Dan Abnett, Andy Lanning & Bill Rosemann Talk War of Kings

All of the major comic news sites have interviews with writers Dan Abnett & Andy Lanning (AKA DnA, who write Nova and Guardians of the Galaxy, along with the Annihilation series), and Marvel editor Bill Rosemann. Here are the Starjammers related highlights:

From IGN:

IGN Comics: Can you break down the basic structure of the story? What titles will it encompass and when can fans expect to see it in stores?

Rosemann: Seeds are being planted now and throughout 2008 in titles such as Secret Invasion: Inhumans, then the opening shots will be fired in early '09. And never fear, as the armies march closer to the battlefield, Marvel will be releasing the official list of War of Kings titles.

DnA: Battlelines are being drawn up right now, all will be revealed as we move from the end of '08 into '09.

From Newsarama:

While Marvel's previous "cosmic" events -- Annihilation and Annihilation: Conquest -- have mostly been relegated to cosmic characters that don't touch the rest of the Marvel universe, this event will involve much of what is going on now throughout the 616, particularly in Secret Invasion. For example, Marvel editor Nick Lowe said at Marvel's Secret Invasion panel that Chris Yost will be writing something with Vulcan that will lead up to the event and will include Havok, Polaris and Marvel Girl.

NRAMA: It looks like the Shi-Ar will also play into this. You haven't worked with them before as part of your cosmic stories, have you? What's that going to be like to get your hands on those characters?

AL: No. When we were doing the Annihilation stuff, [Ed] Brubaker was doing the Rise and Fall of the Shi'Ar Empire stuff. So at that stage, the Shi'Ar were kind of off the table for us, because they obviously had their own involved storyline that Ed was working on with the X-Men books. Obviously, now, things have lined up quite nicely so that we are able to involve them in the War of Kings story. It's yet another great cosmic classic that we're getting to work with. Basically, we've done the Kree, we've had Skrulls, so it's been a nice progression to work our way up to the Shi'Ar.

DA: The nice thing for us is that sometimes the characters out of the X-office do remain sort of separated because they have a continuity all their own. And the Shi'Ar are so important, cosmically speaking, I'm glad we get to use them now, because otherwise there would have to be an increasing question in Marvel readers' minds that we've had these Annihilation events, so why haven't we seen the Shi'Ar in them? You'd think it would be affecting them in some sort of way. So it will be great to show there's that we're sort of linking up different parts of the Marvel Universe, and it's really exciting.

AL: It's almost like the Shi'Ar Empire has been sitting there like they've had very noisy neighbors. This is them starting to bang on the walls and yelling to shut up. [laughs]


NRAMA: An advantage of the timing of doing a story with the Shi'Ar Empire is it now has a character like Vulcan, who has been explored quite a bit lately and has ties to the Summers characters in other parts of the Marvel Universe. Can you talk about Vulcan's role in this at all?

AL: Not too much. Not beyond the point that everyone will know going into this book that Vulcan is taking the Shi'Ar into an overly expansive time at the moment. They're kind of expanding their empire. So that, more than anything, at some point, is going to make him butt heads with some of his cosmic neighbors. And that -- and seeing what their reaction to that state of mind is -- leads to what's going to happen in the War of Kings event.

NRAMA: We've see the Starjammers in the teasers as well. So are they going to be playing a part in this?

DA: All the people you've seen in the teasers will play a part, greater or lesser, in this story. We're drawing together strands from different parts of continuity, and it would be remiss of us not to make sure that anybody who would be affected doesn't get touched upon. So we get to connect up characters that wouldn't otherwise have met, necessarily. And I think that's great. It has that sense of cosmic scope where everyone really is in the same universe. And also, if we've done this correctly, all of those characters will have some role to play in the greater story as well.

From CBR:

When the “War of Kings” finally does erupt, it won’t be a simple Good vs. Evil type of conflict. “This isn't a traditional heroes versus villains story, but it is going to have a true epic scale with clearly defined sides,” DnA remarked.”

“Each side of this battle thinks they are right " which makes it awfully deadly for those caught in the crossfire!” Rosemann added.

The titles and tie-ins which will make up “War of Kings” have yet to be revealed, but readers can expect a prologue and a core mini-series which will be written by DnA.