CRAVE ONLINE: And I loved the relationship with Chameleon as the director to actor, completely natural. I’d love to see a team-up book with them.
DAN SLOTT: This stuff happens all the time. If I had more hands and I had more brains, I would do more stuff. I remember when I was writing Initiative, and everyone was like ‘oh, I want to see the Eric O’Grady Ant-Man and Taskmaster team-up book!’ Especially when you had them in that one battle where they’re ignoring the fight and just sitting there catching up on episodes of House. I would write a whole book of these two guys.
But there’s no way the Spider-Man schedule would allow you to do that. You don’t get side projects, do you?
(looking suspicious) Nnnnnnooooo. (laughs) There’s going to be news later and people are going to be ‘HE WAS LYING. HE’S DOING SPIDER-MAN AND SOMETHING ELSE. LIAR!’ But you’ll have to wait. It’s all super top-secret.
How long do I gotta wait?
‘Til we tell you.
Well, then, I’ll just be excited for a new Slott project. So back to Doc Ock – what was it about him that made you want to elevate him? Because this is ultimate villain stuff – this seems worse than anything Green Goblin did –
He killed his girlfriend and threw her off a bridge!
True, but Ock has killed Peter Parker himself!
Yeah, that’s pretty bad. (laughs)
And he tried to flash-fry the world. So, how do you set-up the balance of how Doc Ock is still Doc Ock, but every once in a while, he gets a morality rush from accessing Peter Parker’s memories? Is it all nebulous, or is there a specific way that works?
Man, wait ’til you read issue #8. There’s a moment in issue #8 I really like. He wants to be a hero. He’s tried being a villain, and he’s failed at it miserably. Has he ever had a single plan bear fruit? The one thing he’s really done where got Spider-Man, the one thing he really did in the past where it was ‘grr, gotcha!’ and ‘oh, the feels!’ was when Captain Stacy died – and that was an accident! ‘You shot that special web fluid and now my arms are goin’ crazy!’ So he’s never really set himself a goal, done it, achieved it, bam. We’ve seen him try to cure cancer, we’ve seen him with Stunner, we’ve seen him do these things that you can look at it and go ‘oh, he’s not such a bad guy,’ but…
He loves Aunt May.
He loves Aunt May. That dear, sweet woman.
And he COULD have stopped global warming. But this is the Doc Ock success story that you’re writing.
DAN SLOTT: Yes! He’s winning! He’s winning!
And it feels like it’s elevating him to a whole new level of Spider-Threat, I guess.
Well, there is no Spider-Threat. He’s Spider-Man!
Well, eventually, this has to shake out.
No! Have you seen the sales, Andy?! Have you seen the sales? It’s doing great! It’s one of Marvel’s best-selling books. It has vaulted up. The amount of people who showed up for #700 who stayed is crazy. For every somebody wandering around the internet saying “I’m mad at #700 and I’m leavin’!” – if that guy’s telling the truth and he isn’t secretly reading and buying it – we must have picked up 20 or 30 guys who are like ‘I’m back!’ We’ve – what can I tell you that I’m allowed? We get these emails that say ‘don’t talk about this, this or this.’ Every issue that can be reordered has gone back to print at least once, and that’s for as high as the sales were anyway. It’s going to second and third printings and what-not, even while it’s doing fantastic.
So you’re thinking about running with this maybe longer that you originally planned?
You’re making it sound like there is some kind of plan. An evil plan. Otto Octavius forever!
My theory was that, once Yost put in the Jackal at the end of his Avenging story –
Clone. CLONE. CLONE.
Either a Doc Ock clone, or maybe a Gwen Stacy clone?
Gaahh! GAAAHH! I’m trying to think of what people would call that online. We’ve already got “Spock” for Spider-Ock.
I was calling him “Supey Spidey.”
What would that be? Gwotto Stoctavius? Stacktavius?
That actually sounds like some kind of Eastern European delicacy.
It does.
So you don’t have an endpoint.
When have I not had a plan? I’m not gonna reveal plans or secrets, but I am saying people are really digging the book and where it’s going and watching this freakshow go on. There’s going to be a major game-changer in issue #9. 7 and 8 is the Avengers and Cardiac story. 9 and 10 have those gorgeous Marcos Martin covers – everybody should go over to PanelSyndicate.com and download The Private Eye and pay lots of money so he can have nice things. If you haven’t checked that out, the Brian K. vaughan/Marcos Martin comic? Oh, it’s gorgeous. The guy from Saga and this wonderful guy from Amazing Spider-Man who is one of my favorites doing their own comic and it’s gorgeous. It’s wonderful. We have these two gorgeous Marcos covers, and in the first one is the game-changer – and it’s the return of Ryan Stegman. Stegman doing 9 and 10. 9, the big thing happens, 10 is all fall-out. Then 11, 12 and 13 are me and Chris Gage and Giuseppe Camuncoli with our giant adventure with all of the payback from everyone who’s been brutalized. 14 is my big guilty pleasure issue with Humberto – want the toys! – and you’re going to have to wait until like C2E2-ish to find out what we’re doing afterwards.
The Private Eye, from Brian K. Vaughan and Marcos Martin
Still no hints on your side project?
No. That’s so in the box, I can’t talk about it.
Okay, so the last thing I’ll ask – is it Norman Osborn in the Green Goblin mask who just showed up?
That is a very good question.
Is it Harry?
We’ve seen the Green Goblin return. We do not know whose face is behind the mask yet.
All I want to do is ask you questions and say “TELL ME STUFF! I WANT TO KNOW!”
That’s great! That means you have to buy the book – and don’t worry if you miss it, the second printing will come out soon.
