Jon Niccum talks new collaborative book about superheroes and the multiverse

Image courtesy of // Jon Niccum 

As superheroes grow more prevalent in our society day by day, it can be easy to forget their motivations and ideologies. While action figures, movies, video games, and children’s backpacks help the already booming industry, the superheroes that adorn them have stayed mostly the same.

Power Up: Leadership, Character, and Conflict Beyond the Superhero Multiverse dives into these themes, among many others. 

The multi-author novel was worked on by a team of over 30 people, with many of the contributing writers and editors being from here in KC. One of the book’s editors and forward writer, Jon Niccum, is one of them.

“Steve Leonard did a book last year called To Boldly Go that kind of put together this same concept, but it was science fiction. And I did a chapter on Alien in that. They invited me to be an editor on this one because it was focused on superheroes, and that is something I know a lot about,” says Niccum. 

Even while having a topic as broad and ever-expanding as this one, working with a team the size of Power Up’s sometimes proved difficult. “It’s tricky to figure out what everyone is going to write about, making sure you’re not getting a bunch of duplications and making sure everyone is on board with the overall theme,” says Niccum. “But then it becomes fun as you brainstorm who is going to do what chapter, where it’s going to go, and so on.” 

Image courtesy Jon Niccum

During that process, Niccum wanted to focus his contributing chapter on Marvel zombies. 

“I’m kind of a nerd when it comes to Marvel Zombies. And I wanted to write about it because it involves morality. The funny thing is, we had the world’s leading zombies writing expert, Max Brooks (World War Z) but he did a chapter over Batman, so somehow I got the zombies chapter. It was fun,” says Niccum. 

Given the abundance of the superhero multiverses we are spoiled with today, there was a lot of opportunity for diverse coverage within the book. Characters and themes from Marvel and DC comics, to TV shows like The Boys are touched on throughout, with each having a fresh perspective from their respective writer’s understanding. 

“We wanted to be as diverse as possible, we didn’t want to write 15 chapters on Superman. So we have some that are dedicated to characters like Squirrel Girl, things that aren’t the most obvious choices,” says Niccum. 

While many of these characters are mostly known for the movies they’re in and the actors that portray them, there is still much to be learned about what they mean to us as people and as a society. 

“We had a lot of teachers write this book, a lot of people with PhDs in the group. Although it is so rooted in pop culture I don’t see it as an academic book, it still has a real teaching base,” says Niccum.