UPDATED: August 2025

Welcome! I hope you’ve enjoyed my creative exercises with the “Doppelganger” and “Armored Underworld” fanfictions. I have another one coming: “Herald of Darkseid.”

Why fanfiction?

I write fanfiction partly as a creative exercise. Sometimes that writer’s block kicks in, or I’m just bored, and it’s a good way to keep the brain cooking.

Using established characters is actually a bit more work than one would think, especially in the context of smashing worlds together. Sure, we all know iconic characters like Batman and Iron Man, but we rarely have any precedent for the two to be together.

That’s where the creativity comes in.

There’s also the factor of not wanting to wait for someone to ask me to write a story with these characters. I can’t make any money off these efforts, but dammit, I can say, “I wrote a Batman story.”

The Man of Steel curse

When I refer to Man of Steel curse, I’m not referring to what some writers say is the problem with writing Superman. They say he’s an indestructible god, and that makes him both difficult and boring to write.

I have a completely different opinion. I think Superman is a “man” first, “super” second. Treat him as you would a man and it becomes very easy to deal with him and make him relatable/ not boring.

The curse I’m talking about is what Zack Snyder did to Superman in the DC Extended Universe movies, a.k.a. the Snyderverse, a.k.a. the Murderverse.

My beef in a nutshell: Superman was portrayed as a god whose central thesis was, “All I do for you and you don’t worship me even after I murder people?”

It’s been said Superman killing is canon, and I would be cool with Snyder’s choice (note that Christopher Nolan was not, and he’s a far superior filmmaker to Snyder) if we had seen consequences of the action for more than two minutes of a movie.

And I won’t get into the unrelated stupidity of, “Why did you say that name?” as a bonding element.

Snyder most assuredly had not earned the right to play the John Williams Superman theme in Justice League.

For a better model of what Superman can be, see James Gunn’s version of the character.

Or the granddaddy version with Christopher Reeve, which critics claim he killed, but that’s only because we never got to see the deleted scene showing Zod and the gang getting hauled off.

This brings us to the fanboy argument, “Well, how would you deal with Superman?”

Glad you asked! Like to see it, see it go!

Adding Kara Zor-El to the mix

In keeping with the mashup idea, I wanted to bring in SHIELD, as I’ve established them in my comic book universe as the go-to intelligence network (stole that from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, who stole that from the Marvel comics, so we’re all good).

But what would bring SHIELD and Superman together? An alien invasion was obvious, but I didn’t want to retread “Man of Steel” territory by bringing in Zod. Which was a retread of Christopher Reeve’s first two “Superman” movies.

I also had an itch to craft a Supergirl story. But what if, as in the “Batman/ Superman” story “Apocalypse,” (a.k.a. “The Supergirl of Krypton”) Supergirl isn’t so super?

This all ended up as a story entitled “Herald of Darkseid.”

And what the hell? Let’s throw in Captain Marvel!

Now I admit my only reference for Marvel is parts of the excellent Kelly Sue DeConnick run, Kelly Thompson’s run, and a few glimpses from the Civil War 2 storyline. I wasn’t a fan of the CW2 Carol. She seemed too brash, belligerent, and self-righteous, despite her good intentions.

I’ve taken the DeConnick tone, channeled so well by Brie Larson in the MCU movies, for my version of the character. Had a ton of fun with it.

Beware the Herald of Darkseid!

For those interested, this story is part of the fanfiction mashup universe I started with “Doppelganger” and continued with “Armored Underworld.” You don’t have to have read those stories to follow “Herald of Darkseid,” but they help flesh out the world, particularly SHIELD’s involvement in everything.

You can find part one of “Herald of Darkseid” here.

If you like it, send a DM to my Writer Mark Wooden IG page. Maybe I’ll continue the story. I envision Fury organizing a strike team to take the fight to Darkseid.

You won’t believe the mashup I have planned for that.