But John is a character I’ve accidently written in other places. What I love about John Constantine, and this will sound strange, is that he’s extremely honest. I don’t mean that in the sense that he’s an honest person when he deals with other people, because he’s not; he’s a liar and a cheat and a con man and a nasty piece of work. But he’s honest with himself. He’s self-aware. He knows who and what he is and doesn’t pretend to be a hero. He doesn’t pretend to be good as gold. He’s utterly guilt ridden because he knows he’s done all the wrong things for all the right reasons and he will continue to do so because he can’t stop. So he’s a bastard with a conscience, and I feel like that describes me (laughs). So, that’s what has always drawn to the character.

You’re not going to pick my pocket or turn me into anything, are you?

Maybe. No. (laughs).

So talk about how you got the Constantine gig. He was on the DC side of things, now he’s on the, well, not Vertigo side of things. Were you involved in pulling him over to the Sandman Universe?

So the Sandman Universe is four titles based on ideas that Neil had when he decided that there were more Sandman stories to be told. So he handpicked four writers, myself included, to come up with the directions. A new editor came in to what was at the time still Vertigo, and part of the demand, this was Chris Conroy, amazing guy, his dream was to bring back Hellblazer. That was part of the deal. In doing so, they asked Neil if he had any thoughts on that. And Neil, quite rightly, identified that as a result of the character and the continuity he went through, like Hellblazer #300 which ended many years ago on an ambiguous note, the character shows up in many different versions and different forms in the DCU and in many series that might or might not be in the DCU. And it’s very difficult to, if your stated goal is to launch a Hellblazer series that returns to traditional Hellblazer continuity, which is mature, horror-centric, character led, nuanced fiction…