[Update] ALEX ROSS TALKS AVENGERS/INVADERS

[MattBrady]

UPDATED: Thought Saturday’s Alex Ross image of Captain America with the word “Return” on it was a swerve?

Pat yourself on the back.

Tuesday morning Marvel announced the project – a 2008 12-part maxi-series entitled Avengers/Invaders – is not bringing the modern-day Captain America back from the dead, but instead according to Marvel, it’s time travel story featuring the Invaders in their prime thrust into the current Marvel Universe, fully integrated into, and reflective of, current Marvel continuity.

The story will be co-plotted by Ross and Jim Krueger, penciled by Steve Sadowski (JSA), with design work and covers by Ross. The series will be packaged by Dynamite Entertainment.

We spoke with Ross in-depth about the project, now that he’s free to talk.

Newsarama: So – here we are, and things that came up on Saturday aren’t necessarily what they appeared to be. What’s the full title of this project?

Alex Ross: The full title will be Avengers/Invaders.

NRAMA: And “Return” is out of it?

AR: “Return” is not in the title, and yeah – it was a graphic that I came up with that went with that one illustration to teased the physical return of Captain America into Marvel continuity by showing his body silhouetted somewhat by the pillars of flame behind him, and the two other arms that accompanied him, and basically trying to get across an idea of how cool the design of the Invaders can be.

We already accept Captain America as somewhat cool, and the hope with this project is to make him somewhat cooler still. There are those of us who just believe so strongly in his design and in his dramatic impact – I’ve always approached him with the sense that you can make that guy seem as cool as any dark-clad superhero that’s out there.

So yeah – “the Return” is the return of the Captain America from his prime, from the 1940s when he was a young man, only a little over a year into being Captain America, and the nation’s hope.

NRAMA: And that’s prime Invaders time, right?

AR: Right - all the adventures of the Invaders are generally taking place around 1942.

NRAMA: So as you said, the hands are Namor and Bucky…

AR: Right – there are five members of the original Invaders who were originally the All-Winners Squad, but The Invaders is what we know them to be thanks to Roy Thomas.

NRAMA: Going back to the origin of the project then, since everything is a little more unveiled, this was something that Nick pitched to you as the Avengers meet the Invaders?

AR: Well, it was originally New Avengers/Invaders, but after the length of time that we’d been working on this, and the fact that in the meantime, Marvel had launched The Mighty Avengers and all the other iterations, like The Intuitive and whatnot, they’d strengthened the overall name of the Avengers, so you don’t need to necessarily tag it on to the “New” Avengers, especially since we’re going to be crossing over with both teams. You can just simply say “Avengers.”

But basically, yeah – his pitch to me, going back two or so years ago, was this.

NRAMA: So it’s kind of like “any and all Avengers?”

AR: Right. We’ll see any that are active right now. The emergence of The Invaders into our modern world will have an effect to draw in everybody’s interest, clearly, so you’re going to have the New Avengers and the Mighty Avengers wanting to know if that’s really Cap. Everybody’s going to want to either liberate or control him.

NRAMA: And that feeling of “what’s up with…” also applies to all the Invaders…

AR: Of course. You get multiple layers of course. Half of the Invaders that show up are dead.

NRAMA: What gets the ball rolling? Just the Invaders popping up?

AR: [laughs] That’s not exactly what we’re calling it, but yeah, the Invaders “popping” up in modern-day New York City.

NRAMA: And in-continuity, and will have repercussions?

AR: It will have repercussions, yeah.

NRAMA: So how did a project that started life two-plus years ago, when the death of Captain America wasn’t known to be coming, and certainly wasn’t something that was being shared with anyone outside of Marvel in its planning stages, get to fit into current continuity?

AR: The problem was that we couldn’t really do much until we knew that we were going to be allowed to let the Invaders cross over into today. We knew we would be able to do the time-crossing thing with guys going into the past, but because the past is set in a way, there’s not much that could be shaken up as much. Bringing these guys into the present – that’s the bigger deal, and that’s what we were holding out for. To be able to be able to do that – that was what we were waiting for – once you can do that, the story, frankly, writes itself.

As soon as they killed Cap, and we were in the middle of this, my thoughts went to if we could be able to do what we wanted to do, and then would be returning Captain America to a time period that he’s just recently passed in…there we go.

NRAMA: So you’ve got the Avengers whose interest is piqued when Cap and the Invaders show up – who else? Is this going to be a universe-spanning event?

AR: Think about who’s calling themselves an Avengers now – you’ve got Wolverine with his ties to the X-Men, you’ve got other potential parties who might look upon this as a situation to take advantage on, and you’ve got your other question of characters. We’re not going to end here with characters from the past too – we want to take a strong look at the material from the ‘40s and visit some of that, to try to apply a very attractive gloss skin to the former characters and universe of Marvel from the ‘40s.

NRAMA: That said, will you be doing much design work on this? Who’s going under your knife?

