J.J. Abrams is joining the world of comic book writing, alongside his son Henry Abrams. The duo will join artist Sara Pichelli and colorist Dave Stewart for a five-issue Spider-Man mini-series debuting in September. This is both Abrams’ first foray into comic book writing and to kick things off, they’re creating a brand new villain: Cadaverous.
In an interview with The New York Times, Abrams said, “The story shows Peter Parker in a way you haven’t seen him before.”
According to Henry, editor Nick Lowe first reached out about 10 years ago, when Henry was just 10 years old. More recently, they started developing the story that has now become this mini-series. Although he and Abrams didn’t share much about the plot in their interview, they did reflect on their personal histories with comics and what it was like to work together on the series.
“Most of my exposure to comics came when I was super young: Calvin and Hobbes, Tintin, Spy vs. Spy. I did have a Marvel compendium when I was 6 or 7 that I adored and I would always land on this page of Spider-Man, not knowing anything about the character or the back story or the powers, but connecting with the visual designs of Steve Ditko,” Henry said. “I didn’t really start reading him until I was 11 or 12. And at that point, I realized that this is a character that I see myself in and that was probably the first time I ever felt that way with any fictional character.”
Abrams said he worked in a comic book shop in high school, where the shop had a copy of Spider-Man’s first appearance in Amazing Fantasy under glass. “It really wasn’t until that job that I started to get into comics,” he admitted. “And while I’ve never been the die-hard comics fan that Henry is, I’ve always appreciated the way that an emotional and weirdly relatable story is being told through this extraordinary circumstance.”
On working with his dad, Henry said the experience was great — as was writing Peter Parker. “I feel like I’ve developed not just as a writer, but someone that can appreciate stories more,” he said. “Spider-Man is one of those superheroes where the more you read about him, for me at least, the less I understand him. He’s so anti-everything that you’d expect from a hero. I think Stan Lee said something about putting the human in superhuman. That is what we’re trying to do.”
Marvel tweeted an announcement video from Abrams and Henry, which you can watch below. You can also check out the cover art for Spider-Man #1, illustrated by Oliver Coipel. Meet Cadaverous and check out this “new take” on Peter Parker in September at your local comic book shop.
https://twitter.com/Marvel/status/114170849222030540
