The phone rang. It was Paul Levitz, calling to inform me that, sorry, there was no way DC could match my Marvel page rate. Not a problem, said I. This was BATMAN!

So I returned to waiting. And waiting. And waiting. A full month went by before the editor called to tell me they were finally sending me the first script. I was annoyed, but—-BATMAN! So the script arrived and I started work. I was disappointed to find that the “story” was one of my least favorite kinds: page after page of recreating existing panels from old stories but——BATMAN!

While this was going on, Jim Shooter called, not at all happy to have learned I was doing a job for DC. He called me a “quisling”, but suggested a solution. Do the book for Marvel. Write and draw all three issues, and they’d keep them in the drawer until such time as Marvel started publishing the DC characters. Shooter’s Marvel RED and Marvel BLUE scheme. Since I kinda liked the idea of this work seeing print in my lifetime, I told Shooter no, and finished the first issue for DC.

And waited for the second script. And waited. And waited.

Two months went by. The editor called. Sorry for the delay, but he would soon be sending me the first HALF of the second issue. Don’t bother, said I. I’d made it abundantly clear I had a three month window in which I could do this project, and that window was now closed.

A short time later, Levitz called me again. He offered DOUBLE my Marvel rate if I would finish the job. I stood my ground. After all, it wasn’t about money. It was about BATMAN. But now, it was about my reputation as a professional.

Levitz later announced that I would not be finishing (as I recall he blamed “scheduling conflicts”) and that Jim Aparo was being called in to ink my “very loose pencils “. (Terry Austin had been set to ink, and had been sent pages from the first issue. He declared the pencils he’d seen were every bit as tight as what I had been giving him on X-MEN.)

So, my first job for DC came and went, and it was a long time before I worked for them again.