Tom King Quotes

All of the characters at Marvel were my ideas, but the ideas meant nothing unless I had somebody who could illustrate it.

One of the reasons that DC, Marvel, and other comic book companies have always asked me to do covers and variant covers is because they know that when they tell me 'icon,' I jump over their words, and I give them an iconic cover - but while I'm doing it, there is going to be an idea there.

Writing a comic book series, you're so reliant on whoever the artist is. It truly is collaboration.

I created lots of characters in high school and college, and the first character I created in pro comics was Liana, Green Lantern of M'Elu, for a backup story in 'Green Lantern #162,' my first professional sale.

I don't need to write comics for a living. I have movies and TV for that. I write comics for one reason and one reason only: I love comics. I love the form, the structure, the storytelling process, I love everything about it.

I decided I was going to tell these stories. I went around and met Crumb. He was the cartoonist. I started realizing comics weren't just kid stuff.

I read things and imagine them and then kind of start trying to kind of take what I imagine and make it visual for everybody else to see. It just happens to be my personal vision, and every person's is going to be different, every book reader.

I truly believe that cinema is a collaborative effort, and as long as I get to tell, and be part of, interesting stories and work with genuine people, I don't see any project as a 'risk.'

When I'm in a session with an artist, my job is to help execute their vision - so it's whatever story they're telling, and the news doesn't specifically affect that.

I love writing novels, but there is something deeply invigorating about the comic-book medium.

Coming from the world of comics, I was very surprised that writers and illustrators, for the most part, don't talk, and they don't collaborate.

When I put together a graphic novel, I don't think about literary prose. I think about storytelling.

To me, I was always just standing on the sidelines because up until issue 50, we were just doing Spawn. I wasn't recruiting anybody because I didn't have any books for people to work on.

Really, I am entirely material driven. If a project appeals to me, I will try to find the right writer and director. And that may be someone I've worked with before, or it may not. It may be a woman, or it may not.

I like it when I can hear directly from the writer: what they're seeing, what they're envisioning, and what their intention is.

I was hired to do as many Boy Commando, Newsboy Legion, and Sandman stories as I could.

I knew exactly how I wanted it to play, but you are never sure until you watch the projected images reflect off the screen. That's when you know it worked.

When you agree to work with a filmmaker, it's important that you accept their world. It's an adventure. I like that. I throw myself into the director's arms, into their universe.

I think my printing to this day looks like the printing right out of a comic book. Actually, I always wanted to be in a comic book. I watched cartoons when I was a kid, too, and both comics and cartoons lit fire in my imagination. This realm holds a lot of interest for me, a lot of passion for me. So to be comic-ized, yeah, that's cool.

I don't really think too much about special effects because that's not really something I can clearly visualize, so I leave that to the pros.

And I think one way or another it's evident to those who work with me that as a writer, a director, a friend, as somebody's there that's very anxious to get the movie made.

I had a great experience working with Dynamite on Masks, and had just gotten started on a stint on The Shadow with them when they floated the idea of a Captain Action series. I've been a little obsessed with the character since I was first introduced to him in the pages of Amazing Heroes back in the early 1980s.

All the director wants is their idea of the movie to be believed in.

Fine artists reflect, and then they act. Fashion photographers - we act, and then we reflect.

Some of my earliest work was in comics. I tend to think in pictures and always like to write scenes possessing the dynamic you find in comics.