Dwayne McDuffie Quotations

Our storylines grew organically out of the characters and conflicts that already existed in the show. We wanted them to challenge themselves, with the temptations of power, with their own unique combination of hubris and self-doubt.

Well, it developed into something very different than we thought it was going to be. Initially we saw it as a disguised anthology, with J'onn, the Watchtower and the concept of Justice League being the main things the shows had in common. Our mandate was simply to tell really good stories with very small groups of characters, usually featuring one or two of the new guys. As we were saying early on, one week we'd tell the best Booster Gold story we can, the next week the best Hawk and Dove story. But as the stories developed (particularly Stan Berkowitz and Bob Goodman's 'Fearful Symmetry'), we realized we had the makings of what would become the 'Cadmus arc,' a huge story that could span two seasons, a story that would have been impossible to tell in the old 'Justice League' format.

The fact that we're having this discussion speaks volumes. There have been all kinds of racial slurs, but only this one continues to have the same powerful meaning for people that it did when it was first used. If you were to call someone a 'mick' today, you just might have to explain what that is.

I think the biggest advice I can offer is don't just pick one story and stop, write as much as you can, as many stories as you can. The best thing about being a writer is, a writer's craft is nearly perfect because a writer can go anywhere and do his craft.

I've always felt that the cool thing about being a writer is that all you need is paper to do the job.

My fan fiction is canon.

I was born in Detroit. I never really saw myself working in comics, I just fell into it. But it's been one of the best things to happen to a kid from Detroit.

I'm conscious of race whenever I'm writing, just as I'm conscious of class, religion, human psychology, politics — everything that makes up the human experience. I don't think I can do a good job if I'm not paying attention to what's meaningful to people, and in American culture, there isn't anything that informs human interaction more than the idea of race.

You don’t feel as real if you don’t see yourself reflected in the media […] There’s something very powerful about seeing yourself represented.

If you do a black character or a female character or an Asian character, then they aren't just that character. They represent that race or that sex, and they can't be interesting because everything they do has to represent an entire block of people. You know, Superman isn't all white people and neither is Lex Luthor. We knew we had to present a range of characters within each ethnic group, which means that we couldn't do just one book. We had to do a series of books and we had to present a view of the world that's wider than the world we've seen before.

Thanks for watching and reading, and stick around, the best is yet to come.