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My first draft of Marvel Knights 'Black Panther' was not funny at all. They smartly rejected the entire script and counseled me to inject liberal doses of humor into very serious subject matter.
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I think, personally, nothing comes from violence other than more violence.
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I'm abrasive. I am so sure that I'm right about virtually everything. I can sing you an aria of reasons to not like me.
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Denys Cowan and Dwayne Turner's visions of Wakanda as an ersatz African Epcot Center opened my eyes to the unexploited possibilities; these men, both of whom are African American, together with writer Peter B. Gillis, created an African Asgard of sorts, and I just went, 'Oh, my.'
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The problem with most liberals - myself included - is we tend to think we're post-racial: that we've got a handle on things because we're not racists.
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I saw 'Get On Up' about a dozen times. I went every day. Every single day, I was standing outside when the movie theatre opened and bought my ticket. The theatre was usually empty. I live in a town that wasn't eager or very interested in a James Brown biopic, but I couldn't stop watching Boseman.
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There is no such thing as Christian art or secular art - writing, painting, drawing, whatever it is.
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I'm a little insane, and I'm going to be a little different. But hopefully, somewhere in there, in that creative arena, something will emerge that is new and different and unique.
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I think every writer is in search of the truth. We are trying to psychoanalyze ourselves.
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In 'Black Panther,' I tried to preserve virtually all versions and interpretations of 'Black Panther' - including the Jack Kirby one, which was really tough to do - and make it work within current continuity.
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I'm like an actor who obnoxiously says he doesn't watch his own TV show. It is extremely rare for me to read my own comics and have asked publishers to please stop sending them to me.
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Escapism has its place. I used to write 'Conan the Barbarian' for Marvel, which takes place in an environment completely removed from the real world.
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We - America - have to move past the ideology, the tribalism, that grips this country. As ridiculous as this sounds, I believe 'Black Panther,' the film, could help us do that if it addresses issues of tribal polarization and, by extension, racism, xenophobia, and homophobia in an entertaining, non-preachy way.
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When I was writing 'Black Panther,' on one level, I was angry because DC would never let me write 'Batman,' so I was doing Marvel's 'Batman,' and Reverend Achebe became sort of the Joker to Panther's Batman.
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At some point along the way, I stopped being a writer, and I became a black writer. I never used to be a black writer. I used to write 'Spider-Man,' 'Green Lantern,' whatever was lying around. 'Thor,' 'Hulk,' whatever. Now, if the phone rings or when the phone rings, it's almost exclusively some project that has something to do with my ethnicity.
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I'm really not used to people paying attention to my writing.
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When you're talking about villainy, then you're automatically circling around to talk about justice.
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I think most superhero stories have already been done a million times.
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Most people don't realize that when we were producing 'Black Panther,' 'Quantum & Woody,' and 'Steel,' fairly few people were reading those titles. We were constantly threatened with cancellation.
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Deathstroke is a villain. Don't come to the book with any expectations that he will, in any way or sense or form, act heroically. He's a bad guy, and that's the fun of it.
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'Deathstroke' became an interesting challenge - not just because of his ethnicity, but because he's a villain. I've never written a villain as a protagonist of a series before. I thought this could be an interesting challenge. That's really what got my attention, and it just went from there.
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Literally everything that could be done with the 'Justice League' has been done with the 'Justice League.'
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With all due respect to the other writers, I don't want to disparage any other writers; I don't want to have to invent a bigger villain than Deathstroke so Deathstroke can seem heroic fighting this bigger villain. I'd rather just have Deathstroke be who is, and he's kind of a bastard.
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What makes a good villain is someone who doesn't just challenge the hero but comes organically out of that character's history and circumstances.