DCeased Writer Reveals Why He Chose to Feature Superman Over Batman

Tom Taylor’s DCeased was one of the year’s most welcome surprises, and the story of a corrupted Anti-Life Equation ended up being the vessel that delivered some of the year’s most human moments. The book featured just about everyone from the DC Comics world in some form or fashion, but it featured Superman and his family in a much more prominent way, though the other pieces of the DC trinity are also featured in interesting ways. We recently had the chance to talk to Taylor as DCeased heads to hardcover, and during our conversation, we asked if the book ever at one point had Batman in the starring role as opposed to Superman, but for Taylor, it was always about Supes.

“Nope, Batman is the…he’s the guy who saved everything in every single story ever, and I’m a Superman guy,” Taylor said. “I love both characters, but Superman is my guy. I choose hopeful over angst every time, and it’s inspirational, so for me, this was at its core, a Superman story. That’s why I think it grabbed so many people, because they’re so used to… there’s this sort of, almost a formula and as fans and their expectations about Justice League being, ‘Oh Batman’s going to show up at the end and have this brilliant idea’ and we even saw it. They’re like, ‘Oh Batman made all of this stuff and Wonder Woman was like, ‘Eh, I’ve got something better.’

“So much of this book was about taking people’s expectations and then pulling the rug out from underneath them… like dashing what we’ve seen before. That’s the fun of this as well. I mean, deciding to split the world’s finest in the beginning. It’s not an easy thing to go with. You would have loved to have seen the two of them fight this together, and with Wonder Woman as well, but it just wasn’t that book. It’s a Superman and Lois book essentially for me, and the two of them sort of embodied by Jon, in the end, to get up in that moment, and so thinking of it, there’s all this humanity in the moment they need it.

Instead of being the solution, Batman is really the character that kicks off this event, and that was a purposeful decision, in part due to his daughter.

“It’s really funny because my son is always complaining to me that Batman gets too much love, and so he knew I was going to kill him, and my son was one of the first ones to read it,” Taylor said. “He read that sequence and he came in crying and I’m like, ‘What’s wrong, you don’t like Batman?” He’s like, “Yeah, but Damian wasn’t supposed to at the other end. It wasn’t supposed to be Alfred who did it. I like Alfred and Damian.’ I’m sorry, things have to hurt.”

You can read more from our interview with Taylor right here, and the DCeased Hardcover edition is available now.