 COMICS |  | WIZARD Q&A: BRAD MELTZER | | The best-selling author kills the DC Universe in 'Last Will and Testament' and tells the truth about his latest novel, 'The Book of Lies' | | | By Andy Serwin | | Posted 8/08/2008 | |  | |  |  Comics become a literal (and literary) life and death struggle in the latest offerings from novelist Brad Meltzer.
Aside from birthing a new novel—The Book of Lies, due out Sept. 2 from Grand Central Publishing—Meltzer also tackles the subject of death, as it pertains to the DCU, in DC Universe: Last Will and Testament, a 48-page one-shot with art by Adam Kubert (Action Comics) that theorizes what the major heroes will be doing the night before Judgment Day during the fateful events of Final Crisis.
"These characters are literally faced with, 'Here's the day that you're going to die: What would you do in those last moments? What would you do if you know tomorrow it's all over?" poses Metlzer. "And I think what comes out of that moment is your true, deepest desire becomes this great vehicle and platform for us to get into what people really want out of their lives. I think the way these characters deal with it is very different depending on each character."
And while comics began as a dream side gig for the best-selling author, in his latest book, a little-known comics scandal becomes the foundation for his best-selling prose.
The Book of Lies chronicles a fictionalized account of the real-life murder of Mitchell Siegel, father to Superman co-creator Jerry Siegel, and its mysterious ties to one of the most famous murders of all time—the biblical homicide involving Cain and his brother Abel. The mystery-laden thriller is Meltzer's stock in trade, but never before has his love of comics impacted his "day job" to such an extent (although he's been known to drop superhero sobrioquets as characters in his books).
"The one thing I pride myself on is trying to do books that have one foot in reality; you want it to be fiction that seems believable," explains Meltzer of the book's premise "Cain is not just a Biblical figure; Cain represents what is bad in this universe. And Superman, at that same level, is more than just a guy with a cape. I just couldn't ignore that overlap. When I started looking at them together and seeing these things that they just strangely, oddly had in common, the story kind of birthed itself."
Here, Meltzer discusses his funeral arrangement for the DCU, the impetus behind his forthcoming novel and the secrecy around his Buffy stint.
WIZARD: What's DC Universe: Last Will and Testament all about?
BRAD METLZER: Last Will and Testament is one of the few cases where you can judge the book by its cover, and it is a book that is designed to deal with death in the DC Universe. Death in comic books, as a whole, is always something that is usually ridiculous. It is something that is completely temporary, and I can't even argue that it shouldn't be temporary, because the fun is coming back to these characters again and again. What I like, however, is that, in the best hands, no matter how many times you bring someone back from the dead, that character never changes. I don't care how many times you kill Superman or Batman or Captain America; the character doesn't change and the character's desires and wants never change and that's why these characters are sharpened with such fine points. So what the book is designed to do is to show you—almost at its sharpest point—what these characters really want. And what you really want only shows up in a moment crisis. I don't mean "Crisis" with a big "C," I mean with a little "c."
Can you talk a little bit about who some of the main players are?
METLZER: You know, I've always found Superman to be one of the hardest characters to write, and it's only recently that I think I've figured it out and I realized that Superman was not what interests me. Clark Kent is what's interesting about Superman. The idea that any of us in all our ordinariness…that the weakest of us…in all our plainness and ordinariness…that the smallest of us can one day do the greatest of things. That is the best part of Superman and that is why he's the greatest hero. I mean, look at all of the ripoffs they've made from him, you know, where they put a cape on and said, "You can fly. You'll have the same powers." But they never got Superman. And the reason they never got Superman is because they never got Clark Kent. And there is a very clear reason why he turned out the way he did. When Superman himself is scared, you know there's good reason to be scared and, to me, there's only one place he's going to go. And, of course, it's not to Lois.
Oh, that's a good teaser! It sounds like you're dealing with all the big guns. Is it safe to say that most of the iconic characters will be used?
METLZER: They're in there. We'd be remiss to not show how the Big Three, or what Flash or what Green Lantern, are doing. But, again, I think there's only so many times you can have everyone going and saying, "Good bye," to their family. I think what's far more interesting are the characters that find something more important, that find something different, that find God, that find a lack of God or that find revenge, and realize that now, in these last moments on Earth maybe, just maybe, you shouldn't be the hero that you've always been.
How did you get involved with this, Brad? It almost sounds like it could be a stand-alone story that just happens to coincide with what Final Crisis is dealing with.
METLZER: I always had the main part of the story in my head, and it is one of the leftover pieces from my work on Justice League. I had answers to all of the little things that I wanted to do, from Vixen to Red Tornado to Geo-Force to Black Lightning to Red Arrow and Hawkgirl. But this is one of the ones that I really wanted to eventually deal with. I didn't know when I'd finally have the time to come back and deal with it in the right way, I just got lucky that we had something else to put it in—and what could have become a nice, small story became something that really had a far bigger theme than I was originally smart enough to plan.
Click here for part two of the interview! | | 
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