Jimmy Palmiotti has more comic book credits
under his belt than can be sensibly listed in a sidebar biography.
He's done lots. Trust us. We don't lie. Much.
Notable amongst the above mentioned credits
are: Co-creator of 21Down, The Resistance,
Gatecrasher, Ash, and Painkiller Jane. Editor
and founder of Marvel Knights, working on Daredevil,
Black Panther, Punisher, Killraven, and
The Inhumans. Writer/co-writer on Beautiful Killer
and Superboy.
Jimmy is also one of the comic industry's
most popular ink artists, having put his pen to Superman, Batman, Catwoman, Midnight Mass, Codename ; Knockout, Sci -Spy, Punisher, Nick Fury, Brotherhood, and many, many more.
Justin Gray has been extremely lucky in
that he has managed to slide his way into a number of exciting
and interesting situations for which he was distressingly under
qualified. He traveled to the mountains of the Dominican Republic
and mined amber with the local people, spending his nights partying
on the balconies of Santa Domingo. Along with eccentric inventor
Roy Larimer, Justin has delivered previously undiscovered species
of insects to the curator of entomology at American Museum of
Natural Histrory.
Currently Justin is co-creator and co-writer
of 21Down and The Resistance, with Jimmy Palmiotti,
as well as being co-writer of Chastity Re-imagined from
Chaos! Comics.
His upcoming projects include a piece of
sequential fiction for the official Matrix
Movie Website with artist JG Jones.
I used to work for Victims Assistance Services of Westchester, which means I was in direct contact with victims of crime in an effort to help them deal with the financial and psychological damages that resulted from crimes inflicted upon them. Part of the attraction to this job was that it would offer me enough time to write while taking care of those nagging bills that keep popping up in my mailbox. The other attraction was perhaps fueled by the same thing that drove me to superhero comics when I was a kid. I have a justice complex, which is ironic considering what my parents decided to name me. I signed on with VAS with little or no real understanding of what I was going to see. As a writer the experiences were invaluable. As a human I learned the value of a paper bag to throw up in, small packets of tissues and a healthy dose of anger management. I almost developed some compassion...almost.
Earlier this year a two-year-old girl, while sitting on her parents bed, cuddling with her mom and watching a Winnie the Pooh cartoon, was struck by a stray bullet and killed. In her own home, in her mother’s arms she died. Several blocks away two young men were using a street sign for target practice, the jacketed bullet traveled a great distance, bounced off several buildings before crashing through the wall of the little girls home.
A month later a car was stolen in the area where I worked. The car thief sped off but not before striking another vehicle with someone in it. The owner of the second vehicle and his friends took off in a chase to catch the thief. At the same time a 16-year-old boy woke up from a nap and headed out to buy something from the local convenience mart. The car thief, in an attempt to fool his pursuers, dumped the car and took off on foot at which point he passed the boy on his way to the store. The men chasing the thief made a serious mistake, they thought the boy stole the car. The men grabbed the boy, beat him and cut his throat with a box cutter. When the police arrived on scene they arrested the attackers AND the wounded boy-charging him with grand theft auto.
After 20 hours of surgery to save the boys life, the police had enough time to realize the boy was innocent and they dropped the charges, but not before the local paper ran the boy’s story on the front cover. The paper refused to publish an apology.
These last few weeks I have been following the case of 12-year-old Ashley Pond and her friend, 13-year-old Miranda Gaddis who disappeared earlier this year. Ward Weaver is being held in jail for the attempted rape of his own son’s girlfriend. Ward Weavers father is in prison for murder. They found these poor girls bodies on his property. I’m not going to go into further detail about the case, but faced with overwhelming evidence if proven guilty, I will say that Weaver should not live to see the sunrise. No appeals, no further incarceration, no lethal injection- he should shot over a pit of lye like a rabid dog. Yea, I said it and I mean it. Unfortunately the world doesn't work that way.
One of the driving forces in comics has always been the need to avenge the victims of crime and deliver justice. Some plot lines are considered cliché or overused at this point. Take something like domestic violence, you've seen it in many gritty urban hero books. Man beats woman, hero beats man, justice is done. Insert kid or minority or homosexual they all work. Some will even land coverage in the mainstream media. The sad fact is that the impact of these stories, the possible morality play that they put forth, doesn't change the statistics. The people doing the beating, providing they can read, aren't getting the message. If justice were a daily part of life there would be no need to create stories about it.
In the past, those sweet golden age heroes filling the sky, you could just tie up the crooks and leave them for the police. Those heroes were all good, sparkly teeth and clean living. Darker themes arose later coinciding with the breakdown in confidence in the justice system. The reason is simple, while you can claim that the industry is being overrun with dark heroes that are indistinguishable from their villainous counterparts, you have to admit that a smile and a fistfight isn’t going to do shit anymore. Captain Sunshine may look good on paper stopping men from stealing purses, but he doesn't address the real issues and therefore undercuts his message of "play nice".
The sainted hero doesn’t always gel with the reality of injustice and a flawed system. Yes we could all fight the Nazi's with Captain America, but Saving Private Ryan showed us what was truly happening during WWII. You can pull kittens out of trees, but handing someone like Ward Weaver over to the law with a cheery feeling like you’ve done you job…I don’t know, I couldn’t do it.
This Punisher attitude was rather unpopular with my fellow social workers even when I pointed out the direct similarities between social work and superheroes. Social workers have an inherent trust in the good of all people. Even people who themselves have been victimized reach out to others in an effort to help complete strangers navigate the pain that they have already experienced. They give of their time and their services to help those in need. They ask for nothing in return. Sound familiar?
