Practically anyone who pays
attention to goings-on in pop culture will know that Joss
Whedon is a busily employed film and television writer and
the creator of Buffy the Vampire Slayer -- both the
under-loved film version and the hit TV show that no-one can
get enough of. Now, Whedon may well be the only comic-book
creator who has been nominated for an Oscar.
In June, Dark Horse Comics will
premiere Whedon's first-ever comic-book project -- an
eight-issue miniseries that has little to do with his Buffy
work, except that the story stars a young, tough female and
her world is a continuation of the mythos Whedon created for
Buffy. Fray is replete with demons,
supernatural weirdness, vampires, and, yes, vampire Slayers.
This time around -- make that a few hundred years from the
world of Buffy as we know it -- a streetwise thug of
a girl living a difficult but satisfying life in a hard
future inherits the mantel of Slayer centuries after the
last vampires were believed to walk the planet. When the
forces of darkness come calling in the world where Melaka
Fray lives, this street urchin will be transformed from a
blemish on the world's skin to being society's only
savior.
Given Whedon's outstanding
reputation and his undeniable skills at telling a story,
it's no wonder people are looking forward to the first issue
of Fray. Karl Moline's art is the other element of
the project people will soon be cooing over. Moline's
pencils are strong, dynamic, fluid, and full of the
life-giving energy that makes Whedon's fantastic comic-book
characters every bit as strong and obsess-able as the ones
he's created for television.
The following interview with
Whedon is a bit longer than many we've run on the Dark Horse
website, but in talking with Whedon, our reporter had a lot
of territory to cover. Buffy fans will delight,
entertainment enthusiasts will be enthralled, and comics
fans will be pleased to meet the newest newsworthy writer to
join the ranks of fantastic writers working in the
comic-book industry today.
Reading this, you'll realize
that Whedon literally oozes friendly, and he's got a bit of
a loony personality. We couldn't think of any way to
accurately express the number of different voices he assumed
while talking -- the high-pitched sissy voice; the deep,
"important Hollywood" voices; the malevolent superfoe
persona...Whedon is like a personality hydra, but it all
works to illustrate how many ideas must be racing through
his head at any given moment. It's also a neat indication of
how he is so readily able to write realistic depictions of
so many different characters. You'll probably be able to
determine where the funny voices come in while you're
reading this, so have fun getting to know the many people --
including his newest young heroine, Melaka Fray -- who live
in Joss Whedon's head.
Shawna
Ervin-Gore: Joss,
before we get started talking about your comic-book writing
career, please explain how you got into writing for
television.
Joss
Whedon:
My father worked in TV, so I thought if I wrote a couple of
TV specs, I could make a little money. I ended up getting a
job on Roseanne as my first.
SE-G:
You're a young guy, so how old were you then?
JW:
I was 24 when I got my first staff job.
SE-G:
Did you go to film school or take film studies?
JW:
I studied film as an undergraduate, but I didn't study
writing, actually. We never studied writing, we just studied
film. And the two are incredibly connected, of course, but I
didn't, like, take writing courses or anything like
that.
SE-G:
What about English classes -- you weren't an English
major?
JW:
No, actually, I took a great deal of English, but not
writing, not creative writing. I never wrote for a class. I
only wrote for my own fun. But I had great film teachers,
and they helped me understand more than just
filmmaking.
SE-G:
That reminds me -- we were talking earlier and you mentioned
a woman that you are still in touch with, and she has some
really cool job where she occasionally gets access to a
theater she can use privately.
JW:
That's Jeanine Basinger. She gets access to all these old
movies -- the great lost silent films.
SE-G:
Is this in Los Angeles?
JW:
No, New York. I actually go with my wife to New York, if I
can, once a year. We meet up with Janine, so we can watch
those damned films. It's good. It's a very good thing to
do.
SE-G:
Sounds like it. Okay, let's outline the evolution of your
career so far: you're now a big-time comics writer, but you
started writing for Hollywood...
JW:
I like the way you tell it!
