One of her inspirations? 1983's Jaws 3-D. And of course, he loves telling people he's a shark." Beyond that, he had a genuine joy at the simple pleasures of our world and I think that made him tremendously endearing.
"He gets his feelings hurt a bit when people are afraid of him. He's not just hungry, he wants to eat everything," she says. "I wanted him to have big, simple appetites. Glass mentions how she added a "quirky sense of humor to him" Glass, Seeley, and Mairghread all give praise for Simone's arc, specifically in regards to fleshing out King Shark's story in a way that still influences the character in the current DC comics run.
MAN OF WAR ASSAULT SQUAD SERIAL KEY FULL
Folks like Lex Luthor and Catwoman were being tapped elsewhere, so out of necessity she came to the conclusion, "Let's take the real losers of the DCU and make them the focus." Thus began this new iteration of Secret Six. "It's a book full of the dregs of the DC Universe, but unlike their thematic cousins in the Suicide Squad, the Six never actually win," Simone says.Īmong the characters on the team are Catman, Ragdoll, Black Alice, and, yes, King Shark.
Simone was asked to be a part of a "massive DC crossover" with a focus on villains. "Never in my wildest dreams when I put the name King Shark on a piece of paper did I think that someday Sylvester Stallone would be saying a half dozen words as King Shark.
Though, he finds the character's current pop culture prominence astounding. One aspect of Kesel's original concept that has been lost in later iterations are the two tattoos in a "shark-toothed pattern" he included as a nod to the character's mythological roots. "Above all, I loved the visual - just this hulking shark creature with massive jaws." "I have been a fan of King Shark's creator, the great Karl Kesel, since forever, and bought the first appearance of the character right off the stands years ago," Simone writes to EW in an email. The impact of the character's main issue, Superboy #9, cannot be overstated, especially for comic book writers like Glass, Seeley, and Simone, who would all write stories featuring King Shark in later years. "So, I couldn't call it 'The Shark,' but Hawaiian myths kept referring to 'The Shark King,' and I thought, 'I'll take those words and flip it around.'" Voila! someone who is a barely functioning human." That iteration also had a fair amount of human intelligence, and Kesel wanted his creation to be "more animalistic. DC's Green Lantern comic at the time featured a humanoid shark figure called "The Shark," but Kesel admits he didn't want to jump through the editorial hoops to secure that name for this new character he was creating. And that's how King Shark really started."įinding a name for this villain was an equally easy process. It's a demigod character except as a shark. "Somewhere in there I decided one of the shark gods has a child with a human.
He researched local mythologies of the islands and came across various shark gods. The hero was operating in Hawaii, "he's surrounded by water, there's sharks in the water," Kesel remembers. Kesel, a comic book writer and inker living in Portland, was looking for a villain to put up against the star of his current series, Superboy. The origin story of King Shark is perhaps the most organic origin story in DC Comics.