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Q&A: MARK SABLE, 'TWO-FACE: YEAR ONE' | | Wizard caught up with Mark Sable before San Diego Comic Con to talk about Two-Face: Year One! | | | By Steve Sunu | | Posted 7/18/2008 | |  | |  WIZARD UNIVERSE: What is Two-Face: Year One about?
MARK SABLE: It's a two issue series, 48 pages each, and prestige format. I should mention that art is by Jesus Saiz and there are flashback sequences by Jeremy Han. Jimmy Palmiotti's inking it, and the best part are the covers by Mark Chiarello. I don't think they've actually revealed the first cover yet, but they had a mock one. Chiarello's covers are really awesome. Anyway, it's in two parts because the whole story is the rise and fall of Harvey Dent. Part one is Harvey Dent becoming Two Face, and part two is the race for District Attorney. Since Harvey Dent is still on the ballot, Two Face runs for District Attorney in this insane election. Basically, his campaign platform is that in Gotham, which is so corrupt, you're more likely to get justice from a flip of the coin than you are from a such a corrupt system, from a corrupt jury, a corrupt judge, an even more corrupt district attorney. Those are the A-stories for part one and two.
Behind the scenes of that, there are some things we've seen before; variations of the breakup of the trio of Harvey, Batman, and Jim Gordon. There's some psychological insight into Harvey Dent, but also Jim Gordon puts together a squad of the only honest cops in Gotham. They first become tasked with stopping organized crime, which nobody wants to stop, and then become tasked with stopping Two-Face. These "untouchables" (and it's very much a reference to that movie) wind up becoming the core of Ed Brubaker and Greg Rucka's Gotham Central. It's Bullock, Maggie Sawyer, Crispus Allen, and Detective Cohen who had a very small role in Gotham Central, but bigger in this series. Everybody except Renee Montoya who we're leaving alone. | |  How did you get involved in this project?
SABLE: [DC] was looking for a Two-Face: Year One pitch. I assume it had to do with the timing of the movie coming out, but I should be clear that this takes place completely in DC continuity, not in movie continuity. In the original pitch, I actually wanted to use Rachel Dawes, the DA from "Batman Begins." I wound up splitting her character into the good romantic interest for Bruce Wayne, Vicki Vale—who we're seeing basically for the first time in year one continuity—and the bad side, the main antagonist of the book, Mort Weinstein. [Weinstein] starts out as Harvey's rival in law school, becomes a mob lawyer. Not just defending the mob, but actually acting as their consigliore. He winds up running against Harvey for D.A. while still retaining his mob ties, and plays really, really dirty election tricks. I think the two things that DC told me they were excited about in terms of the pitch and why I got it were that I think they loved the sort of "Untouchables" in Gotham idea. I think more than just the concept of it they liked the tone of the series, which is hardboiled crime, very grounded. The doesn't mean that there aren't appearances by pretty much every Bat-Villain I can think of, but it's all in the context of really realistic crime. The other thing has to do with the climax of this story. Harvey puts Mort Weinstein on trial at Arkham using the inmates as the jury. Who's worse, this new DA of Gotham or the freaks? The way I described it in the pitch is "Twelve Angry Men" in Arkham. I think those are the two things that really seemed to jump out to DC.
What can fans look forward to from this series?
SABLE: I think there's been a slight bit of concern from some people that we've seen Two-Face's origin before. My answer to that is that you've seen Batman's origin a thousand times before and then there was Batman: Year One. That changed everything. In this case, people think we've seen it told quite well in the background of The Long Halloween. I don't disagree with that. I think I really try to be incredibly respectful to continuity. In my mind, I consider Two-Face: Year One to be The Long Halloween cannon and this takes place right between Long Halloween and Dark Victory. I'm not trying to mess with what Jeph Loeb has done.
