Decoding Convergence With Jeff King: Part Two

WARNING: Spoilers ahead for Convergence #2, on sale today. If you haven't read it yet, go to your local retailer or pick one up digitally and read along with us.

This week's installment of DC's massive Convergence crossover featured a few major moments -- one that saw Earth 2's Gothamites interacting with their pre-Flashpoint counterparts and then a conclusion that left fans of Mike Grell's The Warlord picking their jaws up off the ground.

In our second weekly interview with writer Jeff King, we talked about the inclusion of Skartaris, the intimate moments that drove the Gotham narrative and what to expect when the action kicks into high gear next week after the relative calm before the storm this week.

Check out our conversation below, along with three exclusive pages of interior art -- and the official preview of Convergence #2 at the bottom of the page.

If you haven't read our first installment yet, covering Convergence #1, check it out here.

One thing I did want to point out today -- there is an earth out there somewhere in the diaspora of the DC Comics multiverse where Superman sounds an awful lot like Neal Caffrey!

[Laughs] You know what? I love that world. There's also a place where Lois Lane sounds a lot like Dana Delany, who I'm working with at the moment, as they both have reminded me.

I love hearing Matt [Bomer] play Superman and I love hearing Dana play Lois.

A weird, nitpicky question: we saw Brainiac defeated in Futures End, which is indicated in the dialogue for #0. Is he back in play as a result of Tim Drake changing the past? We also see Futures End on Telos.

That's an excellent question and I think there are two futures in Futures End that ultimately we deal with. One is the five years later and one is the Futures End main storyline itself. I will leave you to draw the conclusion, dear reader, of which one that might be but suffice to say, one made it and one didn't.

You talked a bit about having a more intimate scale and doing character work. We get to see a lot of people in #2 dealing with their loved ones – but not actually their loved ones. We saw that in Convergence: Superman #1, too. How did that become a big part of the story?

I feel like often, we hide our truest selves from the people that we're closest to out of fear of judgment and that a beautiful opportunity was presented in this storytelling by giving some of the characters an opportunity to reveal themselves in a way that was maybe almost impossible for them to do, and certainly in Bruce's case and in Thomas's case, because the people that they really need to say those words to are no longer where that can happen.

This was a moment that we talked about at the very beginning as being something when I knew I was going to follow Dick through the storyline. This is where I want it to go: I want it to go to Gotham and I wanted the opportunity to have this moment and to see Dick Grayson and Alfred and Oracle and Bruce and Thomas all in the same place – and then out of that, find that stillness before the storm, as it were.

There were two very distinct things that I got out of one storyline: Dick's narration is very bleak in #2 with the "If I'd only known..." which doesn't seem to bode well for the third act of the story. At first I thought the woman who helped Tommy onto the transport was Pandora. Is that somebody who could possibly have saved him?

It's so funny – he was actually handing his son over to Barda and Fury from World's End, who made it onto the transport. That's a big spoiler, but that's who they were.

But in answer to your question, part of the journey for Dick is learning to persevere despite his worst fears and despite wanting to give up.

When you talk about the way you can defeat them is "inside the planet," and then you have Deimos show up on the last page, is it safe to assume that Skartaris will play a major role in the way Telos (the world) functions in a way that maybe Telos (the character) doesn't really understand?

You have no idea.

Certainly one of my favorite things that happens time and time again in superhero comics is this kind of misunderstanding, where the heroes save the "wrong" guy. I mean – they save Deimos because he's being attacked by Brainiac, but they're not going to have a good day tomorrow, are they?

[Laughs]

Is that a case of wanting to put the characters in a place where the audience knows more than they do, or are you thinking that given the extraordinary circumstances of Convergence, maybe the audience will give Deimos the benefit of the doubt?

You know, for me, it was the former. I feel like because the New 52 characters, a lot of them have never experienced the broader DCU in the way their predecessors have. New 52 Superman has very little interaction with Brainiac, for example, in terms of history. But the simple answer is, for fans who do know who Deimos is, those alarm bells are going to be going off. I think that's a good thing, too.

Out of my own curiosity, will we see any of the rest of the Skartaris crew? I mean, Grell finally gave Travis Morgan the end he'd been working toward for thirty years.

The Magic 8-Ball says buckle up, Russell. You're in for a bumpy ride.

You're definitely going to be an answer to that question but it's not going to be quite the answer that you think.