by Eric Silvestri, with art by Marc, introduced and united Stryker, Ripclaw, Heatwave, Ballistic, Cyblade and Velocity as a loose team, more military and superhero. The group debuted in a four-issue miniseries, and then saw its own ongoing series which lasted for 35 issues, before ending in 1997. Since then, the characters have been here and there, around the Top Cow Universe, and did eventually see the light of day again in the recently-released Image Tenth Anniversary Hardcover, but March marks their return, fully, as a team.
Helming the group this time out – Ron Marz on the story side, and Pat Lee on the art side. We spoke with Marz about the new series, and making what was once hot compelling and hot again.
Newsarama: First off Ron, this relaunch has been in the works for a little while now, right? When did you first hook up with the property?
Ron Marz: Once I'd gotten my feet wet on Witchblade, Top Cow editor-in-chief Jim McLauchlin asked me what else I might like to get my hands on in the Top Cow stable. I told him Cyberforce, because I really liked the idea of taking something that's been lying fallow and breathing life into it again. This was back in the early part of the year, so the whole project has been percolating a while. I actually wrote the first issue when we were still living in Florida, which was prior to the summer.
NRAMA: What was it about the project that hooked you the most?
RM: The most intriguing part for me was the chance to finally write a team book. I flirted with Titans years ago at DC, and I did write StormWatch for Image, but I actually took over that book right after they'd done the stunt of printing issue #25 more than a year ahead of time, if anybody remembers that. So even though I wrote the book for a year, I didn't have a great deal of latitude in what I could do. I had to point the story in a direction that would eventually dovetail with issue #25. So this is really my first shot at a team book without strings attached. As a kid, I was a big fan of the Claremont/Byrne X-Men, and the Wolfman/Perez Teen Titans, so I guess I'm looking to capture a bit of what made those books special for me.
NRAMA: So –ground floor us on Cyberforce – what was their previous incarnation like – who were they, and why were they a team – or were they a “team” team?
RM: Hey, if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, I'm not going to sit here and tell you it's not a duck. The original incarnation of Cyberforce was obviously heavily inspired by the X-Men. The lineup was Ripclaw, Velocity, Cyblade, Ballistic, Heatwave and Impact, all of them cybernetically enhanced in one fashion or another. Stryker -- yeah, the guy with three arms on one side of his body -- was sort of an on-again, off-again member, and for my purposes he's more "off" than "on." The real task is taking those characters and making the unique, making them individuals that the readers come back to every month because they care about them.
NRAMA: And now – have they continued being a team, and we’re just catching up with them, or have they been apart for some time?
RM: The team has kind of disintegrated. Heatwave died quite a while ago, Impact has sort of drifted away, and Ripclaw has become a villain. Which just leaves the ladies. When we pick up the story, there really is no Cyberforce anymore.
NRAMA: And as the solicits tease, this is about the team going to get Ripclow – one way or there other. What has happened to Ripclaw to make him an evil, twisted version of himself?
RM: Personally, I think he saw Mo Rocca on television once too often. That's enough to drive anyone over the edge.
Of course there's another theory that says the evil Ripclaw is something that came out of the Cyberforce story in the Image anniversary hardcover. From my understanding, Marc Silvestri drew the story quite some time ago, and it's been sitting in a drawer waiting for the other stories in the hardcover to be finished. I've had a copy since the spring, for what it's worth. In that story, the "original" Ripclaw died in the arctic, and this twisted version took his place. We're picking up from there, but Cyberforce #1 is absolutely a ground-floor read. Everything is explained, so if you didn’t read the story in the hardcover, no big deal. You can just saddle up and ride right from issue #1.
NRAMA: And Velocity, Cyblade and Ballistic – Ripclaw is their reason for joining up?
RM: Right. The three woman come together, for what they're fairly certain is the last time, in order to put an end to Ripclaw. They essentially use themselves as bait to lure him into a confrontation, hoping they can take him out.
NRAMA: Do they have a prayer of stopping him?
RM: Of course they don't have a prayer of stopping him. Ripclaw's going to hand them their lovely asses. It's what happens after that that really propels the story. The initial storyline starts off fairly small, dealing with a threat from within the team. But it eventually expands to a threat the endangers the entire world. Without giving too much away, it's a threat that is specifically tied to Cyberforce, and forces the team to come together again.
NRAMA: And – reading the solicitation – there are aliens in the skies – something other than RIpclaw which is playing a role here?
RM: Hey, this is comics, there are always aliens in the skies. And, because this is comics, they're not cuddly, E.T.-type aliens. They're "blow up your planet"-type aliens.
