Earlier this Fall, DC Comics launched a massive overhaul, with all books reverting to #1, and while it’s been interesting to say the least, it’s also been surprising. Case in point: ANIMAL MAN, reborn as a psychedelic horror tale to behold. FANGORIA spoke with author Jeff Lemire (SWEET TOOTH) about the ANIMAL MAN relaunch during DC Comics’ THE NEW 52, depicting the gory imagery with artist Travel Foreman, and his upcoming action/horror comic, FRANKENSTEIN: AGENT OF S.H.A.D.E. 

FANGORIA: How did you get on board?

JEFF LEMIRE: I had written a couple of books for DC Comics at that point. DC kind of approached me, telling me they were going to be re-launching their entire line, starting everything over with first issues. The first couple of different projects they thought I might want to do. I wasn’t excited about either of them very much. I kind of pitched FRANKENSTEIN: AGENT OF S.H.A.D.E to them, and they liked that one. I asked if we could do something else and they suggested ANIMAL MAN, finally. I’m a big fan of the old ANIMAL MAN series from Vertigo, back in the 90s. I really liked the character, and I thought there was a lot of interesting stuff for me to do with it. I was really excited about it and pretty much accepted the job right away.

FANG: ANIMAL MAN was created by Dave Wood in the 1960s. In the late 1980s, he was revamped for a mature audience. How will this reinvention, during DC Comics’ THE NEW 52, be different?

LEMIRE: For me, I really liked what they did in the 90s, especially the Grant Morrison stuff. It was a lot more about him and the relationship with his family. I thought that was pretty cool. I pick up where he left off, as far in the New 52. I wanted to bring a more horror sensibility to the book. I wanted to balance the lighter more emotional stuff of the family, offset with the horrific things going on around them. I wanted to challenge them, see if they can stay together or be torn apart. For a superhero book and in the regular DC Universe, it’s really more of a horror book and a really dark take on it.

FANG: As you said, ANIMAL MAN can be seen as a dark superhero tale and a family drama. Tell me about your interests with the horror genre. 

LEMIRE: To be honest, I’ve never been much of a horror fan, or I’ve never been personally interested in those films, or anything like that. So it’s strange that I’m doing this horror book! For me, the horror aspects come out of the character’s nature, how he’s connected to all living creatures. I obviously needed some kind of conflict, some kind of villain for him to go up against. That’s when the more horror aspects, these monsters and things, emerged. The book wasn’t the product of me being a big horror fan and wanting to do that. It was more just the direction of the book. I find doing the really dark stuff, within the horror aspects, a really good balance with the family stuff.

FANG: In issue #1, Animal Man has this hallucinatory nightmare towards the climax. Tell me about “The Red.”

LEMIRE: The Red is an interesting thing. Back in the old SWAMP THING comics, created by Alan Moore, he introduced the Green, this underlying elemental force that connected all vegetation stuff. In the 90s Vertigo, the ANIMAL MAN series, they sort of connected Animal Man to that, and gave him his own version called the Red, a life force that connects to all living tissue and living animals. They introduced that kind of stuff in the 90s, but never explored it very much. So, I felt that was really rich territory to pick up on and develop. Over the course of the first arc, it really establishes The Red as an actual place that Buddy Baker, the Animal Man character, can tap into and visit. There’s a deeper mystery to who he is and what he’s meant to do. There’s a darker aspect to the Red, the decay and rot, that he’s fighting against. The Red is a new underlying elemental force in the DC Universe, that Swamp Thing and Animal Man are going to be exploring together.

FANG: The first issue is filled with intense imagery, from blood drooling eyes to the monsters in Animal Man’s nightmares. Tell me about your collaboration with artist Travel Foreman. 

LEMIRE: It’s really interesting because I never had that kind of experience, where a sort a simple idea in the script and he’ll do the art; it’ll be so rich and fantastic, and so weird with imagery and symbolism. He actually kind of enhances my original idea and sometimes even changes it. Sometimes I’ll have to go back and readjust my plans based on the art. It’s a really cool collaboration. That imagery, the blood, the themes, that was all from his original sketches. Somehow that needed to be incorporated into the story, so I started writing plot points around them, to make sure to get those images into the book. For me, that’s what you want. You want an artist who really pushes you and forces you to adapt, and make the story better.

FANG: What can readers expect from further issues of ANIMAL MAN?

LEMIRE: I don’t want to give anything away too much too soon. Like I said, the first arc is going to introduce the Red and the actual place. You’re going to see it. We’re going to get to see the creatures who inhabit it, which will be pretty interesting to people. The Hunter’s Dream are sort of monstrous anti-versions of life or anti-versions of animals, who are hunting Animal Man and his family. 

In the second arc, I’m going to do something called, “Animal Versus Man.” I don’t want to give too much away. Every animal on the planet turns against Animal Man and attack him.

Beyond that, I have a big crossover with Swamp Thing. That should be exciting!

FANG: You are also working on FRANKENSTEIN: AGENT OF S.H.A.D.E. Frankenstein is protecting the world from monsters worse than him. Yet he is also vilified by the way he looks. Tell me about the themes of this narrative.  

LEMIRE: To me, the Frankenstein character is a really fun book to draw. I love taking these classic horror archetypes from the Universal Monsters: Frankenstein, Dracula, The Mummy, and modernizing them in ridiculous over-the-top science fiction adventures. That’s the core of the book but at the same time, I really wanted to explain the origin of the Frankenstein character as well. I wanted to see how he got from the monster in Mary Shelly’s book to this version, this modern superhero in this DC universe. I wanted to show the hidden century between the two. Like you said, humanity is terrified of him. His only purpose in life really is to protect humanity. I want to see how that happened and explore as the book goes on.

FANG: Tell me about how you and artist Alberto Ponticelli envisioned Frankenstein as an action hero, alongside with the Creature Commandos.

LEMIRE: A lot of that stuff came from a version of the Frankenstein character from Grant Morrison’s miniseries called THE SEVEN SOLDIERS. He created this version of Frankenstein as a super soldier, almost like a James Bond type of character. He created black-op missions and stuff. It was just a matter of taking what he had done and then continuing, expanding on it. One of the classic horror comics I loved as a kid was WEIRD WAR TALES. In one of the features I liked, the Creature Commandos were the classic Universal Monsters as soldiers of World War II. It was a really fun storyline. So I thought it would be great to make those characters as Frankenstein’s field team and make them a bit more modern. Ponticelli loves drawing monsters and action. You put my ideas with his art, it’s a lot of energy and an over-the-top book.

FANG: What are you working on now?

LEMIRE: Those two books are an ongoing thing. They take up a lot of my time. For Vertigo, I write and draw SWEET TOOTH, which is sort of an action/adventure, apocalypse horror story. It’s about half human/half animal hybrid children on the run, after a plague has wiped out humanity. They’re trying to figure out the secret of their origins. That’s ongoing as well and I draw too. Between those two projects, it’s a pretty much a full schedule for me.

FANG: How can readers find out more about your work?

LEMIRE: They can probably check out my twitter feed, @JeffLemire or my blog. I try to keep people updated on the new stuff coming up.

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