Peter David - Comic Book Career

Comic Book Career

David eventually gave up on a career in writing, and came to work in book publishing. His first publishing job was for the E.P. Dutton imprint Elsevier/Nelson, where he worked mainly as an assistant to the editor-in-chief. He later working in sales and distribution for Playboy Paperbacks. He subsequently worked for five years in Marvel Comics' Sales Department, first as Assistant Direct Sales Manager under Carol Kalish, who hired him, and then succeeding Kalish as Sales Manager. During this time he made some cursory attempts to sell stories, including submission of some Moon Knight plots to Dennis O'Neil, but his efforts were unfruitful. Three years into his tenure as Direct Sales Manager, Jim Owsley became editor of the Spider-Man titles. Although crossing over from sales into editorial was considered a conflict of interest in the Marvel offices, Owsley, whom David describes as a "maverick," was impressed with how David had not previously hesitated to work with him when Owsley was an assistant editor under Larry Hama, and thus, when he became an editor, he purchased a Spider-Man story from David, which appeared in Spectacular Spider-Man #103 in 1985. Owsley subsequently purchased from David "The Death of Jean DeWolff", which ran in issues #107-110 of that title in 1985. Responding to charges of conflict of interest, David made a point of not discussing editorial matters with anyone during his 9 to 5 hours as Direct Sales Manager, and decided not to exploit his position as Sales Manager by promoting the title. Although David attributes the story's poor sales to this decision, such crossing over from Sales to Editorial, according to him, is now common. Nonetheless, he says he was fired from Spectacular Spider-Man by Owsley due to editorial pressure by Marvel's Editor-in-Chief Jim Shooter, and has commented that the resentment stirred by Owsley's purchase of his stories may have permanently damaged Owsley's career. Months later, after Shooter was replaced by Bob Harras, Harras offered David The Incredible Hulk, as it was a struggling title that no one else wanted to write.

During his 12-year run on Hulk, David explored the recurring themes of the Hulk's multiple personality disorder, his periodic changes between the more rageful and less intelligent Green Hulk and the more streetwise, cerebral Gray Hulk, and of being a journeyman hero, which were inspired by Incredible Hulk #312 (October 1985), in which writer Bill Mantlo (and possibly, according to David, Barry Windsor-Smith) had first established that Banner had suffered childhood abuse at the hands of his father. These aspects of the character would later be used in the 2003 feature film adaptation by screenwriter Michael France and director Ang Lee. Comic Book Resources credits David with making the formerly poor-selling book "a must-read mega-hit".

It was after he had been freelancing for a year, and into his run on Hulk, that David felt that his writing career had cemented. After putting out feelers at DC Comics, and being offered the job of writing a four-issue miniseries of The Phantom by editor Mike Gold, David quit his sales position to write full-time.

David also took over Dreadstar during its First Comics run, with issue #41 (March 1989) after Jim Starlin left the title, and remained on it until issue #64 (March 1991), the final issue of that run. David’s other Marvel Comics work in the late 1980s and 1990s includes runs on Wolverine, the New Universe series Merc and Justice, a run on the original X-Factor, and the futuristic series Spider-Man 2099, about a man in the year 2099 who takes up the mantle of Spider-Man, the title character of which David co-created. David left X-Factor after 19 issues, and wrote the first 44 issues of Spider-Man 2099, before quitting that book to protest the firing of editor Joey Cavalieri. The book was cancelled two issues later, along with the entire 2099 line.

At DC Comics in 1990, David wrote a seven-issue Aquaman miniseries, The Atlantis Chronicles, about the history of Aquaman's home of Atlantis, which David has referred to as among the written works of which he is most proud. He would later write a 1994 Aquaman miniseries, Aquaman: Time and Tide, which would lead to a relaunched monthly Aquaman series, the first 46 issues of which he would write from 1994–1998. His run on Aquaman gained notoriety, for in the book's second issue, Aquaman lost a hand, which was then replaced with a harpoon, a feature of the character that endured for the duration of David's run on the book. He quit that book over creative differences. He also wrote the Star Trek comic book for DC from 1988–1991, when that company held the licensing rights to the property, though he has opined that novels are better suited to Star Trek, whose stories are not highly visual. He and Ron Marz cowrote the DC vs. Marvel intercompany crossover in 1996. David also enjoyed considerable runs on Supergirl and Young Justice, the latter eventually being canceled so that DC could use that book's characters in a relaunched Teen Titans monthly.

