Posted in: Comics | Tagged: baltimore comic con, charles soule, Comics, entertainment, frank cho, frank tieri, Herb Trimpe, Joe Rubenstein, Marvel Comics, wolverine

LIVE! From The Wolverine Celebration Panel At Baltimore Comic Con With Tom Brevoort, Herb Trimpe, Charles Soule, Joe Rubenstein, Frank Tieri, And Frank Cho (UPDATE)

At Baltimore Comic Con, Wolverine took the spotlight in a special panel chaired by Tom Brevoort, featuring Herb Trimpe, Joe Rubenstein, Charles Soule, Frank Tieri, and Frank Cho.

Brevoort, speaking with Trimpe about Wolverine led Trimpe to say that he really only worked "briefly" to introduce Wolverine. That one page, Hulk #180 where Wolverine is depicted on the last panel on the last page, given to a friend 45 years ago by Trimpe, was auctioned at Heritage Auction House and in the first 24 hours reached 110,000 dollars online. It climbed the fastest of anything that Heritage had ever auction. When the live auction opened, the final price 657, 000 dollars. That Trimpe gave away. That is a "concentrated story" of the way that Trimpe's artwork has traveled away from him. Most was sold to dealers years ago, he said. Trimpe's agent got a percentage due to all the publicizing he did, and Trimpe did get a divided portion of the proceeds. The largest portion went to Hero's Initiative. He got about 16% after taxes and fees were paid.

Rubenstein asked how the art was stored, and Trimpe said he thought it was in a guest room under a bed. Brevoort commented that "nobody knew" back then, and then asked Trimpe if he had any art to give away, which prompted laughter.

Brevoort asked Soule why he killed Wolverine. "It was a chance to do something that felt new", Soule explained, and said that the first issue appears to be doing very well. "When you write this book, you realize the reach that Wolverine really has. It gets even better from here. The issues build and build and build. I've seen the last page, and it's sad, but it works toward this character who has been building for 40 years".

Brevoort asked Frank Tieri why Wolverine has to be killed now. Tieri joked to Soule "I've been doing Wolverine for years. Thanks for ruining that for me, man".  To Tieri, he's always liked "the struggle" about Wolverine. One of his favorite characters is Sabretooth. He feels that Sabretooth and Wolverine always had their demons, but Sabretooth "doesn't give a crap" and Wolverine fights them. His "sense of honor" and "the sense of history behind the character" fueled the appeal of Wolverine.

Frank Cho said he was a big fan of Wolverine growing up in the 80's. One of his favorite stories was one that Joseph Rubenstein worked on it. He "just missed" the John Byrne run. He liked Wolverine because he's a "short guy" like Wolverine. Wolverine was this "short, odd looking guy who came around kicking people's asses". Spider-Man and Wolverine were always two of his favorite characters.

Brevoort asked about Rubenstein's work on the Wolverine Limited Series. "More than anything what put Wolverine on top" was the Limited Series, Brevoort said, asking if Rubenstein had any sense of the "right combination of elements" that contributed to this. Frank Miller was doing Daredevil, Rubenstein said, and he used to re-read every issue twice, the second time just looking at the artwork. When Miller came up to him and asked him if he wanted to Wolverine, he simply said yes, not knowing how historic it was going to be. Rubenstein said the cover of the first issue is reminiscent of Jack Nicholson whereas the rest of the book is influenced by the films of Clint Eastwood. Rubenstein referred to the work at the time as "breaking the Kirby barrier", drawing an entire book in a week and still making it look good. Miller gave him "scribbly layouts" to work with. He often had to call him to work out the individual panels. Some jobs have a discrepancy with either the story being strong, or the art, but something else wrong, but he was proud of the "package" but he was embarrassed by some of his work. Some years later he changed his mind, looking at the work again. He had been hoping the recent movie would be more like the mini-series but it wasn't.

When Soule was asked what inspired him to write Death of Wolverine, he recounted receiving a phone call and lunch meeting with Axel Alonso and Mike Marts, then having an "Oh Shit" moment when he realized what they wanted to talk about. He was delighted by the offer, and was asked to come up with a script in 5 days after talking about ideas. He went back and read older stories, feeling he had to figure out the essential elements of his personality before writing it, but having done that, he completed the script and sent it off for the layers of publication.

Brevoort, when a fan asked why a character needs to be killed, said it's a universal thing that people can relate to, something that doesn't happen very often, and also that there's the possibility in the Marvel universe to bring characters back at some point, which means that they should, in fact, engage with death thematically when it's appropriate to do so.

Tieri, who wrote Wolverine for 3 years, said that his run was violent, and there was an issue where a villain plucked Wolverine's eye out and eats it, and he took a lot of flack for that. There was also an issue where a puppy was killed in a microwave, and he got many letters about that, despite the fact that hundreds of people were killed in issues of Wolverine. The violence was often under fire.

A fan asked directly if Wolverine will, in the future, come back. Soule said there's a lot of focus on that question, and Soule says, "Who cares? Focus on the story in question". He appealed to the "experience" of the comic. He's "sure" there will be many great Wolverine stories in the future, but whether any of these creators are going to be the ones creating it, he doesn't know. When a fan asked if Wolverine would return in tact, or be missing a nose, Soule confirmed that "his nose like other parts of him will be in tact". Tieri pointed out, as well as fans, that Wolverine has been killed before.

Soule said that he really wanted to "try to hit a home run with this" since there's a "promise in the title Death of Wolverine" and didn't want to betray that trust from readers in actually killing him.

A fan asked why it's so difficult to fix Wolverine's powers when other characters can be healed via Beast. Brevoort said knowing how to fix one machine is not the same as knowing how to fix another, and plus, "It's fiction and we make all the rules. The healing power to work on rays is not the same as healing power from stuff that gets stuck into you". It's a world where someone shoots claws out of his hands, he reminded. Brevoort said that the "future of the Marvel universe" is always "next week's comics".

A fan asked if there is going to be a big funeral for Wolverine and eulogies in other books. Brevoort confirmed that it will effect other books. There are two books that are going to be direct follow-ons from this and approach the death differently, looking at how some of the "bad guys" are handling it, in December. Tieri said that one he's doing involves Sabretooth  in conflict over Wolverine's death and payback for years of struggle.

A fan asked why young women often feature in Wolverine comics, observing him or telling his story. Brevoort said it forms a nice contrast between the "grizzled old dude and the young girl". Soule said it's a "mentor relationsip" and the panelists were amused trying to clarify that these relationships are "not sexual". There were still echoes of "He likes the girls" from panelists though.

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