20+ Mark Waid Quotes On Power, Writing

Mark Waid is an American comic book writer. He is best known for his eight-year run as writer of the DC Comics' title The Flash, as well as his scripting of the limited series Kingdom Come and Superman: Birthright. He has also written extensively for Marvel Comics, where his most notable work includes the limited series Captain America: Man Out of Time and the ongoing series Indestructible Hulk. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Mark Waid on leadership, power, writing.

Super-heroes were created to represent the best in all of us. We should aspire to match their nobility, not their ability to shoot big chrome guns. — Mark Waid

Comics are expensive. Don’t make me resent the money I spend buying yours. Every single moment in your script must either move the story along or demonstrate something important about the characters — preferably both — and every panel that does neither is a sloppy waste of space. — Mark Waid

A superhero is someone who, at some point or in some way, inspires hope or is the enemy of cynicism. Even if you bog it down with political allegory, or even if you're doing celebrity allegory. You still need to take the cynical out of it. — Mark Waid

Not since Walter Gibson has anyone been better suited to The Shadow than Howard Chaykin — Mark Waid

Twenty-two pages is not a lot of space. Believe me. Having written a bazillion comics, I still find myself more often than nine pages into a script and realizing to my horror that I'm only about a quarter of the way through the story I wanted to tell, and the next thing you know, I'm making fresh coffee and tearing up the floorboards to rewrite. — Mark Waid

Never forget that at the end of the day, as a creative person, your résumé is all you've got. — Mark Waid

Does Batman ever NOT have a plan...? — Mark Waid

When you give me something that I love, then I spend a long time drilling down on it and figuring out what it is I love about it. — Mark Waid

Artists are not helper monkeys; they’re not in it to visualize 'your' story, because it stopped being 'your' story the moment you engaged in a collaborative medium. From here on in, it’s also the artist’s story, and if you’re working with an illustrator who’s any good at all, you as a writer have to tamp down any control-freak tendencies you suffer under and relax into the process. — Mark Waid

It's not often that I get to remember and use phrases like "on out my farm" or "powerful ugly" in modern scripts. — Mark Waid

You're a superhero. Shut up and enjoy having superpowers. This makes me crazy. This is why the Marvel movies kick DC movies' asses right and left. Because, I'm not paying $15 for a movie to go watch people being morose about lives that are much more interesting and exciting than mine and they hate them. I'm paying my money to see people sort of revel in doing things that I can't do. — Mark Waid

In a 22-page comic, figuring an average of four to five panels a page and a couple of full-page shots, a writer has maybe a hundred panels at most to tell a story, so every panel he wastes conveying a.) something I already know, b.) something that's a cute gag but does nothing to reveal plot or character, or c.) something I don't need to know is a demonstration of lousy craft. — Mark Waid

Socrates should have written comics. — Mark Waid

Gillen and McKelvie shared their upcoming The Wicked + The Divine with me, and its amazing. Please tell your retailer this week to order! — Mark Waid

Marvel has always been to a large extent the world around us. It has to be evocative of the world around us, the feelings people are feeling. You take real-world concerns and you put a Marvel face on it. — Mark Waid

I was a teenager, and I went to see the Superman movie, and up to the point I walked into that movie, I was a kid with no direction and no real purpose and no strong parental figures, and kind of aimless. I walked out of that movie knowing that whatever my life was going to be from then on, it had to have something to do with Superman, because something touched me emotionally with Christopher Reeve's performance. — Mark Waid

In the long run, the quality of your work is all that matters. That is your only resumé. Be professional. Make sure your editor or publisher can always reach you. Do what's asked of you if your conscience can bear it. — Mark Waid

I like the brighter, shinier, happier comic-book material on a personal level, but I also think the best stories are told where you just don't know from page to page or moment to moment when the sucker-punches are coming. — Mark Waid

In the world of comics, Jack Kirby and Will Eisner may have been more influential artists, but Joe Kubert was its most influential man. Even if he were to be remembered solely for his body of illustration work, he’d still be one of the greats, but by opening the Kubert School in 1976, he was able to personally mentor and educate literally thousands of successful artists who owe their careers to his teachings. — Mark Waid

Each time I think I've made a connection with someone... once they find out what I can do, whether it's hours or days later, everything changes. Invariably they freak. They get retroactively paranoid, wondering what else Clark Kent is hiding from them. — Mark Waid

Life Lessons by Mark Waid

1. Mark Waid's work emphasizes the power of storytelling and the importance of creating strong, relatable characters.
2. His stories often explore themes of morality and justice, showing how these concepts can be applied to real-world issues.
3. Waid's work is a reminder that stories can be used to inspire and motivate people to make positive changes in their lives and in the world.