Earlier this year, it was revealed that Paul Dano, the actor who brought the chilling villain of The Batman, Edward Nashton/The Riddler, to life in the Matt Reeves helmed film, would be diving into the character’s origin by writing a prequel comic, The Riddler: Year One. That comic, featuring art by artist Stevan Subic in his American comics debut, arrives on shelves on October 25th and is a bit of a unique situation with the live action actor shifting gears to write an original tale. Speaking with ComicBook.com, Dano explained how the opportunity to explore Edward Nashton and his development into The Riddler came about and it turns out it was a natural extension of the work he did in his preparation for The Batman.
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Dano explained to us in an exclusive interview that building a backstory for his characters is something that is part of his process as an actor — and when it came to Nashton, it came out as something that felt very much like a comic.
“Yeah, so one of the important steps I take as an actor is kind of creating a backstory. A lot of work goes into just getting to page one of the script so that you’re kind of carrying the life that, in this case, that character Edward had lived in your body and in your unconscious as best as you can,” Dano said. “And that’s kind of how you might help build the physicality, and the voice, and blah, blah, blah. And Matt Reeves is also a very thorough writer, and we got along really well because of that. And I was talking to him on set one night in Edward’s apartment. I said, it’s funny. Something about, I can’t remember, but I kind of was thinking about this, my backstory and this image and this image. And I’d kind of cultivated it partially in the archetypal language of comics because that’s where the character comes from anyway, so I just mean, I had key images in my head. Boom, boom, boom in my head. And he was like, ‘That should be a comic.’”
He continued, “And I was like, ‘Yeah, I think it could be.’ I kind of thought that in my head, but I don’t think I would’ve proffered it on my own. And then, I think, literally the next day he was like, ‘I emailed, or called Jim Lee and you guys should talk to DC.’ And I was like, ‘Okay.’ And then I did, and they liked the idea and the backstory I had. And then it was one of those really good like, oh, shit, now I actually have to do this. But also really excited and this is really cool. And then I started. It’s turned to its own thing now. So, the genesis of it is the backstory that I worked with as an actor, but it needs to also be a story that stands on its own two legs for a comic reader, and not just in service of the film. So, it needs to do both. So now it’s really just turned into, it’s taken its own life.”
But while his backstory for Nashton taking on a comic book form — and in turn its own life — may have been a little unexpected, Dano is no stranger to comics as a reader and a fan. He explained that he’s long been a fan of comics and graphic novels and that only intensified when he began writing The Riddler: Year One.
“I was a fan of comics as a kid. And then in my adult life I’d read some of the great graphic novels. I wouldn’t say I was a comic nerd or anything. I am now,” Dano said. “When I had to prep for The Batman, I read a ton of Batman comics. Not just thriller ones, really just to soak up Gotham, the history, the sort of archetypal energy that’s in all these comics. And I just loved them. It was like a door opened and I was like, oh, I haven’t been in this awesome room in a while. And I just was so surprised how much I loved doing The Batman as a whole. Including the comics.”
He also said that his refreshed engagement with the comic book medium also lets him feel very lucky that he gets to try his hand and that he feels that what he’s created with the artists involved feels like “a full meal”.
“And I dorked out about comics pretty quick before I knew I was going to write the comic,” Dano said. “Even reading books about comics, I just got super into it, and I read Scot McGlasson, and Grant Morrison, Supergods, and this was all before writing the comic. It was just, once I went down the Batman rabbit hole, I was suddenly just really engaged with the medium again. So yeah, it’s been really, I mean, I feel really lucky, too, that I get to take a crack at this, and that they let me. It’s a very involved process. My artists and I have a super intense collaboration and we’ve put a lot into this. So, it really feels like it’s a full meal.”
Here’s how DC describes The Riddler: Year One: “As depicted in Matt Reeves’s hit movie The Batman, the Riddler wasn’t simply an amusing eccentric with an affinity for wordplay and baffling clues, but as terrifying a villain as any in the annals of the Dark Knight. Here you can see Edward Nashton evolve into the menace known as the Riddler. How did an unknown forensic accountant uncover the dark secrets of Gotham’s underworld and come so close to bringing down the entire city? This six-issue miniseries is an immediate prequel to The Batman—the detailed, disturbing, and at times shocking story of a man with nothing to lose.
Artist Stevan Subic makes his American comics debut, including a variant cover that is the first of six interlocking covers. This collaboration with Paul Dano delivers a shadowy and gritty tale of a society’s forgotten man who refuses to go unnoticed any longer. Subic’s recent Conan the Cimmerian for French publisher Glenat has brought him great acclaim in Europe, and he’s about to break out globally with a Batman series unlike any you’ve seen before.”
The Riddler: Year One #1, written by Dano with art by Stevan Subic, goes on sale October 25th.