SE-G:
I make it sound good, don't I? (laughs) Writing for TV,
writing for movies -- this is all pretty nice, but it seems
your career underwent some sort of event when you created
Buffy the Vampire Slayer, when that first movie
hit.
JW:
Yeah, I think so.
SE-G:
So it was 1991 when the movie came out. Once that came out
and subsequently sort of died out, did Buffy feel like "the
one that got away?"
JW:
Yeah, but, you know -- I didn't know at the time that it
would all get away from me. But it did. That character had
been brewing in me for many years. I finally sat down and
had written it and somebody had made it into a movie, and I
felt like -- well, that's not quite her. It's a start, but
it's not quite the girl. I even drew her at one point, long
before I ever finished writing it. Somewhere I probably
still have that. My original idea was a lot less silly. It
had funny, but it was a much more serious action horror
movie with the funny. Actually it was pretty gross, too. It
wasn't just straight on comedy, but that's how the film came
off.
SE-G:
So then, the movie sort of went away...
JW:
It went away.
SE-G:
...And you went on to other things. You know, I can't
imagine maintaining that resolve for so long -- to say "I
made up this great thing and some other people took it and
made it into something I didn't want it to be. Now I want to
go back and fix it...bring her back."
JW:
Well, I never intended to. Gail Berman, who is now running
the Fox Network, was an executive at Sand Dollar, who had
produced the movie and sort of had a share in the rights to
the movie. Since before the movie came out, Gail had been
saying, "This is a series. This is a series." And everybody
said "Ha Ha Ha. You are a fool!" And then about four years
after the movie came out, she got some people interested in
developing it. Somebody eventually said, "you are not a
fool!" Then, when they came to me, they had been offered to
do it like a Power-Ranger type show. It was supposed to be
half-hour, you know, afternoon show.
SE-G:
Sorta chop-socky daytime action?
JW:
Yeah. Like that. I thought it would be really fun to do one
that was sort of tongue-in-cheek and deconstructed itself.
So I sort of got into that idea. And as I developed it more,
it turned into a rather serious drama, and I realized, "I
don't want to make fun. I want this to be real."
SE-G:
And those guys were OK with that?
JW:
Yeah, there was some struggle about whether we could pitch
it as an hour drama, but we went to the WB and they were
like "Yes, please." That was sort of like somebody came
along and kissed Sleeping Beauty Joss and said, "You can
have your dream back now."
The classic
thing is that I wanted it dark. I mean, Luke Perry even
wanted it dark. When we first met, we had the same idea --
"This is so cool! This is going to be so cool!" We were both
in it with the same idea in mind, I think, and as it became
clear what kind of movie was being made, we were both going
"Oh, man! This isn't Near Dark enough at all."
But, my wife,
at the premiere, was sort of like "Well, you know honey,
maybe in a few years, you could make it again, the way you
wanted to." (laughs) I went ," Oh, ha ha, honey, that
doesn't happen in Hollywood! You're so naive!" Well...it
really doesn't.
SE-G:
I think that's why that's probably why a million
interviewers have asked you the same question. What happens
with that? One-hit-wonder movies --
JW:
No-hit-wonders would be more like it.
SE-G:
Yeah. Forgettable movies or movies that people would
consider to be forgettable don't typically resurface and
become the big, cult thing. So that's pretty
incredible
JW:
It's fun.
SE-G:
Now there's another thing. You're not really Mr. Comics yet,
but you are writing comics now. You are not giving up
Hollywood for the glamorous world of comics are
you?
JW:
It would be fun, but no, I am still just dipping my toe in
the pool. I am quite afraid that I am going to drown. It's a
lot of work.
SE-G:
Do you feel yourself enjoying greater freedom in Hollywood
now that you are sort of established?
JW:
Well, I just do my shows. And when I work on movies, I still
get pissed basically the same way I always do when things
don't turn out right. So, in terms of movies, no, I don't
feel like I have a lot of freedom. In terms of the shows,
yeah, I think I do.
I think I've
always been given, well -- they let me do whatever the hell
I wanted. With some caveats, I've been able to do what I
want. It's just been like this for five years. I've just
been doing this thing where we can be insanely creative and
kind of off-the-wall, and they just let us. They're cool
with it.
