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Writer Spotlight: Ryan North

Ryan North (@ryannorth) is a New York Times-bestselling and Eisner-winning writer who once messed up walking his dog so badly it made the news. His recent work includes the nonfiction How To Invent Everything, the semi-fictional graphic novel adaptation of Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five, and the so-far-fictional Unbeatable Squirrel Girl series for Marvel. Ryan lives in Toronto, where he writes for video games, television, and his long-running webcomic Dinosaur Comics. We chatted with him about his new book, How to Take Over the World: Practical Schemes and Scientific Solutions for the Aspiring Supervillain. Be sure to click through to the end for dinosaurs.

So, what made you want to create a guide to taking over the world? What makes you qualified to be taking on this very important public service?

I've been writing superhero comics for Marvel and DC for years, and part of the job is coming up with these big ambitious charismatic plots for the villains to pull off (throwing your enemies into the sun, digging a hole to the Earth's core, becoming immortal, that sort of thing). I thought it would be fun to explore how credible they are here in the real world, where we don't have things like shrink rays and mind-control helmets. So really, it's a book exploring the edges of science and technology through the lens of comic book supervillainy.

That, and I think having a book in your house with "HOW TO TAKE OVER THE WORLD" on the spine is inarguably awesome.

Who is this book for? What makes an aspiring supervillain?

One thing I kept in mind when writing the book is that I always wanted to talk about super-crime, big huge heists that have never been done before, rather than the stuff that happens routinely here in the real world. Robbing a bank is normal crime. Stealing a bank is when you get into the fun space of super-crime.

There are a couple reasons for that: real-world villainy is horrible and dehumanizing, and I'm absolutely not qualified to write about it, but the idea of trying to pull off comic book super-crime in the real world is interesting and fun, and I am absolutely willing and able to think those plots through to their logical conclusions. You want a secret base? Terrific, but you're going to need a way to keep it secret—so let's look at the challenges of living long-term at sea, or underground, or underwater, or in space, or on Mars, etc. And henchpeople require air and food and water—so now we need to think about farming in these conditions and generating power to support all of that. But really, the biggest challenge is that people also get weird and sad when locked alone together, so let's lock eight people in a room together for two years and see what happens, by which I mean, let's study the IRL Biosphere 2 experiment where they did precisely that, and everyone went more than a little crazy. As soon as you take these plots seriously and start thinking things through to their logical conclusions, a lot of really interesting science and history and sociology falls out.

In the book, I define supervillainy as when someone outside existing power structures accomplishes something that's not getting done on its own. The fun thing about that is that the exact same definition applies to superheroes. So really, it's for anyone who wants to learn more about the world around them through this fun fictional lens, and especially those who have read the news and thought, "You know what? I could do it better."

Given a choice, which scheme would be your preferred mode of world domination, and why?

There's a chapter where we look at the problem of immortality, which sounds like complete fantasy until you look at all these tech bros who desperately don't want to die and are spending fabulous amounts of money on trying to delay it for as long as possible, or even indefinitely. We look at the actual science of aging and the technologies people are trying to develop to stop it, but for me, the most interesting part happens when you say, "okay, so assume any of this works. What then?"

Put aside the fact that very few people would look at our planet with seven billion people on it and say, "You know what? This world needs more people. Oh, and they should never die." Also, put aside the fact that death is a safety valve on human civilization, where even the worst people we've ever produced can't hang on to power forever because they too will die. The real issue is whether you put your chips on cryonics or uploading your brain to a computer or cloning or telomere extension or whatever. These are all medical or technological interventions, which means they all cost money—and the second you have an immortality scheme that costs money, you've created this almost cartoonish dystopia where rich people get to live forever, and poor people don't. I don't see a way around it—immortality is something that would absolutely be horrible for both the planet and for us as a civilization.

But!

If you're the only one who's immortal—if you discover it and hide it from the world and never share your technology, then all those issues just disappear. Now immortality is just this fun thing you're doing, and the rest of the world doesn't have to suffer. You get all the benefits of living indefinitely, learning more than the rest of us ever will, and nobody else has to suffer! For me, that's the peak supervillain mindset: wanting to make the world a better place but ending up helping only yourself. That's the scheme in the book I'd do. Not take over the place, but just...stick around and watch it for a lot longer.

