Baltimore Comic Con '07, day 2

Here's the Baltimore Comic Con, day 2. The held the DC Universe panel, which ran the full 1:45, yet Jim Shooter was on the panel. Sounds like the Shooter panel was folded into the DC one, unless Shooter left early.

12:00-1:45 DC Universe
The crisis is over, isn’t it? Or is this just the beginning with the DCU counting down and the Monitors watching closely? Come catch-up, have your questions answered, and learn what lies ahead for the DCU in this slide show presentation and Q&A moderated by Dan DiDio, Senior VP/Executive Editor DCU, and Bob Wayne, VP – Sales, with a bevy of special guests!

Via Newsarama:

• Shooter talked about his run on the Legion, pointing out that he started writing Legion 42 years ago, and the last time he wrote the characters was 30 years ago. "That's got to be some kind of record," he said. Shooter said the series will be keeping the continuity that has been built during
  
  Shooter said the run will start with an epic 16-issue story -- pointing out that of course there will be smaller stories within the larger story. "The two main villains are Geoff Johns and Brad Meltzer, who are stealing the Legion," he joked. He said he's enjoying revisiting the characters, but is coming up with "new and different stuff" as well. "The Legionnaires are all about defending life, so I like the idea of them going out and doing that," he said, adding that comics characters have a "tendency to hang around the HQ until somebody attacks you," and he wants them to go out and make things happen.
  
  Waid said he's thrilled that Shooter is taking over the version of the Legion that he began, adding that he had wanted -- way back when he was doing Action Comics Weekly -- to have Shooter do a Legion Academy comic for DC, but it never happened. "If I'm going to pass the baton to anybody, there's nobody I'd rather pass it to," Waid said.
  
  
• Can Shooter speak to him owning the Legion characters because he wrote his first Legion issues when he was 13 years old? Shooter said he knew what he was doing when he signed the characters over -- he knew DC would own them. He said he was told, when he was writing for Marvel, that he could actually sue DC for ownership because he was not an adult when he signed over the characters -- and there had been no contact with his parents by DC. "I thought about it," he said. "And I said, 'No. I knew what I was doing at the time'" Shooter said it would be "dishonorable to backtrack on that deal."
  
  Didio joked, "Is somebody taping this, please?"
  
  Shooter said he later found out that Ditko was underage when he signed over Spider-Man. "If it's good enough for Steve, it's good enough for me."
  
  
• How does it feel to write something that you have to hand off to other people? Shooter: "You have to learn to let it go, and I've had to many times," he said, adding that even though things change, they're still the same basic concepts. "When they asked me to come back to Legion, they had changed the characters, but the basic characters, my stuff was still there." Waid: "You're contributing to a larger mythology, and you can't be selfish about that."
  
  
• Are Justice League Unlimited and Teen Titans Go gone because of the new kids line for Johnny DC? Didio: JLU will run to the middle of next year at least. "If sales support the number of kids books out there, we'll keep them out there. Those books were built to support television series that are no longer creating new material." He added that Legion of Super-Heroes will continue because the series is still out there.

1:00-1:50 Spotlight on Jim Shooter
From his first work on Legion of Super-Heroes at age 13 to serving as Editor-in-Chief of Marvel Comics to founding Valiant, Defiant and Broadway, Jim Shooter has been a force to be reckoned with in comics. After years of little involvement with the industry, he has reentered the field with renewed vigor. His new firm, Illustrated Media, produces custom comics, and he’ll have at least one big project announced this weekend. Come hear what’s going on with this comics legend.