NRAMA: Overall – at least from its previous iteration, I’m gathering that this won’t be your basic, by-the-book superhero team book. What kind of flavor are you looking to inject the series with?
RM: Team books have evolved since Cyberforce first appeared. Books like The Authority and Ultimates have raised the stakes and especially the scale. So I want to capture more of a widescreen flavor, but also keep the character interaction that's really the driving force behind a successful team book. Every team book has big-ass battle scenes, but those aren't what leave lasting impressions. You remember the character stuff. You remember the death of Phoenix, or the Scott-Jean-Logan love triangle, or Terra's betrayal of the Titans. Again, it all comes down to making the audience care about the characters, about what happens to them.
NRAMA: Back in the day, Cyberforce was pretty much it in the Top Cow Universe. Since then, Witchblade, Darkness and others have shown up – will there be interactions, or at least nods that this whole other tier of heroes/characters exists?
RM: One of the things I really like about the Top Cow Universe is that it's got this dual nature. It very much started out as a superhero universe, with Cyberforce as the cornerstone. Then it took a turn toward dark, more supernatural stuff like Witchblade and the Darkness. But it's all still part of the same universe. What I intend to eventually do, once we're into the second story arc, is start bringing together the superhero and supernatural aspects, make the universe feel a little more cohesive. And if somebody's reading into that and thinking it translates into "new team members" ... yeah, that's exactly what it means. The roster we start with will be very different from the roster at the end of the first year.
NRAMA: On the art side, you’re working with Pat Lee – what’s that like?
RM: I'd never worked with Pat before, but I'm really enjoying the collaboration. I've truthfully never worked with many artists who come from a background of more manga or anime influence, so this is a different experience for me. From what I've been told, Pat was a big-time Cyberforce fan when the book originally came out, so he's coming at this with a lot of enthusiasm, and it really shows in the pages. I might be prejudiced, because it's my story, but I think Pat's work here is head and shoulders above the recent stuff he did for Marvel.
NRAMA: Given that both you and Pat are coming in nearly ten years after the series last regular issue, as well as the same amount of time since the characters were seen – any redesigns or tweaks of the original looks?
RM: Pat's been at work tweaking the character designs. We're not talking about wholesale changes, all the characters are still very recognizable from their original incarnations. It's more a matter of making them a little more contemporary, giving them a little more texture. I've been really pleased with all the new designs.
NRAMA: On a personal level – Pat filed bankruptcy with Dreamwave, leaving freelancers and staff unpaid, along with the rest of the ugliness that a bankruptcy such as that can produce. You were a staff member in a similar situation not too long ago with CrossGen. Is there any tension/friction in that regard, or just water under the bridge?
RM: Yeah, I guess there's a bit of irony at work there. I got left holding the bag for a decent chunk of money when CrossGen went belly up, and so did a lot of other people. So I've seen that side of the coin. As far as Dreamwave, I've never discussed it with Pat, basically because I figure it's none of my damn business. Obviously I've read and heard a fair amount about it, but if I learned anything from having a ringside seat for CrossGen's implosion, it's that a situation like that is a lot more complex than what you might read on the internet. There's a lot more gray than there is black and white. Something like a bankruptcy isn't a spectator sport, despite some people with nothing better to do than treating it like one. I can only judge someone from my personal experience with them. My relationship with Pat is writer-artist, and thus far he's been totally professional, and, frankly, a pleasure to work with.
NRAMA: Away from that side of things, given that Pat is illustrating this, how are you writing to his strengths? What kind of elements are you putting in there just for Pat…or are you?
RM: I think part of the writer's job, on any job, is to write to the strengths of the artist. The basic storyline was in place, but once Pat signed on to the book, I pushed the story in a direction that would take advantage of his skills. You look at Pat's stuff and it's pretty obvious he has a way with tech and hardware, so there's a fair amount of that in the book -- spaceships, jet fighters, maybe even a few giant robots. The action and settings are definitely going to be widescreen.
NRAMA: Finally, speaking of the larger picture – can you tease out the broad strokes of where things will be going?
RM: The purpose of the first arc, in addition to telling a big save-the-world story, is to re-establish the characters and their relationships with each other. The second story arc will bring some changes to the team, because frankly, not everybody's going to survive the first arc. We'll see some new characters, and some characters who have appeared elsewhere in the Top Cow Universe. The dynamic of the team is going to evolve. We're relaunching the book, not simply retreading it. There's no sense in just repeating what was done a decade ago.
|