OK, I admit I’m a little Wild West in my thinking, but I’ve seen the effects of random crime and malicious killing in the eyes of family members. Most of us have no idea what it is like to sit in the living room of a house filled with flowers, stuffed animals and stacks of cards from complete strangers, knowing that in the next room a child was killed. Most of us have not had to endure a painful silence where NOTHING you can say would ever be comforting to the people you want so much to help. It’s frustrating and it ends up as a cold, indifferent news blurb somewhere between celebrity gossip and the weather. Thankfully, there are selfless people dedicated to embracing the core elements of being a superhero publicly.
Overall, I think I managed to help a few people during my time at VAS. Most of my clients were victims of domestic violence, women in shelters hiding from someone looking to beat on them as casually and often as you or I would check the mail. But I still couldn't shake the idea that justice for some people never truly comes except in certain types of fiction. The cathartic value of characters that can make justice happen, that can right a wrong in 22 pages is what is appealing about superheroes, be they vigilantes, Amazon's or men of steel.
OK, there, see I said positive things about the value of superheroes. Don't you feel better?
-Justin Gray 8-29-02
That’s some heavy stuff that Justin has laid on us, and I think some fine points. There are a couple of things I would like to get off my chest that Justin hit on. Every day, since I do live in a Brooklyn N.Y, I see stuff that drives me insane, and I think half of what I see wouldn’t get me unglued if I didn’t spend half my life reading superhero comics. The comics of the 60’s and 70’s had a very clear line between good and bad, and what we, as God fearing people, should do in a situation. Granted, this had some roots in reality, but I think getting this hammered into my head from day one, between being raised roman catholic and then, again, reading comics, I have always felt very strongly that I should, in any situation, react and do the right thing.
If it was only so simple. Reality it’s a bitch. Justin’s stories make a good point of that, but I wonder at times, what the hell is driving me so hard in the “good “ direction and what one-day, the ramifications of a stupid reaction might have. Unlike most of my friends {they will back me up on this) I really do have a good grasp on reality and the concepts of good and evil and so on. This I think comes more from my parents than anything else. Thank God for them. Healthy, responsible, intelligent and with patience to teach. I was blessed with them, but man, it’s depressing as hell what’s out there now.
The other day, a father and mother on the train with their two kids, all sitting in a row. The kids overdosing on a sugar high wouldn’t sit still, so the father, a guy in his 20’s yells at his 6-year-old kid and calls him a faggot. Think about that. The brother, who is maybe a year younger, asks the mother what a fagot is and the mother says, and I quote” your brother is a faggot, now shut the fuck up”. The train is packed. They are not my kids. I want to slap those parents into next week. I open my mouth and I am the idiot for interfering.
An old lady tries to cross the street. The light is fast and a middle-aged man sits high up in his “land vehicle” and leans on the horn, scaring the woman half to death. In a movie theater, seeing a midnight show of an adult movie with horrific images and a woman brings her 2 little girls in with her, neither of them is a day over 7.
You paint your house and some kids graffiti on it, you double-park your car for an emergency and its towed in 2 minutes flat. You are on line for something and someone cuts in front of you…and so on and so on.
Little things that add up. Examples thrown in our face every day. Hey, eventually at some point even the strong willed person will say, screw it, I’m gonna take what’s mine, and that’s what is happening folks. We have a society that should not have children. Not now, not ever. Want kids? Well…I think we should have to be scrutinized before being allowed to have that right. I know I am all over the place on this one, but man, look around. We are a consumer society that is very confused about right and wrong, never mind human decency. Just my thoughts mind you.
One last point. Ask yourselves this. Why in hell should any of us, with all the great fun things we can do each day, ever give a holy high shit about any celebrity and their pathetically planned press release life? Why is it that we should care who is going out with whom? The bigger one that drives me nuts is why should people know what a movie made at the box office? When is it enough that a film is good? I was eating a sandwich the other day listening to these 2 couples talk about Brad Pitt’s love life and how much money Adam Sandler made per film. I’m gonna let you in on a secret folks, those two guys couldn’t give a shit about you!
News flash, all you collectors of useless information about people you can never be or love or live like…Jennifer Lopez wouldn’t screw you if you were the last man on earth, so get a reality check and treat that nice girl that gives you the time of day a little better, because trust me, she is already way out of your league.
I bring this up because an overweight somewhat intelligent guy I know who doesn’t dress well and has the manners of a Viking had a date with a nice girl. After, he told us he had a good time, but she wasn’t good looking enough for him. He was looking for a girl more “model” looking. See? No reality there either. My advice to him was to stay home, order Chinese takeout and continue to jerk off to sports illustrated swimsuit videos for the rest of his life. Sorry folks. I am in a mood. I simply want to point out that we, all of us, should be better people, better to each other. Maybe September 11th’s compassion is slipping a little; maybe I’m just raw as we approach the one-year mark. I say be better not so others will like us, but so that at the end of the day we can go to bed knowing we tried to something positive with what we were given.
-Jimmy Palmiotti 8-29-02
Shameless plugging: In just a few short days the premiere issue of our first new Wildstorm series 21DOWN hits the shelves. Only a few weeks later, on the 25th our second series, which we will talk about again, The Resistance hits shelves. We’re going to be looking to hear from you and here are a few ways to do it. The official wildstorm message boards, here at Silver Bullet in the Chambered Message Forum and the delphi forum on our website paperfilms.com
