Jed MacKay Talks Nova: Centurion and Exploring Marvel's Cosmic Universe

Jed MacKay is one of the most prominent current voices for Marvel Comics, writing everything from Moon Knight, The Avengers, Black Cat, Doctor Strange, and the X-Men. MacKay’s most recent release is Nova: Centurion with Alvaro Lopez and Mattia Iacono! The book, spinning out of the recent Imperial event, sees Richard Rider continue on as the last Nova Corps member standing. I spoke with MacKay about the book, Richard Rider, and exploring the Marvel cosmic universe. Check out our conversation below.

What's your own personal experience with Nova and how did you get on board with Imperial and now the next chapter of Nova's story?

Nova was one of those characters I always knew about, but I don't think I had a whole lot of exposure to him until Annihilation hit, and as it surely did for a lot of people, it hit hard. As for Imperial, it was pretty simple- Annalise Bissa asked me if I'd want to write Nova, as she was looking to get those books cast. I promptly told her no, that I was too busy. But the bug had been put in my head, and despite turning down the book, I couldn't help thinking of what I could do with the character, about exploring some of that Marvel space stuff that I loved, so I emailed her back after a couple hours and took it back and said I'd do it, haha.

What's it like to work with Alvaro and Mattia on this book? The sense of scale, the humor, and the personalities  (Gar-Vann and Kroth made me chuckle) really shine through. 

Álvaro and Mattia have been great to work with - talking through design stuff early on with Álvaro was really lovely, as we had extremely similar ideas on how things should look and work. Álvaro caught the tone I was hoping for almost immediately, and it's all come together in a really lovely way.

The juxtaposition between the grandness of Marvel's cosmic universe and the loneliness of Richard is felt — how does he find the courage to continue after everything has happened? Do you feel there needs to be a lot of humor to balance out the tragedy?

I think a lot of it stems from the simple question he asks himself: if I don't do it, who will?  Rich keeps going because he has to - we get into it a bit in #4, unpacking his motivations a bit. As for tragedy, I think that humour does provide an important balance- this is a Nova story where the stakes are (at this point) very personal. The universe isn't on the line here - but that doesn't make what Rich is trying to do any less important. He's responsible for the entire memory of Xandar and the Nova Corps. If he fails, then it's all gone, cast on the solar winds. Because, ultimately, Rich knows the answer to the question he asks himself: if I don't do it, no one else will.

How much did Annihilation inspire this book? I did not expect to see Ravenous again and Cammi's appearance is a welcome sight. Besides money, Cammi's safety seems to be a major motivator for Richard. I assume he doesn't want to see more people close to him perish?

Annihilation looms large over Marvel Cosmic, and this book is no different. The Annihilation War was a top-tier Marvel story, and I think the way it echoes forward into the present is proof of that. It's an event that left its mark on almost every Marvel Cosmic character, and perhaps Nova most of all, so it's fun to have the chance to go back to it, particularly with Nova going to settle Ravenous' hash. As for Cammi, she's also a veteran of the war, but I should add that my fondness for her comes from Avengers Area/Underground, where we got to see the awful little space pirate she became. Of course, to Rich, she's still the awful Earther refugee kid, so he's got some catching up to do.

Half-jokingly, can you do a cosmic story without Pip the Troll? What's your read on him? (he is hilarious in this book).

I mean, you could do a cosmic story without Pip, but why bother? The Starlin space stuff, Captain Marvel and Warlock were a big deal for me in high school, so dragging Pip into this book is my nod to those very formative comics. The thing with Pip is he's not exactly a cypher- you get his deal pretty much from the get-go.

Speaking of Marvel's cosmic side, when writing a book like this, you have the chance to really explore the greater Marvel Universe. What challenges does such a potentially BIG story present? 

Well, the biggest challenge is that space books historically don't sell very well- people just don't buy them like they do more Earth-bound titles, so it's tough to keep one going for the kind of length that I'd like to write Nova for. So I guess we'll see!

Sam Alexander... what are your thoughts on the character, and is he out there somewhere? Asking for no reason.

I think Sam's a great character! He's definitely out there, and if we get the chance, I'm looking forward to seeing what exactly he's up to!

Thanks to MacKay for taking the time for this conversation. Nova: Centurion #1 is in comic book stores now!