DC: JH Williams III Two Year Exclusive

[Local Hero]

Posted 29/06/2004
Source Newsarama

DC Comics added another exclusive creator to its roster, today announcing that JH Williams III has signed a two-year exclusive contract with the publisher. While the news may come as a “duh” worthy event to some, given that Williams was the artist for the entire run of Alan Moore’s Promethea, but he had been doing work outside of DC.

“I’ve been doing lots of covers and little tidbits if interior stuff for some the competition,” Williams told Newsarama. “But as for why now...I had been approached to go exclusive about six months or so ago but didn't want to do it then without knowing what the next project would be. I wanted to keep my options open for the right thing to come along. Now that it has been settled I figured I might as well take advantage of some of the perks to going exclusive since my next large amount of work was going to be with Wildstorm anyway and I have always been treated with the utmost respect from DC and Wildstorm in particular. It just feels like home.”

Williams admitted that the exclusive will help to keep him focused on the work at hand, without succumbing to temptations from other companies. As for what the work at hand is, the bulk of it will be Warren Ellis’ Desolation Jones

”I’m really looking forward to Desolation Jones Williams said. “One, because it allows me to work on something with mister Warren Ellis. He’s one of my top favorite writers and I really wanted work with him on a project, so I'm very happy that it has worked out. And two, Desolation Jones is very different than Promethea and that’s why I wanted to do it. It’s going to pull me in some directions that I really wanted to go visually - to try something new, which is always what I like to do. My work on Promethea can attest to that.

Jones will be nothing like Promethea visually, other than a spot here and there. But at the same time it will allow me to be just as extremely creative and as risk taking as I have always been. So it will be lots of fun for me as an artist to keep pushing those boundaries of what I'm capable of, very challenging. About the story itself...I really don't want to say much more about it than what Warren has on his website other than that it is very urban, dark, human, gritty, and can be pretty funny at times. I think it has the potential to be some of Warren's best work yet and that’s saying a lot.”

While it may sound like Williams is happy to be moving on past Promethea, the end of the series was bittersweet for the artist. In working with Moore on the series, Williams managed to keep Promethea on a regular schedule, and never required a fill-in. A sign of the times, perhaps, but the accomplishment puts Williams in a small group of artists who can claim that they began and finished a finite work of the series’ scope.

“It feels absolutely amazing, but at the same time, I’m sad to have it behind me,” Williams said of the series. “It has been one of the best experiences of my life professionally and personally. To be honest though, I'm not sure if we really had much more we could have done with this particular take on Promethea. Alan said to me a couple of issues back that we probably only had a few really good issues left in us for now and I think he was right about that. Nothing lasts forever and it’s always good to end on a high point instead of letting things fizzle. So in that regard I am very much looking forward to something new with Desolation Jones. I'm looking to recreate a positive experience for my work and for the readers. I'm sure that will happen.”

Along with Desolation Jones, Williams contract will cover covers for JSA, as well as some pages for the upcoming Wildstorm project by Leah Moore (yes, there’s a relation), called Wild Girl.

“I also want to mention that I'm going to be at the big San Diego Convention this July so if any of you out there are going, please come by and say ‘hi,’ chat, maybe have a beer or two, heh. I can found be at the ‘Naked Fat Rave’ booth on the main floor along with Arthur Adams, Joyce Chin, Howard Chaykin, Walt Simonson, Phil Noto, Seth Fisher, Tony Harris, Eric Powell, Dave Johnson, Brandon Peterson, and Jason Pearson, or wandering around the DC booth as well. I know it's a shameless plug but I couldn't help myself.”