John Byrne Quotes

There are lots of people who call black people “niggers.” Are both terms “right”? You seem to have missed the rather important point that my response indicated roughly the same percentage of fans and pros use the improper terms for various elements of what we do—but that percentage does not approach a balance. It is not that roughly half say “balloon” and half say “bubble.” It is that some say “bubble” and they are wrong.

The Onion lost all credibility for me a while back when they did a “story” on the Hudson River cleanup GE was forced to do. As some of you may recall, one of my neighbors is a GE veep, and he was directly in charge of this, so from him I found out all kinds of details the press did not bother to pass along to the public. Since The Onion apparently gets its info from other papers, the story was full of inaccuracies. What are they, Michael Moore? Anyway, I stopped reading The Onion from then on. (2005)

The question becomes, I suppose, one of value. Knowing that the Vision’s complete personality/memory/intelligence was downloaded into a computer in Titan (was it Titan? Memory blurs) allowed me to scrape his brain in my VisionQuest story, since everything could be restored with a literal flip of a switch. Should something that can be so easily copied and retrieved be treated as having the same intrinsic value as a human being? Should any of the human Avengers, for instance, ever risk their lives on behalf of the Vision? My vote would be no (as some of you have probably already guessed)—but I would say that even if it were not possible to restore or “save” the Vision in any other way. He is a “toaster.” (2006)

Usually, I am quick to point out how the internet would have had a profoundly negative effect—as it does today—if it had been in place twenty, thirty, forty years ago. How things like the DC rebirth in the 1950s would have most certainly died aborning had internet chat rooms and forums been around, where a small group of vocal fans could make themselves seem like an army screaming against this utter abandonment of cherished “continuity.” (2007)

If ^^***** had the stones they’d say “Screw continuity! As of January 2007, we’re hitting ‘rewind’ and resetting all the books to where they were in 1972—just set in modern time.” No “cosmic events,” no 100 issue crossovers. Just an editorial fiat, like Man of Steel. Only way to get things done. (2006)

Pedophiles are almost certainly "born that way". Again, we go to evolutionary conditioning. Seek the youngest, strongest, most healthy, for breeding purposes. A sure (or as sure as it gets) way to guarantee the survival of your genes. Pedophilia also brings along a big heaping helping of learned responses, however. In a society like ours, where "normal" sex is considered by many to be filthy and disgusting, "abnormal" sex is of course even moreso. "Abnormal" in this case meaning anything—even simple physical attraction—that is not "age-appropriate", heterosexual, and strictly for procreation. Preferably missionary position. Thus, any confused individual who finds himself attracted to young girls is likely to find himself attracted to increasingly younger girls, as part of his pattern of self-loathing. So much emotional torment—in victims and victimizers—would surely be set aside if our society was sexually liberated enough to even be able to say "Sure, it's okay to be attracted to eleven year olds. Just don't do anything about it!" (2010)

Um...in point of fact there are plenty of people who use the word “nigger” because that is the word they use, not because they imagine it has any negative racial connotations. That’s precisely why I chose that word as my illustration.

One of the things that kept most comics from being monthly was that very few artists could produce 24 pages per month. Jack Kirby was very much the exception to the rule, but his towering presence at Marvel started to dictate the whole shape of the industry—and that's where problems set in! (2008)

I’d go back to 1975. I commented elsewhere, recently, that pressing the “rewind” button would be a good idea, as long as it was done across the board, and not piecemeal or in stealth mode, a la “Birthright.” Take all the characters back to their status quo circa 1975, but set the stories now. Since the most anal-retentive fanboys need “explanations” for everything, have the Shaper of Worlds do it at M*****. Not sure who’d be up for the job at DC. (2004)

1963 was an insult to all the craftsmen who actually worked to produce American comics in that period. I was appalled—and deeply saddened—by the number of “fans” who embraced the series as a “brilliant evocation” of the comics I’d read as a kid. I tried to tell myself the “success” of 1963 merely served to indicate how hungry fans were for “old fashioned” superhero comic books. So much so that they would embrace travesty as tribute. But eventually I came to see this as yet another harbinger of what was to come—of the ever increasing legions who are embarassed to be caught reading superhero comics, and so would rather see them mocked (or changed beyond recognition, as with current M*****) than simply move on and make room for readers who are happy to enjoy them for what they are. (2005)

John Byrne is tired of stepping up to the plate. John Byrne is tired of “doing the right thing” and getting f**ked up the ass for his troubles. John Byrne is tired of being lied to. John Byrne is tired of you. (2006)

...were I in charge of either of the Big Two, my “solution” to the ills of the industry would be to “reset” all the books to where they were at some arbitrarily chosen point in time. Usually I say 1976, for many reasons good and bad. Mostly because that’s the last year when, while actually still working in the Biz, I really still felt like a fan. (2007)

As I have said many times, I don’t care if they wipe away every trace of every book I have ever worked on. I just wish they’d stop doing so by pressing the “rewind” button. That’s just creative bankruptcy. (2005)

When working with existing “franchises,” any good writer will return to the source material from time to time, to see if s/he can divine from that work something that might have been missed before. This is true whether the work is good, bad, or indifferent. The best place to start, however, no matter what the context, is not by saying “the creator didn’t get it right.” That’s the worst kind of hubris. I have been pilloried for my work on Superman, Spider-Man, Doom Patrol, and in the early days even FF and X-Men, yet I have never once said the creators of those series/characters “didn’t get it right.” It disgusts me not only to read Gaiman saying this—about Jack Kirby of all people!—but to see the cartwheels people are willing to turn in order to make his words seem other than what they are. Apparently, dissing one of the greatest talents this industry has produced is okay, as long as you’re on the Approved List. Next, how Eisner screwed up the Spirit, and Lee and Ditko on Spider-Man—what the heck were they thinking?? Maybe you should keep in mind, then, that the only person who knows if a creator “got it right” is the creator himself. Unless Kirby told Gaiman he felt he didn’t “get it right” on The Eternals, it’s pretty f***ing arrogant of Gaiman to make such a statement. “Kirby didn’t get it right, and I probably won’t either” sound like it should read “I don’t want to do this series.” (2006)

Oh—and “but it’s a good story” is the biggest load of crap ever foisted on the reading audience. Any story which deliberately violates core concepts and themes of original materials is not, by definition “a good story.” Time some people pulled their heads out of various writers’ asses and realized that. (2006)