What's your writing process like? How do you merge the scientific bits with the fun bits?

When I'm writing, I'm also reading, so I'm always trying to keep myself entertained. If it was boring to write, it'll be boring to read! And when I'm re-reading, I'm always looking for ways to keep it funny. I believe we learn so much easier when we're having fun, so that's what I'm always trying to hit.

That said, my process is to write alone where nobody can see me because when I'm writing jokes, the only way to know that they're working is if I make myself laugh, and it's so embarrassing to be that guy at the coffee shop who's typing and then pausing to laugh out loud at his own stuff. Just mortifying. I, therefore, write in an empty room to hide from the shame of my craft, lol.

What does the Tumblr of an aspiring supervillain look like? What's it called? What does it contain? Are they vocal about their super-villainy, or are they more of a lurker?

Okay, so Doctor Doom's Tumblr is clearly full of reblogs with his self-aggrandizing additions in the tags, and he's probably got a macro to type out "#FOOLS!!" because he uses it so often. He's also always starting fights with strangers and secretly proud when a post he started gets a ton of notes because Doom conquers all.

On the other hand, someone like Poison Ivy definitely has this really beautiful, well-curated feed. She fills it with some really compelling environmental arguments and gorgeous pictures of her plants. You probably wouldn't even notice she's a villain until she takes over Gotham with giant venus flytraps that can also walk around somehow.

And finally, someone like the Riddler just has the worst Tumblr in existence, auto-playing midi files and sparkles that follow your cursor around, except the sparkles are question marks. It's filled with old memes, and he keeps posting bad riddles that you can easily Google the answers to, and it's pretty clear he got them off Google too.

These are my correct opinions.

How do you get someone to publish a book that incites world dominance?

Haha, well, I don't expect anyone to actually do any of the schemes in the book—mainly because I priced them all out, and you need 56 billion dollars, all in, just to start! But the real answer is that using a fictional lens to explore actual nonfiction is something that works. It's a fun thought experiment!

Can you talk about working with illustrator Carly Monardo?

Carly is the best, and I was so pleased to work with her on this. Basically, I'd call her up, and I'd talk about the chapter and what I thought an illustration could be for various parts, and she'd say, "okay, but what about this idea instead" and come up with something way better.

It was her idea to have a single supervillain recur throughout the book—so as you're learning these plots, this character's doing them right alongside you, and you have this companion throughout. She's so great (both Carly and the supervillain we came up with), and her work totally elevates the book.

That said, in the end, I asked her what we should name our new supervillain, and she said, "Patricia." And I said, "Why?" and she said, "So that her full name is Patricia Chaddams," and I said "Why?" and she said, "So then, for short, her name is Pat Chaddams," and I said "Huh?" and she said, "So that way it sounds like the 1998 Robin Williams vehicle Patch Adams." So uh, I suppose you take the good with the bad.

What's the best piece of advice you've ever received as a writer? Do you have any advice for budding writers of humorous science-based nonfiction?

In comics, the best advice I ever got was "your fundamental unit of story is the page," which means to always keep in mind how it'll work when it's printed and in someone's hand and how turn-the-page reveals work. But when you're writing prose, that doesn't apply because you don't (usually) know where on the page your words will land!

My best advice for people interested in science writing, science communication, or really any sort of writing is this: read outside your genre. People who only read comics end up writing comics that sound an awful lot like the comics that already exist. People who only read nonfiction write nonfiction that's also very samey. But when you read stuff that doesn't typically cross over, you're seeing stuff that others aren't, and you can start drawing connections nobody else is seeing. Don't turn your nose up at other genres just because they're not what you normally read or write. I would much rather read a sci-fi novel from someone who's read a ton of steamy romance novels than someone who's only read a bunch of other sci-fi novels, you know?

Who's your favorite supervillain of all time?

Doctor Doom. He's a scientist who wears a metal suit, and he knows magic. Plus, he's got a cape. What's not to like?

