LAYLA WHO? BENDIS & BREVOORT TALK LAYLYA MILLER

[MattBrady]

Say hello to the character Marvel promises will soon be, “…the most important person in the Marvel Universe”…

No, no … not him ….The one of the left.

She may be small and doesn’t look all that tough, but Marvel’s summer steamroller House of M introduces Marvel readers to Layla Miller, who according to the solicitation for July’s HoM #4, is “the newest of new mutants” and who has the fate of the entire world resting on her shoulders.

Those are pretty big words, so Newsarama thought you might like an early introduction.

Who is she exactly and why is she getting this kind of advanced billing? We went to HoM writer and editor, respectively, Brian Bendis and Tom Brevoort for some answers. And though understandably tight-lipped this early on, here’s what they had to say in a brief Q&A…

Newsarama: Gentlemen, first off, can you expand on the solicitation copy at all? Who is Layla Miller?

Tom Brevoort: She's a brand new character who'll be appearing for the first time in House of M, and then will go onto other things once that series is done.

NRAMA: What can you readers about the creation of this character?

TB: Brian made her up.

Brian Bendis: I’ve said publicly that last year, unintentionally, was a year of a lot of killing for me … just kind of went that way …and that this year would, intentionally, be a year of a lot of creation. Expect new characters in almost everything I do. New villains in New Avengers and Ultimate Spider-Man. New heroes like the new White Tiger in Daredevil and whoever Layla Miller is.

NRAMA: Saying she is going to become the “most important person in the Marvel Universe” is a pretty bold statement in a universe that has a Spider-Man, Hulk, etc… Is this just solicitation hyperbole or are you already preparing to back this up?

TB: She's the most important character in the Marvel Universe as far as House of M is concerned.

BMB: Which is the entire Marvel Universe [smiles].

NRAMA: The solicitation also implies this is the “first” of many appearances for her, which is often music to collector’s ears. Is Layla a character that may be appearing in her own series in the future, or play an important role in the core X-titles being she’s a mutant?

TB: Yes, she'll definitely be appearing post-M - but just where, we can't reveal just yet.

BMB: Exactly. Sorry…

NRAMA: Okay then, on the macro side Layla would be the latest over the last few fears of new, young, female characters – including (but not even limited to) X-23, Arana, the aforementioned White Tiger, and the new Scorpion. Brian Vaughan’s Runaways are predominantly teen females at the moment. Spider-Girl is getting a big summer Marvel Universe crossover limited series. And there have been projects like Sean McKeever’s Mary Jane limited series for example.

It seems like Marvel has passed its own self-imposed version of Title IX. Why are young women being given such a spotlight in the contemporary Marvel Universe? Is it just coincidence? Or the obvious answer - to attract that readership and appeal to the manga audience? Or something else entirely?

TB: A little from column A, a little from column B. There hasn't been any specific mandate to suddenly produce a whole slew of young female characters. That said, it's a demographic that the Marvel Universe and the Marvel publishing line could use more of, so it's completely natural that people would begin to develop characters in this direction when the opportunity arises.

BMB: I noticed this too, I see it as a lot of creative people seeing a glaring hole and everyone rising to the challenge to fill it. I heard no mandate. I just looked around and felt something was needed and it looks like other people did too.

Speaking of House of M, while all parties remained pretty tight-lipped about the specific premise behind the storyline, Bendis added a little flavor to online speculation at a new interview with Westfield Comics Roger Ash.

“When we open up on House of M, here's Wanda constantly playing with reality like a band-aid, just trying to make herself happy in her own little room and Xavier trying to stop her from doing it because the consequences of her actions are too much for the world to take,” Bendis tells Ash. “Every time he does, it just reminds her of what she's done to the Avengers. She has moments of clarity. It's just getting worse and worse. You can see that holding her down mentally is taking every bit of energy Xavier has. It's more than he can handle.

Later, Bendis and Ask talk about the related limited series and ongoing series tie-ins to the event, again addressing a point that seems to be at the heart of speculation about the story.

”You can read them separately, or you can read them together, of course you'll need to have read House of M but what will shock people is that it's not an alternative universe,” said Bendis. “This is actually really happening to the Marvel Universe.

“See how cryptic yet interesting I'm being? [laughs] I want people to open it up. By the end of issue 2, people are going to be like ‘Oh my God’. The end of issue 3, I guarantee you, is my best last page of a comic ever. I guarantee you. Everyone who's read it has called me up and said, ‘Get out of here!’ I think by the end of issue 3, we'll crack the Internet right in half. I think that'll be it for the Internet.”

[Mr Wesley]

Originally posted by MattBrady
I want people to open it up. By the end of issue 2, people are going to be like ‘Oh my God’. The end of issue 3, I guarantee you, is my best last page of a comic ever. I guarantee you. Everyone who's read it has called me up and said, ‘Get out of here!’ I think by the end of issue 3, we'll crack the Internet right in half. I think that'll be it for the Internet.”

Sue Dibny shows up.

By the way... FIRST POST!

[DocBrass]

I'm going to have to by about 100 of these for future speculation.
and then I'll need the variant covers
and then I'll have to get the Collector's Edition

and then I'll have to sale them for 1/2 price in 2 years when everybody goes...."Layla Who?"

[BurgundyTears]

Well, the whole 'We'll crack the Internet in half' quote sounds good. If nothing else it would give me more free time.

[Jayzgame]

"Crack the internet open?"

Hmm, I may have to wear a hard hat on that day. Seriously, I can't wait until House of M starts up. Its gonna be awesome. Now if I could just find a summer job to help me pay for all of this . . .

[Rawle Austin]

This has definitely got me intrigued. Looking forward to seeing this pan out.

Bendis has a great track record with new characters including Jessica Jones so this should be no different.

Bring it on!

Growler

[Comic-Reader]

She's the most important person in the Marvel Universe because she'll be the one that undoes the entire warped-reality thing that the Scarlet Witch does and sets everything back to normal.

Hopefully, I'll be wrong about that because I'd like to see real, lasting changes in the Marvel Universe. But the caveat is, the changes have to not suck.

Making Peter a clone was a change and killing Tony Stark and replacing him with a teenager was a change, but...

Anyway, according to the recent Comics Buyer's Guide, speculation is that Wanda's reality-altering powers might have permanent changes that go back in time -- undoing Spider-Man's marriage to Mary Jane, for example.

[Kolimar]

Perhaps Layla is Wanda's latest attempt at having a child: the new reality-warping Scarlet Witch!!

[EJOrtiz1]

Maybe someone can explain to me the purpose of this news item on Newsarama. I still haven't learned anything new about the House of M or Layla Miller that I've read previously here.

Crack the internet in half...lol...what a bunch of hype....

Just my two cents.

[mdhprime]

Man...now the waiting is going to be even worse! I am really looking forward to this series, but I wonder how the tie-ins will work. Will they be loosely related like the Disassembled tie-ins or will they be more directly related? Either way it sounds like a lot of good reading!

[xdemon]

I am looking forward to House of M.

But seeing the name "Layla" makes me think of Eric Clapton unplugged.

[Kolimar]

Originally posted by Comic-Reader
She's the most important person in the Marvel Universe because she'll be the one that undoes the entire warped-reality thing that the Scarlet Witch does and sets everything back to normal.

Yeah.

Originally posted by Comic-Reader
Anyway, according to the recent Comics Buyer's Guide, speculation is that Wanda's reality-altering powers might have permanent changes that go back in time -- undoing Spider-Man's marriage to Mary Jane, for example.

That's a good one. Ben Reilly could come back for good. YES!

Y'know, this reminds me of the way Byrne explained Wanda's powers in AWC at the time she was being manipulated by Immortus: basically, the things she altered were shown to have been that way since the beginning, making the change retroactive. At the time, that was due to the power boost Immortus gave her. After Byrne left, she returned to "normal" levels.

[bishop-m]

I usually am not a fan of the big, massive, large "comic event" but I am looking forward to this....interested in seeing who Layla turns out to be...

[Punchy]

I have no idea what this Layla person is going to do, but i don't care, i'm looking forward to an awesome story, I love alternate reality and this will be even more exciting, as it will actually have an effect on the MU, i hope they kill some of the s**t mutants and sort out the marvel heroes line.

[KID FANTASTIC]

The tie-ins will have to do with the story and it looks like that this will be a mix of AOA and the Crisis.Oh yeah, split up Peter and Mary Jane, put Pete back in college, bring back Harry Osborn, and undo Sins Past. Oh and kill as many X-Men as you can.

[bob_at_york]

This is interesting...

Have there been any characters in the Marvel U with the last name "Miller"? I can't think of any.

[Mark Cardwell]

All these new young female characters, hmm, nothing to do with the fact that the fastest growing demographic for new comic book readers being the young female buyers of manga? Nah, didn't think so.

Meanwhile, Marvel zombies - check out my eBay sales. Hot damn, that's a lot of out of print classics!

[AdamYJ]

Originally posted by KID FANTASTIC
The tie-ins will have to do with the story and it looks like that this will be a mix of AOA and the Crisis.Oh yeah, split up Peter and Mary Jane, put Pete back in college, bring back Harry Osborn, and undo Sins Past. Oh and kill as many X-Men as you can.

God, I hope not.

The more I hear about what House of M is supposed to do, the more nervous I get.

The problem is that many of the things that people want undone are things that other people like. For example, I like Peter and Mary Jane together. I also bet that a lot of the X-Men characters that other people want gone are ones that I like.

[Vyper]

As someone pointed out, Bendis has a good track record with new characters - fingers crossed

[render man]

I love Bendis work, but didnt he say the same things about his Avengers dissassembled work? About it being the biggest and it will blow people away, yada yada yada...
He is the king of hype. And yes I will pass on this.

[samnoir]

Where are the Geldof jokes?

I do hope Bendis does take another stab at developing Geldof. He seems like he would be a good "spoiler" character somewhere in the Marvel U. Particularly given the fact that he's not evil, just a regular teenager.

I was actually thinking that Smallville's version of Mxyzptlk (sp?) owes quite a bit to Geldof from the pages of Ultimate Spiderman.

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[sidewinder]

Originally posted by Kolimar


Y'know, this reminds me of the way Byrne explained Wanda's powers in AWC at the time she was being manipulated by Immortus: basically, the things she altered were shown to have been that way since the beginning, making the change retroactive. At the time, that was due to the power boost Immortus gave her. After Byrne left, she returned to "normal" levels.

I think if Bendis was smart, he would tie-in moments like this and when Chuck Austen had her doing weird shit, and say that was prior "glimpses" of her reality-warping powers coming through. Like she never really realized her full potential until now. Cuz different writers always had Wanda doing different things. Her powers never really seemed all that defined to me. This could all be explained by her crazy reality warping powers she's got now. And supposedly always had.

[bob_at_york]

Originally posted by AdamYJ
God, I hope not.

The more I hear about what House of M is supposed to do, the more nervous I get.

The problem is that many of the things that people want undone are things that other people like. For example, I like Peter and Mary Jane together. I also bet that a lot of the X-Men characters that other people want gone are ones that I like.

You and me both. We are in the same boat.

[Cyphon]

Originally posted by MattBrady
[b]Say hello to the character Marvel promises will soon be, “…the most important person in the Marvel Universe”…

No, no … not him ….The one of the left.

Okay, that was PANTS PEEINGLY FUNNY!!!!!!

And a good article to boot. I'm looking forward to seeing how House of M plays out.

[Mr Wesley]

Originally posted by Mark Cardwell
All these new young female characters, hmm, nothing to do with the fact that the fastest growing demographic for new comic book readers being the young female buyers of manga? Nah, didn't think so.

So? Brev00rt even admitted as much here:

Originally posted by Tom Brevoort
There hasn't been any specific mandate to suddenly produce a whole slew of young female characters. That said, it's a demographic that the Marvel Universe and the Marvel publishing line could use more of, so it's completely natural that people would begin to develop characters in this direction when the opportunity arises.

It's about DANG time they started bringing in more teen heroines. And at least this one (hopefully) doesn't have a connection/template based from another previous character.