Nightwing's New Villain Threatens the Entire DC Universe

WARNING: The following interview contains spoilers for Nightwing #44 by Benjamin Percy and Chis Mooneyham, on sale now.

It's been said that Dick Grayson is the lynchpin character of the DC Comics Universe, and starting this week, that saying may be more true than ever.

That's because with the just-released Nightwing #44, writer Benjamin Percy is starting not just a new era for the acrobatic member of the Bat Family, he's also spinning a story that will reverberate through many other series in the months ahead. Joined by Five Ghosts artist Chris Mooneyham, Percy's "The Bleeding Edge" story sees the hero face off against a mystery threat from the dark web. And the writer promises that the villain known as Wyrm is just the first tendril that will reach out into other DC titles.

CBR News caught up with Percy on the cusp of the launch, the writer opened up about the years of research into the dark web that led to his landing Nightwing, the ways classic Frank Miller stories have reverberated with him on and off the page and the responsibility of telling a story that will take the lead of the DCU in 2018.

CBR: At a convention panel recently, you spoke about the secret origin of your Nightwing run. You wrote a novel called The Dark Net that dealt with the criminal side of the web, and then Dan DiDio pitched you on bringing that world into Dick Grayson's life. When he suggested that, were you excited to continue that journey, or was there some trepidation about keeping your brain in that headspace?

John Romita, Jr.'s variant to Nightwing #44.

Benjamin Percy: I'd been doing research for over three years about the dark net. Initially, that research sprung from an article I wrote for GQ where I got on the front lines of technology with researchers at Google and Apple and Verizon trying to understand what was going on with digital security right now and the threats we face. So I have pile after pile after pile of notes...and only some of that fed into my novel. And every time I finish a novel, I leave some of it incomplete. I always open up a doorway at the end to make room for a possible sequel. So the stories and threats in my novel have sort of tentacled outward and found a new purchase, new life, in this series.

I wouldn't say it's a continuation, but it is an expansion of that original idea. I'm broadening that idea. And what Dan wanted me to do was, as he'd say, "Dose it up with adrenaline and venom and broken glass and whiskey...and put a cape and spandex on it and make it something worthy of the DCU." So this threat of the dark web is not just something that's going to impact Nightwing but also oscillates into other series.

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Though this also feels like a subtle continuation of a lot of stuff that's been happening with Dick Grayson's life going back to Forever Evil and through the Grayson series – this idea of technology and his identity. Is that part of the planning that went into your run?

Well, if you think about the way that comic books are oftentimes a cracked mirror of reality – the way they often channel the anxieties of the time – then of course you're going to see not just in Nightwing, but in other series a fear of technology informing storylines. And if you think of what's happened previously, it's table setting for what is to come.

And you're introducing a new big bad to drive this story: Wyrm.

And there's more than just Wyrm. Right now, all we see of Wyrm is him as a kind of astral projection – a digital projection. You don't know who's behind the "mask." There's a whole army online.

Are you a write who thinks of superhero franchises in terms of "What is Nightwing's rogues gallery? Can I expand that slate or give him a villain that is unique to him as a character?"

When I took on Green Arrow, I went through all the previous runs, and there are some good rogues, but there's a genuine dissatisfaction with a lot of the villains he's faced. So I came up with a villain who I thought played off of Oliver Queen's history as a Leftist – his history as someone who's always berating the fat cats and the fascists. So if you have this hot-headed liberal battling against a bank – a cabal of villainous bankers in the Ninth Circle – you have a nice opposite to his personality and the core of his character.

I was thinking about something very similar when I moved to Nightwing. I'm all for bringing back villains from the past, and I'm going to be doing that. There's some Grant Morrison weirdness. Flamingo is going to show up once. Professor Pyg will be there. But I also want to create. I want to create a villainous force that will hopefully go down in the annals as a significant threat not just to Nightwing but to the surrounding Bat Family and beyond.

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You're joined by Chris Mooneyham on art, and it seems like his skill set is meeting this idea of both a modern story but one steeped in pulp atmosphere. What has it been like to see him have to design these ideas and give them life?

When we first got on the phone and talked to each other on the series, some of the stories we talked about were Batman: Year One and Daredevil: Born Again. You can see in the pages that have been released so far that Mooneyham feels like the second coming of David Mazzucchelli. If you look at the beautiful grid of it, the neonoir elements and the incredible intricacy of the backgrounds, he's making Blüdhaven come alive as a character in the series. There's a much more mature sensibility to it.

And there's been a question all along too as to how are we going to make a threat that is invisible into something visual. How can we show Nightwing fight something that he can't punch? That's one of the great challenges of this and also one of the most exciting things about it – creating a new visual language and a new visual world. It draws its influence from everything from TRON to The Matrix.

I'm sure no one wants the pressure of being compared to Frank Miller, but just in terms of career shape, you see how Miller was drawing Daredevil for a while before he started writing it and brought in Elektra and really made that book what it was. I feel there was a similar transition for you on Green Arrow where you write the book during the DC You era with some straightforward arcs, but things really picked up in a whole new way once Rebirth hit. Have you felt a chance in your writing in terms of confidence in the medium? Does doing a huge run on a marquee character with a beginning, middle and end change how you're approaching the Nightwing gig?

Absolutely. I'd written a two-shot for Detective, but otherwise Green Arrow was really my first comic. So I've learned a lot. I was talking to my artists about this as I went. "Teach me everything you can so I can become a better comics writer." Patrick Zircher was an early mentor who taught me a lot on how to script and how to work with an artist. He showed me how to pace a script and create dynamic visuals.

By the time Rebirth hit, not only was I feeling more confident as a comics writer, but I was able to do everything I wanted to do from the very beginning that was off the table during the New 52. Black Canary was not allowed to be in Green Arrow, and I wanted to put her in there. Green Arrow couldn't have a goatee. But then with Rebirth, we were able to funnel all of that back into the book in an explosive way.

I'm at a point right now where I feel like I'm going to continue to learn, of course. I'm always studying other people's scripts and trying to become a better writer. But I'm very confident now – not just as a writer but as somebody who's involved in a series now that's going to be impacting others. WithGreen Arrow, I was always off in my own corner of the DCU, and whatever happened there didn't "matter." Then in Teen Titans, what happened in other people's series affected me, not the other way around. Nightwing is the first time I've been the nexus, so to speak, where what I write will flow outward. It's a cool position to be in, and I'm glad they trusted me with it.