After perfecting schemes to take over the world, what's next for you?

Keep writing Dinosaur Comics (@qwantzfeed baby!) and hopefully keep getting to write weird little books that get to do things like "take an absurd premise absolutely seriously." It's my new favorite genre.

#writer spotlight #ryan north #How to Take Over the world #Practical Schemes and Scientific Solutions for the Aspiring Supervillain #reading room #reading recs #book recs #suppervillainy #humor #science #booklr #writers on tumblr #writing advice #dinosaurs!

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qlala · 3 years

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Hi here's my money for that Barry and Len "guilt versus shame" essay. Thanks! 💰💰💰💰💰 (I drew the dollar signs on the bags myself. I'm crafty)

Anon when I said essay, I meant essay. But alright. Here you go. for you and your hand-drawn dollar signs. Come, take this journey with me. (A journey of character analysis for fun—please, no one take this as reliable psychology.)

As I said, I consider the main conflict between Barry and Leonard not one of good versus evil, but of guilt versus shame. Specifically, the difference between them is that Barry is a character motivated by guilt, while Len is motivated by shame.

(And to get this out of the way - I’m not talking about sexuality, but how Barry and Len relate to the world and other people. I don’t think Len is the least bit ashamed of his sexuality; Wentworth Miller has always said that Len is someone who knows exactly who he is, and I think that’s true).

A more accurate way of talking might be to say that guilt-driven characters are motivated by love, while shame-driven characters are motivated by respect.

I’m going to start with Barry, because guilt-motivated characters tend to be much more straight-forward than shame-driven characters. Barry grew up (with some bumps along the way) in supportive, loving homes. His parents, and later Joe, always treated him with love, which allows Barry to love himself and other people.

Treating children with love is the most basic respect their guardians can afford them, and they’ll always have that basic core of respect to fall back on in the face of outside adversity. (Barry is remarkably hard to ruffle with insults—antagonists always have to target the people he loves, because he just… does not rise to the bait when it’s just his own pride on the line.)

This kind of early exposure to love and respect are fundamental to being able to feel guilt about harming others later in life. Barry was raised to respect and love other people (in the general, “love your fellow man” sense), so he would feel guilty if he hurt someone innocent. The core sense of self-respect and self-love that Barry developed in childhood means Barry’s sense of self can always take the hit when he feels guilty about hurting other people.

Guilt makes us feel, temporarily, unloveable. But because Barry was raised to feel fundamentally deserving of love, he can afford to feel briefly unloveable when he hurts other people—it just means he needs to make amends, and then he’ll be worthy of that love again.

That’s why Barry’s a guilt-driven (or love-driven) character: when he interacts with the world, the thing he’s most afraid of losing is love. He’s never been put in a position where he feels like what he’s missing is respect.

And that’s where he and Len differ. Len’s not guilt- or love-driven; he’s shame-driven.

Len appears to feel zero guilt for hurting innocent people, at least when we first meet him in season 1. And the reason for that is Lewis. As I mentioned, love is a prerequisite for guilt. And unlike Barry, Len wasn’t brought up in a loving home. I highly doubt that Lewis’s love for Len was ever freely given, even before he became physically abusive. And if it was, that sense of self was absolutely ripped away from Len when that abuse started.

As I mentioned, treating children with love is the most basic respect their guardians can give them. By withholding that love, Lewis taught Len that he was inherently worthy of neither love nor respect. Raised in that environment, where violence was the way Len saw power exerted over others, the natural response was for Len to seek out respect, not love. He had nothing to gain from loving others—and therefore, from feeling guilt—because he’d already been taught he could survive without love. What he couldn’t survive without was respect, because disrespect meant becoming the object of violence—first from his father, and later, from the criminal justice system.

(Prison is a conversation for another day, but suffice to say, the dehumanizing treatment incarcerated people face parallels that childhood lack of love, robs them of the self-respect and self-love they need to have healthy relationships with other people, and increases the likelihood that they’ll commit violent crimes, not reduces it).

So Len did whatever it took to survive, and survival meant accumulating respect. There’s an obvious cure to this obsession with respect, of course: 1) love, and 2) safety.

