Eddie Berganza On 'Reign Of Doomsday'

A while back, CBR ran a nice interview with Super-editor about the upcoming Reign of Doomsday arc.  Here is the link: http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=30779

As always, the interview is worth reading in its entirety. I will post some of it and my usual comments.

First off, that’s a pretty slick Dan Jurgens variant cover for Justice League. Glad Jurgens got to have a small part with Doomsday’s return.

This is clearly a nice homage to the cover of Superman #74 way back in the original Doomsday story. Even the placement of the fallen heroes are the same. Slick.

Anyways, here are the blurbs from CBR's interview.

CBR News: Eddie, we spoke with Dan Didio briefly on this, but I wanted to get your take on the origins of the "Reign of Doomsday" event. Dan said the ball got rolling internally in terms of bringing the character back in a big way, but who picked up the ball from there?

Eddie Berganza: It kind of evolved. We mentioned how we all really got excited by the prospect of bringing him back, and as we all settled into our new titles, I as Executive Editor was looking for ways to make the books more cohesive. It made sense to have this take place on a wider playing field. From there, everyone got excited to have Doomsday in their book. One of the key factors for me as "Justice League" editor was that James really embraced this, and it was coming in the middle of his Eclipso story line. We talked about how it always seems that the villains are very polite and take their turns, but the reality is that they'd all attack at once. [Laughter] So here we're in the middle of an Eclipso attack, and the League gets sideswiped by Doomsday, who came out of nowhere. It's similar in that when we were launching the icon covers for January and wanted to do something with Steel, which just so happened to fit within these broader plans.

Well, I do agree that plugging Doomsday into an Eclipso story is going to make that one crazy issue. My worry always is will there be enough room to tell the stories that need to be told. Or will splitting the time with these different arcs mean less of a product. Both arcs deserve their time in the sun. I think Doomsday is not in the following issue of JLA but this story might be continued in the announced Superman/Batman Annual.

CBR: Part of what James is going to be playing with in his issues is following up on the New Krypton stories he was writing in the Super books a while back. That's also where we last saw Doomsday, but he was more of a side character there. In "Reign of Doomsday," the villain is the primary focus, so how did you go about making the character feel different than he has in the past and feel like a bigger threat?

EB: You'll see more as the issues come out, but one thing you've already seen is that he's adapting more to who he's fighting. We upped the game that way, and there will be more revelations as he goes along attacking each of the Super people.

I can’t imagine why Doomsday would be going after the Superman stand-ins from “Reign of the Supermen”. Could he being used as a tool by someone else? Or is he simply working his way through the Superman Family, exacting his revenge on everyone involved in that original arc.

CBR: In "Justice League" aside from two villains, the multiple battle fronts splits the team up into different group. How did you focus in on which heroes would get involved on the Doomsday side of things?

EB: What's great is that we played with this as if it was real. We saw where the character were and asked where it would be the least convenient for them to be attacked by Doomsday. That's how we built this. You mention how New Krypton plays into this, and while that isn't a big part of the story, smaller touchstones from that affect how Kara plays a role. She's still mourning that event, and it draws her in. She happens to be in the wrong place when Doomsday appears. It has to do with where we last saw one of the other characters: the Cyborg Superman. He's currently trapped inside of an Alpha Lantern who is patrolling where Kara happens to be. There's a lot of unfortunate events colliding.

Well, I am glad that Kara isn’t being ignored here. She wasn’t around for the original Doomday storyline. Will Matrix even be mentioned here? Unlikely.

The comments above make me think we are still in ‘Dark Supergirl’ mode here. Will she even care about Doomsday? ‘Dark’ doesn’t seem evil, just superficial, snarky, and a bit narcissistic.

CBR: Cyborg Superman is a character who aside from being Doomsday's target has grown on his own into being a bigger DC Universe villain rather than just a Superman villain or a Green Lantern villain. How is James playing with that aspect of the character now that he's the victim of this piece?

EB: The thing about the Cyborg Superman is that he wants to die. Ultimately, he's in the position where he's suffering the loss of his wife and the loss of everyone he ever knew. He wants to just be at peace, and he doesn't care who goes along with him. Now he's facing down the guy who killed Superman, so it's his opportunity. The question is, what can he do to make this guy mad enough to kill him? The Justice League happens to be in the middle of it all, and James is playing with an interesting idea which is that it's not always the best thing to get what you want.

Hmmm, could Cyborg Superman be manipulating Doomsday to use as a vehicle for his own suicide? That would be pretty cool.

CBR: The other key part of this story is that James has been developing the legacy heroes in the League. In the original "Reign of the Supermen" story, the stand-ins took a major role, but the wider supporting cast from Supergirl to Lois Lane to other DC heroes like Bruce Wayne all had a part to play in the bigger event. In what ways does James' story mirror that idea?

EB: Well, not only do we have a reflection of what happened back then, but there's also the new element James is bringing into it, which is that on the character's mind is "Hey, this is Superman's killer. What chance to we have to survive this? What can we put against him?" It's almost like fighting a force of nature, which ups the ante a lot. And James really wants to say, "This is the Justice League." They're not just standing by. It's a real team that's fighting back, and each of them has something to prove whether it's Supergirl or Dick as Batman. Even, let's face it...you've got Congorilla and Starman. [Laughter]

I hope this isn’t played up too much here. I think we all understand that this is the JLA now. If the Starheart wasn't a big enough threat, if the Omega Man wasn't a big enough threat to convince people, I don't know if Eclipso plus Doomsday will either. Still I think Robinson is doing this team right by pitting them against the most gigantic threats. That is what the League should be like, facing massive threats like we saw throughout Morrison's run, for example.

And I keep wondering if everyone is going to escape this storyline alive. I really hope that Steel doesn’t get killed as has been hinted at.

Anyways, it will be interesting the see this arc weave it's way through so many titles.