EXCLUSIVE! Ron Marz talks WITCHBLADE

While attending this year’s Comic-Con International I was able to sit down with the engaging literary maestro, Ron Marz.

UTF: My first question would be, why did you decide to come back to Witchblade after you already had such a successful initial run?

Ron Marz: The simple answer is, they asked. They decided they wanted to bring some different people on to Artifacts. We had some contest winners and they asked me if I would switch over to Witchblade and I absolutely said yes. It’s like coming home again.

UTF: As you continue to shape the second run, where do you see Sara Pezzini , as a character, going? Because last time you got her pregnant, so to speak, and ended the universe.

Ron Marz: Well, let’s get this right. It wasn’t like I got her pregnant, because my wife would be really unhappy with that. [laughs]

Obviously, when I came back to the book we didn’t want to just keep doing the same thing that we had been doing. We wanted to put Sara in a different context, in a different place so that’s why she’s now a sheriff in an upstate town and where the series will go from here is a sense of figuring out what that means for her. Is that where she belongs? Or does she belong somewhere else? Does New York City pull her back in?

UTF: Well, that sounds great. So you’re now working with Laura Braga instead of Stjepan Šejić, how’s that going?

Ron Marz:Laura‘s great. She was absolutely my choice to do the book. When we started looking around for an artist, I had kind of become aware of her stuff on Twitter and looked at her site and just thought, “Man, she’s awesome. She would be a perfect fit for Witchblade,” and showed her stuff to Top Cow. They had her do an 8-page story that I wrote, really kind of as a test, to see if she could handle the monthly grind and the sequentials that go along with it. She did a great job. That short story appeared in issue #175, in fact.

That was actually the first time she drew Witchblade, and I couldn’t be happier with her. I mean, obviously working with Stjepan is a completely different thing. He’s essentially a painter while Laura‘s doing black and white work with Betsy [Gonia] coloring it. I love working with both of them. It’s just a different experience for either one and thankfully I get to continue with Stjepan on other things, so I kind of get my cake and eat it too.

UTF: I have one last question. We have lots of fanboys and fangirls who are hungry to get into comics or become a writer of some kind in the entertainment industry. Do you have any words of advice for them?

Ron Marz: I think any advice is such a loaded question because it’s such a huge topic. I think what most of it boils down to is: write the stories that you want to tell. Don’t write what you think the audience wants. Don’t write what you think will please people. Write the story that entertains you. You, as the writer, have to be your audience first and foremost. I think doing anything other than that just kind of prostitutes what you are trying to do and you’re not as invested in it as you should be.

Figure out what’s inspiring to you as a writer, figure out the kind of stories you want to tell, and pursue that, and then hope the audience comes along with you.

I want to take the time to thank Mr. Ron Marz for chatting with me. It was a great pleasure and I can speak for the UTF staff when I say we can’t wait to see what he does with Witchblade during his second run.

So what did you think of the interview my fellow fanboys and fangirls?

Sound off with your thoughts and opinions in the comments section below!