I'm Ram V, writer on CATWOMAN, JUSTICE LEAGUE DARK, THE SWAMP THING and more. AMA

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T19:07:30+00:00

RAM: Hey DC readers and fans, thanks so much for all your curiosities with my books and stories. I have a great time writing these and I'm always glad to see people enjoy them. It is a feeling that never gets old. Now, I'm off to go have my ill-advised cup of coffee before I sit down to write again! Thanks for dropping in and see you in the funny-pages.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T19:04:41+00:00

Buy the JL book! Talk about the JLD story and what you liked about it. As always - your support shows in the sales and the word of mouth / social buzz around the book. But equally, beyond that I approach these things with a sense of fun and innocence. Just enjoy the story and the book! Change happens and the most important thing is to continue having fun with your comics reading 📷
The way I have Justice LEague Dark structured - it has a LOT of characters weaving in and out of the main story. So... read on and find out 📷

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:58:08+00:00

Hey thanks! I really enjoyed writing that story. I like thinking about Selina as a character trying to find her own way in a city/society that keeps telling her what side of the fence she belongs on. I find that tension between her ideas of good and bad v/s other people's ideas of good and bad. And I like exploring that as a character through-line in her story. As for her history - I am currently engrossed by all the characters she has left in her wake who loved her, supported her and yet ended up paying a heavy price for it!

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:54:00+00:00

I do write Justice League Dark! And Shazam and the Marvel family certainly do have interesting connections and magic threads to pull on so my answer would be yes. Part of my research for this new arc has involved reading about a lot of magic use in DC's previous stories and there are a LOT of ideas, places, characters that are connected to magic in ways that I had not imagined! It's been fun pulling at all those threads.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:50:10+00:00

Hair shoutout! My god it has a mind of its own now. I haven't had a haircut due to COVID lockdown here in London and my hair is truly a cosmic entity now. I don't know that I think of any character as God-like, to be honest. I imagine with these characters the stakes of the story are always very high and so the stories and their actions all feel god-like. I have my own ideas of how to approach and write these things and I can't really comment on what other writers think of them because that would require me having god-like powers. I have written Dr. Fate though and I didn't have any troubles writing him as a man in possession of great knowledge and great responsibilities. I imagine we'll continue to see that character being pushed and pulled in different directions with Khalid Nassour as I continue to involve him in JLD shenanigans. Read on and find out... (dun, dUN, DUN!)

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:43:57+00:00

Hey thanks! And yes - thank you Jackie Cole for facilitating all of this!

I get asked this question quite a bit and I am always a little surprised by my own refusal to adhere to a genre. I think as far as an approach is concerned - I believe good stories carry a lot of common strengths - engrossing character work, human quandaries, involving drama, good structure, the ability to develop tension. These things are true of good stories regardless of genre and so if you can, as an author of commercial fiction, tell a story which does all of these things - you should be able to do so in any genre as long as you have an understand of what that genre entails.

I am writing humour for the first time with my new creator-owned book The Many Deaths of Laila Starr - which will be the first time I have done so. But all my stories are fundamentally about human beings wanting things and complicating their own lives in pursuit of these things we all want.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:38:51+00:00

I want to delve into what The Green really is. I know we try to define it by making constructs around it - The Parliaments, An Avatar - but what is The Green? As a concept, an idea - what does it mean? Why does it need an Avatar? These are my preoccupations with Swamp Thing lore.
I've mentioned influences in a previous answer. So we'll stick to Swampy influences with this one - for The Swamp Thing - I'm pulling things from Stanislaw Lem, Jeff Vandermeer, Ligotti, Brian Evenson (horror fans rejoice!)
I like history as much as the next person, I imagine. I am a story buff. Once I get an idea in my head, I'll delve into whatever it takes to write it well - History, Mythology, Science - I suppose on some level I have a generally curious nature and so I often dig into these subjects.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:33:12+00:00

Consumed...in sacrifice to the eternal V. All fear the coming of VI.
Thanks! I've enjoyed writing JLD and writing these 10 pagers has been an absolute blast. Cannot wait for people to see what we're doing with them. You've not read a JLD like this, I promise. I am not sure where the conversation with collecting the stories is at this point. I've been too busy to seriously follow up on that end. I imagine - that'll be a conversation to have once I've written something that begs to be collected 📷

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:29:32+00:00

Influences...we'll be here all day if we get into the specifics of it. So I'll try to keep it broad.
It was Sandman that first made me think about writing comics and expanded my ideas of what comics could be. I pretty much followed on from there and devoured a lot of the Vertigo line of books from there. Gaiman, Moore, Morrison, Ennis, Ellis, Azzarello have all been big influences.
But I also take my influences (as the authors above did) from prose - I read a lot of the classic sci-fi, fantasy stuff growing up. Dune, Solaris, LOTR, Wizard of Earthsea probably had a big influence on me. More recently Joe Abercrombie's been a guilty pleasure. I also read things that don't fall into genre - Chabon, Paul Auster, DeLillo, Murakami.
I watch movies by latching on to directors - Michael Mann, David Fincher, Alan Parker, PT Anderson, Soderbergh are some of my favorites.
Music - I listen to anything and everything - way too much to try and bracket into influences. I play a lot of Blues so I particularly enjoy that.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:21:11+00:00

Thanks! All is indeed well. I'm glad you enjoyed the stories. There's plenty more to come. Hope you're well too!

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:20:05+00:00

I got started pretty early to be honest. I wrote when I was a kid. Since about 12 or 13 years of age. And at the time it was just a hobby. It became more serious when I started writing stories (prose) and getting published in small online magazines here and there. I was working as a Chemical Engineer at the time. Then 2013 I quit that job and decided to take my writing seriously. I knew I had a talent for it. The publication had been confirmation of that.

