MARVEL PRESS CONFERENCE: ONSLAUGHT REBORN

Marvel Comics staged a press conference regarding its upcoming Onslaught Reborn mini-series, featuring writer Jeph Loeb and artist Rob Liefeld.

Following are highlights:

* As it turns out, Onslaught Reborn is Loeb's first published work since signing an exclusive with Marvel. "I've been working on everthing from Ultimates to Jeff Campbell's Spider-Man project. There's lots of things," he said. "People are going to be sick of me in '07. But, in '06, Jeph Loeb kind of fell out the grid."

* Loeb said it was Liefeld's idea to hinge the project around Onslaught, rather than simply doing Heroes Reborn 2.

* Loeb described the story as "a huge chase that starts in the Marvel Universe, goes into the Heroes Reborn Universe and will eventually spill its way back onto the Marvel Universe."

* Loeb reiterated that the Scarlet Witch's decree of "No more mutants" is the launching point of Onslaught Reborn. "You can't go and do that and wipe all that stuff out without also letting something out," he said.

* In the story, Onslaught goes after Franklin Richards, who created the Heroes Reborn Universe to hide the Marvel heroes from him.

"The idea of this big boogey monster chasing and trying to capture and kill someone's son was a story that obviously rang true for Rob, because he's such a great dad, and my own personal resonance because of how I lost Sam," Loeb said.

Loeb said that "a significant portion" of profits from Onslaught Reborn will go to the college scholarship charity created in his son's honor.

* Loeb and Liefeld left the original Heroes Reborn story after six issues, with Jim Lee's crew finishing it.

"Because we were telling Rob's story from 1-6 what was to come obviously Jim's poeple didn't know," Loeb said. "They brought in good people, James Robinson and Walter Simonson, but Jim and Walter didn't have an idea of what we were doing. It was sort of coming on in the middle of a movie and finishing the movie. And they did as good of a job as they could.

"Now, some of those things we're going to wink back to. We didn't want a situation where people picked up the comic and go, 'Wait, I don't understand a thing. I didn't read this 10 years ago.' We're being very careful to explain exactly what is going on."

Loeb said the story takes place before Civil War and after Avengers Disassembled and House of M. "It all takes place in a very short amount of time," he said.

Loeb said that he and Liefeld have tried to streamline Onslaught as a character.

"Jeph in the first four pages encapsulates and really gives the history of Onslaught," Liefeld said. "There's an opening, the first page, we cover the House of M/Decimation aspect, the "no more mutants," then there's a double-page spread with Xavier and Magneto. Jeph right there covers the essence of the origin of Onslaught, where he comes from.

"Then, by page four, we're into the story. It's very digestable. By page five, you've met Onslaught and you're off and running."

* Liefeld said that Onslaught has had three different visuals through his history. "We actually start him out how he appeared at the end of the mini-series and he was quite monstrous," Liefeld said. "He will slowly regain what I call his more 'regal form' as he regains control of himself toward the end of the story."

* Liefeld recalled Onslaught as "a big-ticket bad guy."

"He's a bad guy you haven't seen in the Marvel Universe in some time," he said. "He rallies the greatest heroes in the Marvel Universe 10 years later."

* Liefeld said he looked at the Heroes Reborn comics, and more recently the collection of Lee's Fantastic Four stories to distinguish the characters from their Marvel Universe counterparts.

"Hulk looked different in the Heroes Reborn Universe. He was noticably bigger. He had much longer hair than he ever had before," he said. "Swordsman, Hawkeye, Hellcat, Iron Man ... they all had different looks. Scarlet Witch had a different look.

"It's cool seeing these versions of these characters again."

Liefeld noted that the costumes in the current Fantastic Four animated series resemble those that Lee created for Heroes Reborn.

"They don't look like the Ultimate costumes and they don't look like the 616 costumes," he said. "They look like the Heroes Reborn costumes.

"It's funny the sort of quiet impact this stuff has had over the years."

* In addition to Onslaught Liefeld said, the Marvel heroes will also have to deal with Loki, the Enchantress, the Masters of Evil (including the Executioner), Ultron and Sub-Mariner.

"I love when the Marvel heroes get together," he said.

* Liefeld noted that Captain America and Iron Man are friends in the story, unlike the adversaries they have become in Civil War.

"They're not trying to kill each other," he said. "I'm drawing these pages with Cap, Iron Man and Thor and they're all fighting together and Cap's barking out orders and directing the Avengers. And I'm like, 'You're not getting that right now.'"

* Liefeld said that Franklin and Bucky act as "the eyes and the ears" of the audience. "It's a perfect viewpoint," he said.

* Asked to compare his art from the 1990s to what he's doing now, Liefeld said, "Everybody has slimmed down. There's not that sort of rage on the page."

Liefeld said he's still guilty of "the gritting of teeth," but not as much as before.

* Asked about his history of lateness, Liefeld noted that every issue of X-Force he did two years ago shipped on time.

"I've got a good head start on this," he said. "I'm two issues finished. By the time the first one ships, I'll be closing out the third issue. I know that I've got to get this out on time."