There's nothing comparative to Damien [the current Robin] or any of the other characters. I love those characters. And this isn't, "This is better than that." I think a couple of people misread what we had said in the first issue about that stuff.

"The Cursed Wheel" is the heart of the whole year on All-Star. All-Star is a series that's largely compartmentalized so that every artist can reinvent a villain and have Batman go up against the villain in a way that's pretty singular.

If I know what something's about, and I can always have that touchstone, I feel like I can reach for really ridiculous humor and also go really dark in terms of the things I'm afraid of.

The thing with Superman is that he's completely emotionally open to the reader. Meaning what he tells you is what he's feeling; there's a transparency there. And what he tells other characters is usually as transparent as can be. What he says he believes in. So there's an honesty that is both really inspiring writing the character. One thing I love about Clark Kent is that there is a badassery that you don't see a lot. Even as Superman, he's always kind of restraining himself. When you challenge him, I think there's nobody that has a stronger spine than Superman.

[Duke] is the same way that Harper Row is a character who doesn't want to know who you are beneath the mask, and that makes her interesting. She'll show up and help Batman, but she never wants to know if he's Bruce Wayne.

This one's like that because it's about these things that I think weigh heavily on me in terms of my own failings and the things that I worry about and my personal demons. Is the sum of my personal demons greater than the things that I like about myself? Is this moment - because it's a particulary high tension, scary moment for all of us in terms of the global climate - going to bring out the best or the worst in us?

I love The End of the Batman story. I have my original copy, the hardcover, at my house from when I was a kid, whenever that was,'88 or '89. It was very influential to me because it was so explicit in touching on the notion that Batman might be mad and that he might belong in the mad house.