'Grayson' living large with a superhero superspy

Brian Truitt | USA TODAY

Come to the DC Comics series Grayson for the superhero spy hijinks, stay for the zombie orca with legs.

Since taking the former Nightwing into the world of international espionage, co-writers Tom King and Tim Seeley have embraced the core character of Dick Grayson while also surrounding him with colorful characters old and new as well as situations that are crazier than what he'd find back in Gotham City.

"Part of it is just recognizing stuff that's cool and keeping it around when it works," says Seeley.

"Dick is an evolving character," King adds, "and we can't just place him in stasis saying, 'This is where he's gonna go.' "

While most of the DC Universe still thinks Grayson's dead in the aftermath of Forever Evil, Batman assigned his very-much-alive former sidekick to go undercover in the Spyral organization.

Illustrated by Mikel Janin, the first five issues have featured Grayson (code name "Agent 37") and fellow agent Helena Bertinelli (aka "Matron") on the trail of various missing organs from the metahuman named Paragon, putting them at odds with the masked man known as Midnighter.

The tension turns into a explosive situation in Grayson No. 6 (out Wednesday) where, in addition to running into a walking killer whale transformed by nanites on Gageo-Do Island, Grayson is on the hunt for the Paragon's brain and faces off in a huge fight with Midnighter, who was at one time affiliated with Stormwatch but now works for the mysterious group known as the God Garden.

The reason why the writers chose to use Midnighter is because he's an homage to Grayson's Dark Knight pal, says Seeley, one of the many writers on DC's weekly Batman Eternal. "Having this substitute for Batman but with a different agenda makes for some pretty good Dick Grayson characterization."

The series started out with the two men wanting the same thing — and Midnighter getting annoyed in the process — but incidents in the previous issue made it personal for Midnighter, King says. "Dick basically backslapped him and he's ready to punch back."

The ending of the new chapter, however, will reveal Midnighter's real employer and what the God Garden actually is, Seeley teases. "We're going to get a lot of cool mileage out of that idea later. It also opens up the possibility for a lot of different characters to work for the God Garden."

The comic has had many side players thus far, including enigmatic Spyral head man Mr. Minos and the excitable spies-in-training at St. Hadrian's Finishing School for Girls. How they fit into the whole story comes to light — as well as Minos' true agenda and the conclusion of the Paragon hunt — in March's cliffhanger-y issue 8 and issue 9 in June following DC's two-month line-wide Convergence event.

The first arc was about establishing Dick as a functioning spy, according to King. When the series returns, the scope of Grayson will broaden as it digs into how his new gig affects the rest of the DC Universe.

"Al those old relationships exist, he doesn't exist in a silo, and we want to explore that impact," says King, who also is co-writing an upcoming Teen Titans annual.

He adds that Helena recently helping Grayson and lying to Spyral was a really big moment — "We underplayed it but you're going to see that play out going forward" — but their relationship is going to create tension within the Bat-family as more and more of Grayson's old Gotham confidantes get involved in the series.

From the beginning, it was important to Seeley that they maintained Grayson's core character so that it didn't get lost in a new genre — unlike Bruce Wayne, who also lost his parents to tragedy, Grayson actually enjoys being a superhero rather than getting broody about it.

For King, that's what makes him so special.

"The fact he was born a performer and he comes from such a dark background, he's overcome that," the co-writer says. "When Spider-Man makes a joke, he's hiding the panic underneath. When Dick makes a joke, he's really trying to make you laugh, This is something he wants to do and something he's good at."

The two scribes had never met before Grayson and now are friends, and they've also won over fans, some of whom initially balked at the idea of Dick Grayson being a secret agent.

"This is my first time in mass media dealing with something that people really care about, and I was just amazed by the trust people had in us," says King, a former CIA counterterrorism operations officer.

"At this point, the book's got enough buzz and success that we're not feeling like we ruined Nightwing for everyone," Seeley figures. "We did the right thing."