At the same time, it made no sense to write it if I wasn't adding new things to the Two-Face mythos. One of them is the idea Harvey Dent was messed up before he got the acid thrown in his face. I think there are other characters in the DC universe that have been scarred and not gone off the deep end as villains. The example I use is Cyborg. He also has half a face and he's a hero. Coincidentally, I'm writing a Cyborg series, and my hope is that I don't become typecast writing characters with half a face. [Laughs] It's been done before where they deal with his childhood and that's where [his insanity] came from. I don't deal with the original cause of his insanity, but I do say that at an early age, by at least law school, he realizes that he's got a problem. He thinks it's just an anger problem. He meets a psychiatrist that becomes sort of a father figure to him, and the psychiatrist identifies it as multiple personality disorder. Instead of doing the traditional therapy, which is integration and trying to integrate the personality, the psychiatrist decides to try something different. He wants [Harvey] to channel his rage and that dark side of his personality into fighting into doing something good. [The psychiatrist's] intention is that it'll be into fighting crime, but because the system in Gotham is so corrupt, Harvey can only fight it within the system for so long. What happens is that he is just constantly being undermined by the cops, by the juries, by the judges – it just drives him further towards that dark side and makes him become first a vigilante and then a villain.
The analogy that I use is sort of like the Showtime series "Dexter." Dexter is a serial killer and his father realizes there's no cure for it so he teaches Dexter to kill bad people. In this, the psychiatrist basically realizes he's created a monster, but it's too late.
| |  Are you putting in any old, familiar Bat-faces into the title?
SABLE: Many, many, many familiar faces! Obviously, I've mentioned the cast of Gotham Central. This is going to be their first official appearance. I have familiar Bat-Villains, but without giving it away, I also have some obscure ones. One of them that I think is pretty clever is the Penny Plunderer. If you've ever wondered where the giant penny came from in the Batcave, it's the Penny Plunderer. It made complete sense to me. When you think of Two-Face and you've got a coin, there's a connection there. I won't spoil what more connection there is.
From Batman: Year One, there's a ton of Easter Eggs. There's Commissioner Gillian Loeb, there's Captain Branden, the crazy SWAT team leader who tried to kill Batman in Year One. Jefferson Skeevers who is one of the drug dealers from year one that makes a funny reappearance. This is sort of about the Maroni and Falcone crime families getting taken out, and the crime family that replaces them in the second part is the Bertenelli family, which fans will recognize as the father of Helena Bertenelli AKA The Huntress. So, there's tons of those Easter Eggs and at the same time I hopefully place them in such a way that if you're not a die hard Batman fan, you don't need to know who they are, but it just adds a sense of recognition to the story.
What other projects are you working on?
SABLE: The main thing that I have from DC right now is the Cyborg mini series, it's his first ever solo title, and that's currently – the first two issues are already out, there are four more to go. I'm really proud of it. It's the first time he's had his own series, which is pretty crazy to me considering how popular Teen Titans is and he's one of the most recognizable of the Titans.
From Image, I have my first book, Grounded, about a kid who gets sent to a high school for super heroes where everyone has powers except him. Grounded is in trade, and in individual issues there's Fearless, which is about a super hero who's addicted to an anti-fear drug. He's got this crippling anxiety disorder and he needs the drug not just as a super hero but to function as a human being. It's about what happens when this anti-fear drug gets cut off. Finally, the most recent thing I have out from Image is an original graphic novel called Hazed with Robbi Rodriguez. It's a dark comedy about sororities and eating disorders. It's kind of like "Heathers" or "Mean Girls," but set in college and as far away as you can get from super heroes as possible. It's something that I'm quite proud of and has been getting a good reception.
I'm still pitching stuff to DC and hope to be doing more stuff in Year One. I think there's a lot of untapped potential there. I like the really gritty crime stuff and I'm also writing an original animated pilot for Cartoon Network. Also, there's an adaptation of Tori Amos songs coming out called Comic Book Tattoo Tales. Salgood Sam and I did the song called Upside Down. It's up on MySpace comics. Supposedly Tori chose Salgood and my story as the one to represent the collection. That'll be debuted at Comic Con. You can also check out my blog for more of my projects.
Mark Sable will be at the Image Booth at San Diego Comic Con next week for signings and questions about his work!
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