You remember when Tobey Maguire was first selected, most of the fans were angry. They felt, what kind of a guy is that for a superhero? Nobody thought it was a good idea. Yet he turned out to be great. The people at Marvel who do these things are really pretty smart. If they chose this guy, he'll probably be terrific.

Comics are stories; they're like novels or anything else. So the first thing you have to do is become a good storyteller.

No matter how good a story is, if you're at a newsstand and you see a lot of comic books, you don't know how good the story is unless you read it. But you can spot the artwork instantly, and you know whether you like the artwork, whether it grabs you or not.

To my way of thinking, whether it's a superhero movie or a romance or a comedy or whatever, the most important thing is you've got to care about the characters. You've got to understand the characters and you've got to be interested. If the characters are interesting, you're half-way home.

I love all the voiceovers I do. I can't remember them all, but I seem to do them all of the time. And there's nothing easier because you just stand and read the script, and you don't have to act the way actors do. You don't have to be made up and put costumes on.

The more you read, the better you're going to become as a storyteller.

That's what everybody tells me. "I would've had a great comic-book collection, but my mother made me throw them away." But when I was growing up, my mother didn't care. As long as I was reading, she didn't care if my room was filled with comics. I could have saved everything. I was just too stupid to do it.