AR: That’s more presentation than anything else. No one’s getting redesigned under my watch in this project. My hope is that I get a chance to illustrate directly some of the characters from Marvel history that otherwise I’d never be able to touch. I have this weird bug where I want to illustrate almost anybody from the Golden Age of comics, so if I can find an excuse to do it creatively in these projects, I will make that happen. Just for the few sixty year old men who might be still reading comics, now they’ll be able to say, “Hey - I know that guy! How does that young whippersnapper know who he is?”

NRAMA: You’re the youngest sixty-year old in comics…

AR: Exactly.

NRAMA: Back to the team – this is Cap, Namor, Bucky, the Human Torch and Toro, right?

AR: Exactly – the classic five. It’s not like we won’t get a chance to show characters like Union Jack and Spitfire, but to the purists, those are inventions of the 1970s, realistically. Even the name “The Invaders” is an invention of the ‘70s.

But these guys actually did work together in the ‘40s, so that’s what we’re going to root ourselves in. I’m excited about bringing in this younger version of Namor to start pulling out the differences in his interpretation over the years – getting to something closer to the original Bill Everett Namor, and having that in contrast with his modern self should be quite cool.

NRAMA: Who’s angrier?

AR: The younger one.

NRAMA: Really?

AR: He’d be the impetuousness of youth. These are all guys that are coming out of fighting in the middle of World War II. Their ferocity in battle is something to consider. They don’t approach running into other, powerful, costume-clad characters as being something for a dust-up. In a more guttural interpretation of them, these men are warriors. They’ve been out there wiping out Nazis.

NRAMA: They fought through World War II, and survived, laregely without tanks or even guns, for the most part. I think that it was clearly shown how well that view of these characters had been glossed over or all-out forgotten when Ed Brubaker took some flack for showing Bucky killing soldiers as effectively and efficiently as a Navy SEAL in Captain America…

AR: Right – but even Bucky with the gun was on covers in the ‘40s all the time, along with Captain America. It wasn’t anything new – it was something that hadn’t been shown in a while, but it was nothing new.

I think the biggest alteration of Bucky that he did, and that we’ll be doing is making it clear that this guy is at least somewhere in the 17-18 year old range, rather than a 13 year old boy. Boy superheroes in that time period were more like that, which is true, but when we have to justify to ourselves why this guy would be anywhere near the military and be allowed to run around with Captain America – that’s where we have to make it clear that he’s a young man, but not a child, necessarily.

NRAMA: Moving over to Torch and Toro – how are you getting a handle on their personalities? Are you going back directly to the originals, with Torch being the quasi-hero/Frankenstein?

AR: Oh yeah – we’re playing upon the fact that you shouldn’t really approach that character without reconciling his origins, that he’s an artificial man. What does that mean? Other people have interpreted that to mean that he’s just a robot that you can just pull out gears and swap out innards. I’m one of the least supportive people of the idea that Steve Englehart had of him being recreated as the Vision. I hate that idea. Why couldn’t they bring back the original Vision?

The interesting thing to point out about Toro is that he is, effectively, by Marvel definition, the first, high-profile mutant in their universe. His power was immediately responsive to meeting the Human Torch and igniting, and he then had the same exact abilities as the Human Torch, who’s a completely different physical creature. He’s not a biological man, but Toro was a boy who could mimic those abilities exactly. What does that mean? We’ll get into some of that, and start exploring that territory while being true to the original storyline.

NRAMA: In bringing these characters up from the past – is there an almost reverential feel to them, that, while you may be able to put Iron Man through his paces in the story, the Invaders actions and words get…checked and double checked?

AR: There would have to be a reverential feel to some degree. I think you should always have that kind of sight for what you’re doing with these guys from their original publishing. The modern age of comics is a very brutal one, so when you interpret stuff that Ed did and the way that we’ll be suggesting, there’s a level of toughness that, once applied to possibly more idyllically viewed characters from a bygone age…that may be jarring for some. But when you consider what they were created for – they were created to fight World War II – it makes sense.

And what makes Marvel’s characters more intriguing than most, I would say that their stories – even just taking in their covers – they were always in battles with our enemies, directly. They were full-on propaganda of engaging the enemy – they weren’t asking readers to buy War Bonds or aiming a machinegun at an unseen opponent. They were in there doing the fighting.

There’s something very appealing about their stories – they were in Europe. They were on the front. They were dealing with the enemy directly. That’s something they symbolize to me – they are superheroes created by and for the war. Captain America’s very creation was on the eve of Pearl Harbor – so back then even, propaganda was already being created that was suggestive of the idea that we were going to be in the war soon and in Cap’s case, punching out Hitler.

NRAMA: When the Invaders do show up in the present day…you mentioned about them being warriors, and clearly, much of their aptitude as warriors comes form their ability to rapidly react to new surroundings and situations. Are we going to see that approach, that these guys are smart and savvy, not wondering how pictures can be in color at the talkies?

AR: You gotta imagine that it’s going to be slightly different here than it is for any singular character coming into the future from the past in that there’s a group of characters. There will definitely be some culture shock, and that will be an issue that I want to take to the level of them frankly, just not believing what’s going on. This world is one that they don’t even buy.

They would consider much of what happens to them in this story purely a continuation of the villains they were already caught up in fighting – this is clearly something that’s meant to confuse them. Accepting this world they’re in as the future that is to come might be a longer process.

