Absolute Power: Mark Waid Talks Amanda Waller's Big Swing Against DC's Greatest Heroes

Amanda Waller has been assembling a grand plan to finally swing the pendulum in humanity’s favor against those who have the power of Gods, and it all kicks off in Absolute Power. Waller finally makes her big move, and the heroes are not prepared for the storm she’s sent their way. At the helm of that storm is the talented team of writer Mark Waid, artist Dan Mora, colorist Alejandro Sánchez, and letterer Ariana Maher, who bring together threads from Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, and more across the DC Universe as the world learns what Absolute Power really is. ComicBook had a chance to speak to Waid all about the series and its action-packed debut (which you can get a full preview of on the next slide), and one of the mission statements for Waid was to create an event with real stakes that wasn’t necessarily dealing with a cosmic-level threat.

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The Threat

Superman is shocked when he gets hit by two bullets

“The biggest thing was I wanted to create a real sense of peril and drama without endangering the universe. Because those crossovers have been great, but it’s not my wheelhouse exactly to do the big cosmic stories. So that was goal number one,” Waid said. “So then I started thinking about it, and, ‘What is the worst thing that you can do to these characters? What great sense of loss can you imprint upon universally all of them?’ It’s not just a matter of taking away their loved ones or their friends, because some of them have loved ones, some of them don’t, or whatever. What’s the one thing universally across the board you can do? And that’s to make them stop being superheroes.”

Another key element that makes its presence felt early on in the story is Artificial Intelligence, showing how quickly it can affect people’s perceptions in a massive way. “I will not have been the first to say this, but about a year or so ago when we started planning this thing out, it was pretty obvious to me that as we get closer and closer to the 2024 elections, regardless of what side of the political spectrum you stand on, that’s going to be an accelerant,” Waid said. “And so I figured early on this is going to be the summer of Deep Fake. This is going to be the summer of worry about AI and what AI can produce, and so my predictions were pretty on base, and so that helps keep the story feel pretty timely.”

An Epic Scale

Batman, Robin, and Animal Man survey the situation

As detailed in Absolute Power: Ground Zero, elements of the Superman and Batman books are already playing heavily into the series, but those are only a few of the story elements reflected in the series. Bringing those together wasn’t actually the challenging part though, as the sheer scale of how many characters were involved and what they were actually up to was more imposing.

“That part wasn’t the challenging part, because a lot of that, especially in the case of the Titans, for instance, they were laying the groundwork. For Flash, same thing; laying the groundwork for Amanda Waller taking bigger swings. So that wasn’t really an issue. Brainiac Queen being the third leg of the Trinity of Evil made perfect sense to us because she’s able to bring something that Failsafe and Waller can’t to the table,” Waid said.

“So that wasn’t the challenging part. The challenging part really was accounting for eight million superheroes and trying to keep track of who’s where, who’s captured, who’s not, who’s de-powered, who’s on the run. And Dan Mora, God bless him, has stayed with me every step of the way there,” Waid said. “And it really helps that Dan loves drawing these characters. I mean, the constant refrain with World’s Finest is always, ‘Who do you want to draw?’ And he’s like, ‘Whoever I haven’t drawn yet.’ So awesome.”

Whle the series does pull from those other books, those who haven’t been keeping up with those other stories shouldn’t hesitate from jumping right into this. “A little bit, but I think we do a pretty good job making sure everything’s in context and making sure everyone knows, and we spell out for new readers,” Wait said. “Even if you haven’t been reading DC comics for a couple of years, by the time you get to page eight or nine or whatever, I think you get a pretty good sense of what’s at stake, who the players are, and what they want. So I would encourage you, even if you are a casual DC fan, not inclined to pick up everything, I think this is something that will scratch every itch.”

You can get a full preview of the big debut issue on the next slide. Absolute Power: Ground Zero #1 is in comic stores now. Absolute Power #1 will land in comic stores on July 3rd.

Are you excited for Absolute Power? You can talk all things comics and DC with me on Threads and Twitter @mattaguilarcb!