David's work for Dark Horse Comics has included the teen spy adventure, SpyBoy, which appeared in a series and a number of miniseries between 1999 and 2004, and the 2007 miniseries The Scream.

Other series David worked on in the 1990s include the 1997 miniseries, Heroes Reborn: The Return, for Marvel, and two creator-owned properties: Soulsearchers and Company, which is published by Claypool Comics, and the Epic Comics title Sachs and Violens, which he produced with co-creator, artist George Pérez.

David's early 2000s work includes runs on two volumes of Captain Marvel, which debuted in 2000 and 2002.

David and his second wife, Kathleen, wrote the final English-language text for the first four volumes of the manga series Negima for Del Rey Manga.

In 2003, David began writing another creator-owned comic, Fallen Angel, for DC Comics, which he created in order to make use of plans he had devised for Supergirl after the "Many Happy Returns" storyline, but which were derailed by that series' cancellation. That same year, he also wrote a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series for Dreamwave that tied into the animated television series broadcast that year. DC canceled Fallen Angel after 20 issues, but David restarted the title at IDW Publishing at the end of 2005. Other IDW work included a Spike: Old Times one-shot and the Spike vs. Dracula mini-series, both based on the character from the Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel television series.

In 2005, David briefly returned to Incredible Hulk, though he left after only 11 issues because of his workload. He also started a new series, Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, beginning with a twelve-part crossover storyline called "The Other", which, along with J. Michael Straczynski's run on Amazing Spider-Man, and Reginald Hudlin's run on Marvel Knights Spider-Man, depicted the webslinger as he discovered he was dying, lost an eye during a traumatic fight with Morlun, underwent a metamorphosis and emerged with new abilities and insights into his powers. As tends to be the case when fundamental changes are introduced to long-standing classic comics characters, the storyline caused some controversy among readers for its introduction of retractable stingers in Spider-Man's arms, and the establishment of a "totem" from which his powers are derived. David's final issue of that title was #23.

David also wrote a MadroX miniseries that year, whose success led to a relaunch of a monthly X-Factor (volume 3) written by him. This was a revamped version of the title starring both Madrox and other members of the former X-Factor title that David had written in the early '90s, now working as investigators in a detective agency of that name. David's work on the title garnered praise from Ain't it Cool News, and David has stated that the opt in/opt out policy and greater planning with which Marvel now executes crossover storylines has made his second stint on the title far easier. However, his decision to explicitly establish male characters Shatterstar and Rictor as sharing a homosexual attraction to one another (a confirmation of clues that had been established in X-Force years earlier), drew criticism from Shatterstar's co-creator, Rob Liefeld, though Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada supported David's story. David would eventually win a 2011 GLAAD Media Award for Outstanding Comic Book for his work on the title.

On February 11, 2006, David announced at the WonderCon convention in California in that he had signed an exclusive contract with Marvel Comics. Fallen Angel, Soulsearchers and Company and David's Spike miniseries were "grandfathered" into the contract, so as to not be affected by it. The first new project undertaken by David after entering into the contract, which he announced on April 5, 2006, was writing the dialogue for The Dark Tower: The Gunslinger Born, the comic book spin-off of Stephen King's The Dark Tower novels, which would be illustrated by Jae Lee. He would also script the subsequent Dark Tower comics as well.

David took over Marvel's She-Hulk after writer Dan Slott's departure, beginning with issue #22. His run, which won praise, ended with issue #38, when the series was canceled. He also wrote a 2008-09 Sir Apropos of Nothing miniseries, based on the character from his novels, which was published by IDW Publishing.

David's other 2000s comics based on licensed or adapted properties include Halo: Helljumper, a 2009 miniseries based on the Halo video game, a 2009 Ben 10: Alien Force manga book published by Del Rey, Ben Folds Four, a "Little Mermaid" story in Jim Valentino's Fractured Fables anthology that was praised by Ain't It Cool News, an adaptation of the 1982 film Tron that was released to tie in with that film's 2010 sequel, and a John Carter of Mars prequel to the 2012 feature film. He also wrote the script for Avengers: Season One, an original graphic novel published to promote the DVD release of The Avengers.

On November 24, 2011, David was one of the balloon handlers who pulled the Spider-Man balloon during the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade.