Geoff Johns, Bryan Hitch Explain Why Ghost Machine Is Returning to Classic Genres

Geoff Johns and Bryan Hitch, two of the creators behind Ghost Machine, explain why the comic book company is spreading its wings beyond just superhero storytelling. Spearheaded by Geoff Johns, some of the biggest names in comics have joined on with Ghost Machine, such as Bryan Hitch, Gary Franks, Ivan Reis, Jason Fabok, Peter J. Tomasi, Francis Manapul, and more. Ghost Machine #1, a one-shot that provided readers with a glimpse of the four universes inside the publishing initiative, was recently released, and they span multiple genres. Geoff Johns and Bryan Hitch, two of the creators behind Ghost Machine #1, discussed why they're veering away from superheroes.

ComicBook.com spoke with Geoff Johns and Bryan Hitch at MegaCon last weekend, where we asked why Ghost Machine is putting a spotlight on non-superhero tales. "I think superheroes is less... It is a genre in itself, but it's very adaptable," Geoff Johns said. "So you could have a horror-based superhero, a science fiction-based superhero, you could have a Western superhero. So we're all very aware that comics is a medium, and that throughout its history, it's had everything from superheroes to romance comics. So we use the term superhero-adjacent, but they're all action, adventure, horror, science fiction stuff. It's not something that doesn't have to be differentiated from superheroes. The only thing is we're not doing capes and tights, but there's still big-budget action adventure comics.

Bryan Hitch added, "It's interesting. If you look at comic books before TV, really when TV was just getting started, they had all genres. They had superheroes, Westerns, crime, romance, everything. And then when TV started having Westerns and romance and crime, those comics started to go away because you could only get superheroes in comics. And now superheroes are all over TV and film and it felt like a chance to go back to all the different genres that comic books originally started with and just do different stuff. And we were planning this years ago now, it's just we've been doing superheroes most of our careers and we love them, but we all want to just do something new and different."

Ghost Machine's mission statement reads, "Ghost Machine's groundbreaking creator collective was launched at New York Comic Con in October 2023 and features a global best-of-class lineup of artists and writers whose award-winning and iconic works include a who's who of comic book legends such as Batman, Superman, Spider-Man, Aquaman, Stargirl, JSA, The Flash, The Ultimates, Black Lightning, Green Arrow and countless more: Brad Anderson, Jason Fabok, Gary Frank, Bryan Hitch, Geoff Johns, Rob Leigh, Lamont Magee, Francis Manapul, Brad Meltzer, Ivan Reis, Peter Snejbjerg, Peter J. Tomasi, and Maytal Zchut. In an industry first, all of Ghost Machine's creators jointly own and run the company, sharing in all of Ghost Machine's publishing, media, merchandising and licensing. Each creator is exclusive to the company for their comic book work after completing projects already committed to."