Jason Aaron Opens Up About His Original Sin Marvel Event

Jason Aaron took some time today to conduct a liveblog with fans on Marvel.com about “Original Sin,” his upcoming Marvel Comics crossover event. Aaron spoke for a bit about the genesis of the event, which is triggered by the death of Uatu the Watcher.”It all started with the idea of a murdered Watcher,” he said, “which would put all of his most treasured secrets up for grabs. Once I grabbed hold of the story, it was up to me to figure out who killed him and why. The story was in the air for a few different Marvel retreats, waiting for somebody to grab it. At one retreat, suddenly the whole story seemed to make sense to me, so I grabbed it. It was the crime story aspect that attracted me. I’ve never written a big cosmic murder mystery before. Combining the epic cosmic stuff with the gritty murder mystery part of it has been the most fun. Like mixing Kirby and Steranko and Grant Morrison with some Garth Ennis. I’m trying to throw everything I love about the Marvel Universe into one big story. It’s dark and weird and emotionally gritty but full of action and big ideas and cosmic craziness.”He also talked about how one of the most interesting things about the series will be the unique pairings of characters readers don’t often see interacting together, and how the story takes so many of those characters far out of their normal areas of operation.”Old Nick Fury is a big part of things,” Aaron said. “He’s sort of our lead investigator. Our Marvel U version of a grizzled old homicide detective. The regular big players are there as well. Cap and the Avengers. Thor has some big scenes later in the series. But we also spend time with characters who aren’t normally part of a big Marvel event. Like Dr. Strange, Black Panther, Punisher, Emma Frost, Moon Knight and a few others. So it’s a fun mix. Just today I’ve been writing a scene with Dr. Strange and Punisher together, which is a blast…There’s action in space. There’s Punisher traveling to other dimensions with Dr. Strange. The murder investigation leads us to some unusual places. As you might expect when somebody kills a Watcher.”Aaron explained that Uatu’s death itself is not the only issue at hand for the heroes. There is also what he left behind.”There are items of power missing from the Watcher’s base,” said Aaron, “as well as all those secrets. Remember the Ultimate Nullifier? You’d hate to see that fall into the wrong hands, right? And as for those secrets, I don’t wanna say too much about how they’re stored or how they get out. I think that’s one of the fun reveals of the first two issues.”Aaron also talked a bit about the artist for the series, Mike Deodato, Jr.”Mike’s awesome,” said Aaron. “He’s doing the work of his life on this story. Drawing every Marvel character you can think of, loads of crazy action and more weird dead bodies than you can count. He’s killing it. The book looks slick and sci-fi but also dark and real all at the same time.”While answering fan questions, Aaron explained a bit about the unique publishing plan for the event and its tie-ins.”This will be a different sort of mix between main story and tie-ins than Marvel has done in the past,” said Aaron. “The main Original Sin series tells the story of the murder and the investigation. The tie-ins will deal with the fall-out of that murder and the secrets that come out because of it. So they’re two different sets of stories, basically…if the consequences are big enough, they’ll always affect the Marvel U as a whole. And the consequences in this one are pretty big, especially for certain characters. But Original Sin is also a story with a very definite beginning, middle and end.”Original Sin #1 is scheduled for release digitally and in comic shops May, 2014.