Sony's Powers debuted yesterday on their PlayStation Network, marking the end of a long process for one Brian Michael Bendis - the writer and co-creator of the original comic series. Having worked with the concept for over fifteen years, Bendis finally got a chance to reflect on the outcome of his hard work in a recent interview with THR. He began by commenting on how he handled working on both the Powers comic-book and television properties at the same time:
"I compartmentalize them in a weird way. It's all Powers, but there's the comic, and then there's the show — and that's what I wanted, I wanted the show to be its own entity and not an offset of the book, or the book to be an offset of the show. I wanted them to live in their own universes... I wanted the show to be the best television version of the idea, while the comic can be the comic."
He then clarified the relationship between the comic and the show, and the method in which Powers was adapted from page to screen - drawing inspiration from the likes of AMC's The Walking Dead, and Marvel's Iron Man:
"All the elements of the show are things that have happened in the book — but what's cool is that Charlie [Huston] was very smart. He cherry-picked the things from the book that would make the best show, that would make the best television... For our fans, that's great: they don't know what's going to happen. They're not sure. It's something that Walking Dead does really well, too. You might read the comics, but watching the show, you're still not sure what's going to happen."
"I think that a faithful adaptation sometimes can be very leaden. It can be very flat, very lifeless if you try to be too faithful. It can just sit there. Having consulted on the Marvel movies, that's something I've learned. You watch the first Iron Man movie, and it's not based on anything, but it certainly feels like Iron Man. Part of that is, it's only beholden to the idea of the character, and that stuck with me as we made our choices going forward."
Finally, Bendis commented on how Powers' proceedural focus always superceeded its "supehero element" - and how it stands out from the rest of the comic-book TV crowd:
"That was the biggest hurdle: it's a cop show, and when there's a superhero element, a lot of people want to lean too heavily on the superhero element, and that's what we're trying not to. Finding that balance is one of the struggles of the show."
"It's very cool that there's a lot of comic book-related television projects being made right now, but I think that what Powers is going to offer, and what it's always offered, is that we're an independent comic... It's a scrappy independent look at superheroes in a way that other people haven't been able to do. I think for people who're looking for something a little more mature, something that you're not going to see on network television"
Powers debuted on the PlayStation Network Tuesday 10/03, and the first episode is available on YouTube to watch below (if you're from the US...). For more from Bendis, you can check out the full interview over at THR. Are you guys excited to watch the rest of the series, or will you be giving this one a miss? Let us know in the comments below!