Now, as eager as I am to jump into how Barry helped Len break the cycle of violence, Barry’s not the source of love I want to talk about here. Barry comes in later; when I talk about the love that saved Leonard, I’m talking about Lisa.

Because, listen—I’m as exhausted as you are by the trope of “female loved one is male character’s humanity,” especially where, like in some of the Flash comics, it means killing off Lisa to make Leonard a more ruthless (and, I guess the the theory goes, interesting?) villain. But Lisa isn’t just some crack in Len’s armor; she fundamentally changed Len’s life when she was born.

Len was already somewhere between thirteen and sixteen by the time Lisa was born; for the sake of convenience, let’s put him around 15. (For some more detailed meta about the Sniblings' ages, check out this excellent post by @coldtomyflash). If Len was five when Lewis went to prison, and ten when Lewis came out a much more violent man (see: everything I said about prison earlier), that means Len experienced several years of incredibly traumatic treatment before Lisa was born.

He and Mick were in juvie together at least once when Len was still young enough to be “the smallest kid in there,” and Len was nearly killed. Mick saved him, yes, but the experience had to further numb Len to guilt and reinforce that violence and respect were the only real paths to survival.

And then, Lisa. Len clearly, canonically loves Lisa from the moment she’s born. We know nothing about either of their mothers (and it is pretty likely, given the 15-year age gap between them, that they have different mothers), but they’re clearly both out of the picture—Lisa says Len raised her. Len raised her! Fifteen years old, three years away from being free and clear of Lewis’s house forever, and Len stays to raise her.

Lisa is absolutely the one person keeping Len from sliding fully head-first into the path carved for him by Lewis and reinforced by the prison system. He is still primarily shame- and respect-driven—we see him kill people without any guilt, hell, he tries to derail a train with children on board in season one just to see what Barry will do.

But Lisa taught Len that he’s deserving of love and capable of loving others, and because of that, Len cannot, will not respect Lewis for his violence he rains on them both.It leaves open a door in his mind: Lisa doesn’t deserve to be treated that way, which could mean, if he could ever afford to consider it, that he didn’t deserve to be treated that way, either.

It’s why Barry is so unbelievably smug at the end of “Family of Rogues.” He’s figured it out; he wouldn’t put it in terms like guilt and shame, but he’s cracked it all the same. He always knew Len was like him, was someone who had been forced into violence by his circumstances, and now he has proof. Barry is remarkably unconcerned that Len shot Lewis; he’s briefly surprised, sure, but by the end of the episode he’s visiting Len in Iron Heights and goading him about the good in him.

And that’s where Barry comes in. He’s the crucial second ingredient to that cure for shame—he’s the safety.

He blazes into Len’s life and praises him for things no one else ever praised him for: for his morals, for his mercy, for the way he loves Lisa. He gives him an acceptable out to stop killing (he appeals to his vanity, says he’s good enough at what he does that he doesn’t need to hurt innocents, and they both know it’s an excuse), and he makes it clear that he respects not Len’s capacity for violence, but his desire to escape the need for it.

He also offers Len protection to start making that transition. Len knows, even if neither of them say it, that Barry would drop everything to help him if he called. When Len’s reluctant do-gooding puts him in harm’s way, like with King Shark in ARGUS, Barry does drop everything. He gives up a tool that could save Iris’s life to save Len’s instead. This is not me hating on westallen at all—Barry’s sense of obligation to Len is just that strong. He knows he’s put Len on slippery ground by helping extract him from the safety net he’d built himself out of violence.

And that’s Barry’s guilt drive in action—because yeah, he loves Len. He cares about him, and he respects him, and that’s love to Barry. He just wants to give Len the chance to love people that way, too. And in the end, Len, despite all his misgivings, ends up letting him.

#and then he. and then he d. he di-#i'm going to go stare into the ocean #leonard snart #barry allen #coldflash #to an extent. and that extent is that i think they should kiss on the mouth #lisa snart #the sniblings #abuse mention tw //#meta #i might get into how barry's childhood tracks a little closer to len's than i gave him credit for in this post but like #another post for another day

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