In February Dynamite is adding SilverHawks to its nostalgic list of new comic titles based on beloved properties. Writer Ed Brisson and artist George Kambadais lead the book, and Lucio Parrillo, Jae Lee & June Chung, James Stokoe, Geraldo Borges, Declan Shalvey, Lesley “Leirix” Li, Manix, and David Cousens lend their talents to the covers.
Brisson and Kambadais chatted with The Beat about entering the galaxy of Limbo.
DEANNA DESTITO: Why did you want to bring SilverHawks back?
ED BRISSON: I’ve been a big SilverHawks fan since I was a kid and never thought they got nearly as much love as they deserved. I always dug the mash up of police procedural with a far flung future sci-fi angle. But, the team have always lived in the shadow of Rankin-Bass’s other show, ThunderCats, which is a shame as I always thought of them as being equals.
Beyond that, I always felt there was deeper lore within the show that was maybe hinted at, but rarely – if ever – explored. That opens up a ton of potential with telling new stories in the same world.
GEORGE KAMBADAIS: Hmmm… for me it was quite a few things, such as nostalgia for one of my favorite childhood animated tv shows, and a chance to work on it, expand on its saga, so to say, and of course the chance to work with Ed Brisson for the first time and [editor] Nate Cosby again!
DESTITO: What can old and new fans get from this new series?
BRISSON: Trying to appease old fans while appealing to new readers is always a tightrope act, but, like mentioned above, I think the show left plenty of threads and opportunities for us to digger deeper into its characters and lore.
There’ll be plenty of familiar faces and plot threads from the original cartoon to satisfy long-time fans, but we’re going to be digging a lot deeper into character backstories in hopes of making them feel more well-rounded and grounded. By digging deeper, by showing how each character came to be on the team and how they’ve been directly impacted by Mon*Star’s reign of terror, I think we’re providing a great place for those unfamiliar with Stargazer and crew to hop on board and not feel lost.
KAMBADAIS: Both new and old fans will hopefully have as much fun as I have while I’m working on it!
DESTITO: Which classic characters are there and who is your favorite?
KAMBADAIS: All the main characters will be there. I love everyone to be honest! But, not to sound super basic, my favorite is Quicksilver. He is the leader of them and such a cool one at that!
BRISSON: Like George said, all the familiar faces will be there: Quicksilver, Steelwill, Steelheart, Bluegrass, Copper Kidd, and Stargazer. We’re bringing in Hotwing as a member of the team pretty early on, which is one place where we diverge from the cartoon – in which Hotwing joined about halfway through their 65-episode run.
On the other side of the law, we’ve got intergalactic terror mobster Mon*Star as our main bad, and fans will see plenty of his cronies in action: Hardware, Pokerface, Melodia, Windhammer, Mo-Lec-U-Lar, and plenty more.
My favourite tends to shift based on who I’m writing, but growing up, Bluegrass was my guy. Dude’s a rock ‘n roll space cowboy with a mohawk, how could he not be. Hotwing is another favourite and I’m really excited for folks to see the work George did on giving him a bit of a makeover.
DESTITO: How was it adding your own touch to the franchise?
KAMBADAIS: I would say that so far I am excited and kind of emotional about it… these last few years that I have been with Dynamite I have worked with amazing writers on characters I used to love as a child! When a kid tells you: “When I grow up I want to be an artist/writer, etc.” what they imagine is they will get to work on characters such as these… and I get to do that! I get to do what little George dreamed of doing at the age of 10, and I think this is amazing!
BRISSON: It’s been a lot of fun. Honestly, I can’t remember the last time where I had this much fun writing a book. I love taking the familiar and expanding upon it or giving it a fresh twist. Spending some time writing the team before they come together, showing who they are and why they ultimately decided to join up with the SilverHawks has been a thoroughly satisfying experience. There’s nothing that breaks the cartoon; it’s all additive and I think that readers are going to be very pleased.
DESTITO: If you could have a crossover with SilverHawks, which team would you choose and why?
KAMBADAIS: That’s a tough question… the obvious answer is right there. I would love to see a Thundercats- SilverHawks crossover of course, but if we tried for a moment to think just a little out of the box… I would say maybe a crossover with Voltron would be cool!
BRISSON: ThunderCats feels like the one. I’ve already been asked about it a million times by fans and would love to do it. Voltron, like George mentioned, could be a lot of fun. It feels like those two teams could exist in the same universe for sure.
SilverHawks goes on sale on February 5!
English (US) · 