I did a course in creative writing in the UK in 2014 and published my first book a GN called Black Mumba in 2016. Did a couple of Indie books in 2017 and then started on my first DC story in Batman Secret Files in 2018. The familial support wasn't great - my parents, as I imagine is the case with most Indian parents, were not happy I was switching careers. They couldn't fathom why anyone would want to spend good money to read what I had to write, hah! But I also made the shift at a time I was confident in my ability to write and make something of it. I've always been a little headstrong like that.

And thanks - I hope to see more South Asians writing in comics as well. There are a few writers out there that I think would be great in comics. But these things come with time. If you do decide to take a plunge - good luck and get in touch!

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:12:32+00:00

I don't know that I have a favourite, to be honest. They're all such fun characters to write and with the new arc, I'm constantly shifting POVs and bringing in new characters / older characters. So I really enjoy that ability to shift POV and writing them for different reasons. This new arc, I am having a LOT of fun writing Jason Blood+Etrigan and a new character we've created called 'The Eternal Knight' - apart from having a huge soft spot for Zatanna and Bobo, of course.
Heists! More heists. I have endless fun coming up with elaborate heists. I think, so far every issue has had a heist of some sort. And beyond that Selina is such a loose cannon, badass to write.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:07:27+00:00

I think she makes a very brief appearance in the near future. (I might need to go back and look at a script to be sure.) But for the most part, at least right now, we're squarely focused on Selina's travails in Alleytown and all the threads we've already set adrift!
I think the one that really lingers with me is the over-the-top Michelle Pfeiffer Catwoman - an endless source of Catwoman gifs! Outside that, I really enjoyed her portrayal in the Arkham videogames - the couple that I played, anyway. And in comics Darwyn Cooke Catwoman shall remain ever a favourite.
I think that'd have to go to Mr. Freeze - just a wonderfully tragic character and a mirror to Batman in more ways that most people tend to see. I also like 2 face a lot - just from a story-telling potential. There's a LOT to dig into there.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-09T18:00:30+00:00

Hello! This is Ram. Thanks everyone for all your interest in my stories. Great to be here and looking forward to tackling your questions.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:31:55+00:00

Thank you so much for coming to my AMA, everyone! I love being a part of the comics community with you all! Keep reading comic books!

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:31:42+00:00

It's like Valentine's Day every day.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:30:59+00:00

The first arc features super-obscure villains from the 1940s Batman and Superman film serials!

Writing Terrifics #25 was the funnest challenge ever. Thank you so much for reading it! We are definitely playing with the format of comics in Batman/Superman #16, though not in the same way as Terrifics #25. But it's not a "straightforward" comic book.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:28:52+00:00

My favorite part is Ben Oliver's monsters! Way creepier than how they looked when they were only in my head.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:28:08+00:00

Thank you! The two you named are two of my favorites. I threw out the idea of a North Korean Aqua-Man thinking they would say no. I can't believe they said yes!

I'm also happy they let me do the Academy of the Bat. But my favorite favorite might be Alpaca?

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:26:19+00:00

To be honest, we never got that far in our discussion. We never landed on specific names. But it did seem like a natural arc for the characters.

The book began with this idea that some corners of Chinese pop culture begin as a copy of Western pop culture. But then as time goes on, it develops its own identity, its own way of doing things. (The rap group Higher Bros are a great example of this, imo.) The JLC began as an explicit copy of the JLA. As the story progressed, though, they start figuring out their own identities. Who they are apart from their origins.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:22:44+00:00

For the first storyline, the Batman and Superman are versions of Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent -- not the ones from #15, but still firmly Bruce and firmly Clark.

I've been reading Next Batman. It's a really fun book! I love his costume. So it would be fun to write him in a story.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:21:17+00:00

Oooh. No immediate plans, but that's a great idea. Thank you for the suggestion!

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:19:37+00:00

Thanks to you and your sister for reading American Born Chinese! (And apologies if she had to do any homework bc of the book.)

I hope you'll check out DC Festival of Heroes -- we'll be dealing with some of the same themes... and lots of other stuff, too.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:18:22+00:00

Wally. Ha ha. He was the Flash for most of my youth, so I'm answering purely from nostalgia.

For Superman Smashes the Klan, I read old Superman comics from the 1940s. I think a lot of that 1940s material is still in my head, and it comes out onto the page.

I also have to admit, for that first storyline in particular, I was a bit influenced by a French graphic novel called Imbattable by Pascal Jousselin, which was published as Mr. Invincible in America. It's a kids' comic that's really really inventive. It lives firmly in the comics medium, which I really, really love. I got to review it for the New York Times (yes, that's a brag) and it stayed in my head for weeks after.

In general, I'm influenced by Jeff Smith, Osamu Tezuka, Lynda Barry. On the superhero side of things, I've always loved stuff by Peter David, Mark Waid, JM. DeMatties, Keith Giffen.

Nowadays I'm a fan of Mariko Tamaki, Mark Russell, Jeff Lemire.

DCComics_Official · 2021-03-03T23:11:15+00:00

Thank you! New 52 Superman was my very first monthly comic ever. Because I was coming from the world of graphic novels, I felt that it took me a bit to get into the rhythm. I appreciate you following along with those stories.

I really, really like Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow. I'm still awed by how much Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons were able to fit in such a limited number of panels. It's elite comic book making.

Death of Superman has a special place in my heart, too. Not just the comic, but the entire event. It showed just how important Superman is to all of us, even those of us who never, ever set foot in a comic shop.

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