SE-G:
Are you just sort of digging into the whole Buffy and Angel
worlds right now, or are you setting your sights
elsewhere?
JW:
I'm starting to think about making a movie and making a
movie myself this time.
SE-G:
A Buffy movie?
JW:
That's not what I'm thinking about. Although that
possibility is attractive. I think. I'd love to put my kids
up on the screen.
SE-G:
I would assume that you get a lot of requests to do Buffy
again with your current cast.
JW:
Yeah.
And I love this cast. It would be fun. But, you know, while
we are doing the show, I am not going to do the show in a
mediocre way or put it on hiatus to fit a feature in there.
If I make a movie with Buffy, I want it to be as good as it
can be. And meanwhile, I want the show to be everything it
can be. So the Buffy movie I am making is the one you see
every week.
SE-G:
Buffy is now also a comic-book series. It has been for
almost two years now. Why did you want Buffy to become a
comic?
JW:
I always wanted the character to be an icon. I wanted her to
be a hero that existed in people's minds the way Wonder
Woman or Spider-Man does, you know? I wanted her to be a
doll or an action figure. I wanted Barbie with Kung Fu grip!
I wanted her to enter the mass consciousness and the
imaginations of growing kids because I think she's a cool
character, and that was always the plan. I wanted Buffy to
be a cultural phenomenon, period.
SE-G:
That's interesting to me, because I work in the comic-book
industry, and most of the time it doesn't seem like many
people in our society would associate that sort of
recognition and importance with comics.
JW:
Well, look at how many people want to make movies of comic
books right now. And what a groundswell of people who are
coming out and saying, "Yeah, I used to read that
stuff."
SE-G:
That's true. X-Men was big last year. I know you're
historically a big X-Men fan, so what was that like for
you?
JW:
Well, I've got a tortured history with that movie. I had
written an entire draft of it that was thrown
out.
SE-G:
Yeah -- you couldn't exactly kick back and enjoy it after
looking at it that closely.
JW:
There were things that I liked and things that I didn't, and
I thought it looked better than comic-book movies usually
do. But ultimately I didn't like it. I mean, what the hell
is that thing on Magneto's head??
It was like
when Tom Cruise does that little "Afternoon of a Faun" dance
move in MI:2. That's the moment you think to yourself, "Oh,
I see. I'm not laughing with this."
You know, I
wanted the world to see X-Men. I'm this way every time.
Every time a movie like this comes up, I see it with my
heart full of hope, and I've never seen one like this I
could stand.
SE-G:
Would you ever want the chance to make another comic-book
movie?
JW:
I think I would. Not right now, though. I talked briefly to
some people at Marvel about some of their stuff, but I won't
do it now. I really wanted Ironman.
SE-G:
He's a cool character.
JW:
I love Ironman. It would be a great story to tell, because
it's a story about weakness -- and strength, after that. It
would be fascinating. But my forays into the film world have
been pretty dismal. They've always served to remind me that
should that happen -- me making a comic-book movie -- not
only will I have an entire studio telling me what to do, but
I will have an entire comic-book company telling me what to
do...none of who are actually filmmakers.
If I am
established at some point, I'd love to do it. It would be
cool to make a Batman movie, or a James Bond movie, or a
DareDevil or a Thing.
SE-G:
I think you've mentioned liking Jack Kirby -- how about a
Silver Surfer movie?
JW:
(laughs) You know, he's riding that big, God-damned
surfboard, and I think he'd look stupid.
SE-G:
(laughs) Some things don't transfer from the medium as
well.
JW:
(laughs) He looks good when John Buscema draws him, but I
don't want to see Mark Wahlberg with his head shaved on a
big, stupid surfboard, flying through the cosmos. I just
think it would be a mistake!
What I would
like to do is make a movie of a comic book that doesn't
really exist, though. It would be a genre movie, like Buffy
-- action/adventure with a female hero that plays the same
template of a comic movie but without having it based on
someone else's work.
CLICK
HERE for Part Two of
the interview with Joss Whedon
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