Salad Days – Nerdcenaries

[What follows is an excerpt from a lost interview conducted for a 1997 Holiday Special issue of Wizard Magazine. When pressed about the miniseries discussed in this piece, Warren Ellis declined comment, mustering only to shrug his shoulders shamefully while dramatically exhaling cigarette smoke. He appeared particularly morose.]

Warren Ellis, the brilliant Brit scribe behind the twisted companion piece to Kurt Busiek and Alex Ross’ MARVELS called RUINS, has a new miniseries shedding light on another dark corner of the Marvel universe he wants you to read.

“I honestly don’t care if you read it or not. The check already cleared.” Warren Ellis sits in an Irish pub down the street from his New York City hotel, jotting the occasional note into the frayed pages of his well worn moleskine. Beginning in February, Ellis and artist Mark Buckingham will be releasing a six issue miniseries starring New Warriors founder Night Thrasher, giving the notoriously controversial writer a new canvas to brutally paint his harsh interpretations of the superhero genre.

Wizard: Well, what drew you to Night Thrasher as a character?
Ellis: Tom DeFalco had read RUINS and some of my Vertigo stuff and was quite the fan and asked if I’d fancy taking a stab. I’ve never read an issue of NEW WARRIORS in my life, nor did I know anything about the character.
Wizard: So, how did you end up getting the gig?
Ellis: DeFalco sent me copies of some pertinent storylines and they were just awful. He’s basically a black version of Batman, if instead of a bat, a methed up Rocket Racer had crashed through the window. I about pissed myself from crude laughter.
Wizard: …but, you agreed to do the series?
Ellis: Of course, I did! It’s a check. I told them I’d write THREE THE HARD WAY, but with Night Thrasher, Blade and Cloak from Cloak and Dagger and they agreed to pay my rent anyway! Do you think DC would ever let me do this with Cyborg? Fuck no!
Wizard: Will any of Night Thrasher’s comrades from New Warriors be making any cameo appearances?
Ellis: Well, Speedball shows up as kind of a Jimmy Olsen type assistant, but he’s coked to the gills and ends up being kind of a damsel in distress. He’s basically the well meaning friend who wants to join in on the cool black guy party, but fucks it all up because he’s off his tits.
Wizard: Was there anything editorial wouldn’t let you get away with?
Ellis: I did have a scene where Luke Cage calls Thrasher an Uncle Tom and they settle their dispute with a malt liquor drinking contest, and that was denied. It was really for a bet with Ian Edington, though, so no real loss.
Wizard: So, is the miniseries largely parody?
Ellis: Well, I’m pitching it more as a satirical urban jungle espionage thriller, but that may be the gin talking.

This week, when it was announced that celebrated scribe Ed Brubaker would be penning the silver screen adaptation of his critically acclaimed crime fiction series, cleverly titled CRIMINAL, fans rejoiced. Why wouldn’t they? Brubaker is one of the biggest and most successful comic book writers in recent memory not named Brian Michael Bendis and CRIMINAL, though blandly named, is a reliably brilliant addition to any shelf it sits on. This is the man who killed Captain America, brought Bucky back to life, saved Matt Murdock from getting raped in prison by Stilt Man and brought the semi-relevant ¾ of one of the eight X-Men teams back from space. His work deserves to reach the widest audience possible.

There was, however, a time before Ed Brubaker was a household name. Before he took a ride- along through Gotham and hypothesized how a Steven Bochco Batman TV show might look, Brubaker pitched a tent in Metropolis, and that tent was named BIBBO.

In late 1994, just before Brubaker and Eric Shanower’s criminally underrated PREZ reboot (PREZ: SMELLS LIKE TEEN PRESIDENT), Vertigo editor Karen Berger accidentally left an issue of Dark Horse Presents in the passenger seat of Jerry Ordway’s car after a lunch meeting. Brubaker & Shanower’s serialized tale “An Accidental Death” lay therein, sparking Ordway’s long dormant twentysomething urge to tell a darker crime story and his current, burning passion to one-up Frank Miller’s SIN CITY. DC commissioned the newcomer to pen a 4-part miniseries starring the legendary SHAZAM penciller’s co-creation, Bo “Bibbo” Bibbowski.

Bibbo had long been portrayed as Superman’s punch drunk, cranially challenged erstwhile pal. In professional wrestling vernacular, if Lois Lane was The Man of Steel’s Miss Elizabeth, then Bibbo was his Brutus Beefcake; a loyal, meaty, if less than mentally available compatriot. Brubaker set out to poise Bibbo as a classical noir protagonist, a tough and determined brute beset upon by dishonest dames, labrynthian plot dynamics, and painfully opaque exposition delivered through terse, double entendre laden dialogue. It was an exciting effort.

The story began with a lowly drug dealer on the run from Intergang enforcers seeking sanctuary in Bibbo’s bar, the Ace O’Clubs, which for whatever reason, was drawn to look exactly like Hell’s Kitchen dive bar Josie’s from DAREDEVIL. The dealer is killed by Livewire, moonlighting as a contract killer for Intergang, at the end of the first issue, leading Bibbo to solve the mystery of why the thug was on the run with the help of the girlfriend he left behind. Clever appearances from Bibbo’s scientist brother, Professor Bibbowski, Morgan Edge and mild mannered reporter Clark Kent were worked into the twisty tale’s house of wet playing cards narrative structure. Every chapter break was telegraphed by Bibbo being punched in the face before fading to black and a smirking “to be continued…” tag promised even more noir theatrics the following month.

After the third issue hit the stands and Frank Miller took serious (potentially litigius) offense to Ordway drawing Bibbo to look more and more like SIN CITY’s Marv, DC pulled the plug on the miniseries, choosing to conclude the dark tale in a Dan Jurgens written and drawn eight page back-up story in an Action Comics annual. Brubaker’s proposed grisly ending was written to feature Maxima and Knockout as a pair of lesbian femme fatales murdering members of Intergang after a double cross using only their hilariously thick thighs, where Jurgens’ new ending had the Guardian team up with an updated version of he Newsboy Legion to get to the bottom of the mystery using a simple combination of fisticuffs and journalistic integrity.

Needless to say, Brubaker found his tastes better suited to the darker adventures of the Caped Crusader and the rest was history.

Category: Salad Days

Salad Days: Warren Ellis

Salad Days: Brubaker on BIBBO