Suicide Squad - Amanda Waller Special (Patreon)

With San Diego Comic-Con next week things are going to be crazy, so I thought I'd get this posted up a bit early. Enjoy!

DC released a series of female-centered double-sized New 52 specials in 2014 and I was hired by editor Wil Moss to tackle Amanda Waller, the infamous head of Task Force-X, the Suicide Squad. They didn't want an origin story (that had already been handled in Suicide Squad #0), just a self-contained action-packed adventure that gave us a glimpse into her personality and methods.

Right after I was brought on board, Wil decided to head across the road to Marvel and the project was handed over to editor Brian Cunningham. Brian and I carried this through to the finish line and I'm proud of how it turned out.

I managed to track down the original email where I spit balled the idea that lead into the story pitch, so you can really see the difference between that preliminary brainstorming, the formal pitch and the revised-expanded pitch with pacing notes where I was finally given the go ahead to write the full script. Originally I'd hoped to make the villain of the story Frostbite from DV8 (hence the way his powers work and him joining the Suicide Squad in the end) but, to simplify approvals and keep the story more self-contained, it was decided the villain would be an original character and he'd die in the end.

Along with my full script, you'll also see my lettering guides. Some editors do their own lettering guides, others ask the writer to do them. I prefer to get hands on and do them if at all possible (and Brian was super busy during production of this issue anyway) so I set it all up for the letterer and you can check the attached guide side-by-side with the script to see how it all played out. Penciler Andre Coelho did a wonderful job and his storytelling is really tight.

If you want to read the finished-colored version, it's available on comiXology:

http://www.comixology.com/Suicide-Squad-Amanda-Waller-2014-1/digital-comic/83984

I hope you enjoy seeing the process on this one, gang. If you feel you're getting good value from my Patreon, please tell other friends/aspiring writers to jump on board.