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Rob Williams, known for his work on Judge Dredd and DC’s Suicide Squad, is writing the Red Dragon series. Yeowell is joining him, along with Patrick Goddard, hot off his stint drawing Rogue Trooper: Blighty Valley. The two will illustrate different eras of the narrative, with Yeowell drawing parts of the story set in the 1960s colored by Dylan Teague, while Goddard draws the present-day segments in black and white.
“Reading Red Dragon’s story arc in Zenith in 1987 broke my heart, and I wasn’t alone in that,” Williams says. “Grant and Steve created this vibrant, deeply flawed, extremely human character and, what’s more, he was a Welsh superhero. He sounded and felt like quite a few people I’ve known over the years growing up in South Wales, just they didn’t have the ability to fly (although there were a few alcoholics and arsonists). When I was asked if I would be interested in telling a Red Dragon story, I started to think about the idea of a Welsh superhero. Of where the UK and Wales was in the 1960s of Red Dragon’s heyday, of showing some of that optimism and bright color, and then telling a story about where Wales, and Britain, is now.”
And that led to Red Dragon. ComicBook had the opportunity to ask Williams, Yeowell, and Goddard a few questions to dig deeper into what Red Dragon is all about. Here’s what they had to say:
It’s been 33 years since the original Zenith ended, and, outside of a one-off in 2000, that universe hasn’t been revisited since. Why now? How did that idea even begin to come to fruition?
Rob Williams: I was asked if I’d have any interest in doing something with the Zenith universe. I think my initial reaction at the time was – probably sensibly – to leave a classic character alone, as anything you produce is probably going to suffer by comparison.
I forget exactly what happened, but at some stage, a possible Red Dragon series was mentioned. And I’m Welsh… So that was a dirty trick! And then, even worse than that, I came up with a story idea and a way into it that got me genuinely excited.
I rather wrestled with whether or not it was a good idea to do this story for a while, as I’m pretty sure it’s not what people are going to expect, or even necessarily crying out for. But the story stuck around in my gut, and in the end I thought, “Well, I’ve let this marinade for a good long time now and I’m still excited by it.”
So, with enormous respect for Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell’s work on Zenith, which I loved when I was growing up reading 2000 AD, I went in.
Steve Yeowell: Rob mentioned to me his idea for a noir story set in present-day Wales featuring Zenith journalist Martin Hand and including flashbacks to Cloud Nine in the 1960s. Almost a year later, editor Matt Smith contacted me asking if I wanted to be involved in what had been fleshed out into Red Dragon, drawing the ’60s sequences that were plotted to appear alongside those of artist Patrick Goddard’s set in the present day.
Patrick Goddard: I got involved when Rob contacted me and floated the idea of the Red Dragon series. It came as a bit of a surprise, as I didn’t think that universe would ever be back. Fortunately, Rob can be persuasive, and when I heard Steve was involved, that eased any concerns about stepping on anybody’s toes.
Red Dragon is a Welsh superhero. As an ignorant American, I may not be fully aware of how significant that might be for readers in the U.K. How does his Welsh origin factor into the story?
PG: One of the big selling points for me was getting to work on one of the only Welsh characters in mainstream comics. I also get to draw parts of Wales that I know, and it’s almost like a character itself in the story (if I pull it off correctly!). As Rob said, my part is more of a detective/ investigative style of story; the landscape plays an important part in the storytelling, so I’m trying to do it justice.
RW: When we first met Red Dragon in the original Zenith strip in the ’80s, he was a Welsh-speaking, Dylan Thomas-quoting alcoholic who, in his heyday in the ’60s, was possibly the most powerful superhuman on the planet. But at some point, he stepped away from Cloud 9, the UK’s superteam, went back to a Welsh village, hid away, and drank himself to death. It was enormously exciting at the age of 16 or whatever I was when I first read Zenith, as a Welsh teenager in the valleys, to see and read a superhero who sounded like people I knew, who acted like some of them.
Red Dragon’s Welshness and the way the character leans into certain romantic Welsh traits are fundamental to the character. So I started thinking about telling a story that shows where Wales was in his heyday, and where it is now, and how being a Welsh character in a team of English superheroes would have made him feel. This is a very Wales-focused series. Three of the four creators on the series are Welsh.
Zenith readers know — and SPOILER WARNING to those who haven’t read it — that Red Dragon doesn’t make it out of Phase One of that story. They also know how his story began, how it ended, and at least one important decision he made in between, with him opting not to join in Cloud 9’s “plan.” What part of Red Dragon’s story still needs to be filled in? What are you most excited about exploring in this character’s history?
RW: Well, for one thing, I’m excited to have Steve join me for the ’60s sequences of our tale. This is a story that’s split in two, one thread showing Red Dragon at his height in London in the cool Britannia of the 1960s, where he’s young and vital and has his whole future ahead of him, the other thread being 2025 and a documentary film crew going to Red Dragon’s village to interview people who knew him.
SY: I’m enjoying drawing a Red Dragon in his prime and at the peak of his powers, unlike the older, broken, and disillusioned Siadwell we met in Phase One. Nineteen-sixties Red Dragon is a product of his times – more optimistic, more charismatic, and more self-confident (outwardly at least).
RW: That contemporary thread is being drawn beautifully by Paddy, who recently collaborated with Garth Ennis on Rogue Trooper: Blighty Valley. I had zero interest in a story that brought Red Dragon back from the dead. I wanted to remain respectful to the brilliant pathos of what Grant and Steve did with Siadwell Rhys in that first Zenith book. But there are still secrets to be uncovered, and to perhaps put some layers on Red Dragon’s corpse along the way.
PG: It’s more of a puzzle for my part, trying to piece the elements together, so I’m enjoying learning how it all goes myself!