NRAMA: Speaking of the villains that they were fighting – what’s the threat for the combined teams in the present day?

AR: I would suggest that the animosity that exists in the Marvel Universe currently, especially having two different sets of Avengers that would have different views of what needs to happen in society at large, and The Initiative going on, let along as to the idea that everyone you know could be a Skrull – it’s a very suspicious environment…

NRAMA: So…who needs villains?

AR: Not maybe that far, but the thing is, this is along the lines of a lot of storylines in my comics, especially Kingdom Come - what ultimately set off the trouble in that story is not an organized villain front, as much as it’s just superhumans screwing things up for each other.

The greatest conflicts write themselves without having to bring in the unknown quantity of the villain in the corner to come in and be the mover and shaker to really get everybody charged up against them. There will ber surprises to titillate and satisfy that need, though.

NRAMA: Given what you said there, it seems like there could be a temptation at least, to compare these Golden Age heroes to modern day? Almost the metatextual object lesson of, “No – look, this is what a hero is?” which DC kind of started off with in Infinite Crisis?

AR: Well, no, but in a way, I could see that people might thing that we’re bringing the original Invaders to the present to “put the Marvel Universe back on track” like another project… There might be some dramatic implications on that front, given that people can look at what that project meant and what it did with the idea, but that’s not why we’re doing this.

NRAMA: End of the day, what are you looking at people taking away from this? Crate an epic story to stand up with your other big projects?

AR: I spent way too many years trying to “educate the world” with what I saw as my important comic book opuses. Now I just want to create fun stuff…

And this, I think, falls under that classification.

[Godfather]

Penciled by Steve Sadowski!!

[Tusko]

Cap had one too many flaming burritos.

[Blackbeard]

Sign me up!

[Godfather]

So Steve on his forum at Comic Bloc said that he's only doing the 'first bit' (apparently an intro issue) and that another regular artist will be named later. Who's the artist?

Edit, Steve just posted on his forum that he's the regular artist. Woot

[whitemarkd]

Well, it could still be a way to bring Cap back - back from the past, that is.

[Thunarr]

Did wonder why the picture showed Namor and Bucky stood either side of Cap. Presumably, then, that's the Jim Hammond(?) Human Torch making all the flames.

Wonder when Marvel will actually bring Steve Rogers back, then?

T

[magik2381]

Hell. Yessssss.

[SWulf]

This will probably be the only Marvel title I will pickup.

[NightRiver]

dam, nice. One poster, forgot who, but they called it. A time travel story with the Invaders coming to the present.

[bigdaddyhub]

Originally Posted by whitemarkd

Well, it could still be a way to bring Cap back - back from the past, that is.

Good possibility there. We know that in Cap's book, the Skull is trying to build a time travel device, so this might be how we get Steve Rogers back without a resurrection and we also get the "Man out of Time" element in spades.

[Punchy]

I would be interested if not for Ross.

[Nobody]

Originally Posted by Godfather

So Steve on his forum at Comic Bloc said that he's only doing the 'first bit' (apparently an intro issue) and that another regular artist will be named later. Who's the artist?

I would have gotten this book if Sadowski was the only artist.

[bigdaddyhub]

Originally Posted by Punchy

I would be interested if not for Ross.

Pretty opposite of the reaction I expected. Why?

[XtremeX]

and at the end of the series... Cap stays.

yeah it messes up time, but its a comic, someone will find a way to make it work.

[Tusko]

This looks really good.
The generation gap stories and solid art always make for a good adventure filled with contrast and social commentary.
I'll check it out.

[Spy_Smasher]

Cool concept of past Cap finding out current Cap is dead (though how he forgets this little tidbit and being frozen, etc. is beyond me). Guess he gets mindwiped at the end. Having said that, it will suck, of course, with Ross and Krueger co-writing.

[samnoir]

Given all the Golden Age revivals lately, this one makes the most sense to me. Looking forward to Ross' take on the Invaders.
___________________________________

Fantastic Four Cycling Jersey for sale on EBAY! Quick-dry. No longer being produced!

FRANK CHO RARE SIGNED LTD ED. BOOK and MAGAZINE for sale on EBAY! SHANNA UNCENSORED ARTWORK! SKETCHES.
___________________________________

[KoozyK]

wow

just...

wow.

[Tom Daylight]

Psst! Don't tell Cap he's dead!

[Uchiha_Prodigy]

The pic reminds me of this commercial for some reason

[Tinmansstory]

Does anyone else find it ironic that everyone's previous suggestions of "hey, that would be neat, a man out of time. Cap could be brought back and find out he died only months ago here!" is the exact same story element for the recently returned Captain Marvel?

[mheath81]

So why didnt current Cap remember coming to the future with the invaders? Time travel always screws things up, imo.

[EyesBL7]

wait....WHICH Avengers? I cant wait for Tony explaining to Cap how he died.

[seethruhero]

Ross isn't doing the interior work?


Color me disappointed.

I'll still pick it up though. Anything Ross associates himself with, I'll buy.