Having that North Star for every story [about Batman] is really key for me. It allows me to go farther and farther off the reservation.

[Bruce] sees a lot of himself in [Batman], you know? You could argue that something even worse than what happened to Bruce happened to [Duke's] parents, who are now Joker-ized*. They're not just gone or irretrievably lost. And I'm NOT curing them, so you can put that out there! There's no relief from that.

You take the thing that is the worst thing that could have happened to you, the worst challenge in your life, and you turn it into fuel. You don't give up. And that's what Gotham is about.

Vampires as creatures have evolved over time as different vampire bloodlines have hit different populations of humans. Every once in a while the blood will make something new and mutate into a new species with different powers, abilities, weakness, physical characteristics, and so on. I don't want to give anything away, but there are whole species and branches that date all the way back to pre-modern times.

The hope that they have legs. That's the biggest fear you always have creating new people. You love them, but then they kind of dissipate. Sometimes you don't get to write them as much as you'd like, like me and Harper Row.

Duke is a character who believes that heroism and the Robin mantle can exist entirely separate from Batman himself.

Bruce sees in this character - who fought all the way through "Superheavy" when his parents were missing, and now is determined to fight even though his parents are telling him he's worth nothing - the essence of Batman.