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Detailed preview of American Flagg for First Comics, the project that brought Chaykin back to comics after a two-year hiatus painting paperback covers. Describes the series' near-future setting in 2031 Chicago — a post-collapse America governed from Mars via 24-hour television, with street gangs, corporate drug distribution, and competing Brazilian and Pan-African empires. Explains that his hero Reuben Flagg is a 32-year-old former TV star turned suburban cop, and that the series deals with politics, sex, and advertising as adventure — "a comic book that's about something, other than about twenty-eight pages." Notes he could never have sold this book to DC ("it is antithetical to what DC Comics does") and stresses the writing is as important to him as the art.

Chaykin speaks at length about his disillusionment with the mainstream comics audience and his transition toward screenwriting in Hollywood. He discusses Black Kiss as a deliberate creative and commercial experiment, his upcoming Twilight series (DC), a Batman story with Michael Golden, and the Nick Fury/Wolverine graphic novel. He is sharply critical of the comics industry's creative conservatism, the immaturity of its audience, and the lack of acknowledgment for genuinely adult work.

Explains his self-taught coloring techniques (cel-vinyl animation paint, airbrush, felt markers) and how he broke into comics through conventions and a connection with Byron Preiss, eventually coloring for Howard Chaykin's The Stars My Destination and Marvel's Hulk magazine. Vents about the constant frustration of beautiful color work turning to "mud" in printing due to paper quality and separation issues — "So often you put all this beautiful work into something and it turns to mud." Discusses upcoming work on the X-Men Graphic Novel with Brent Anderson and his side career illustrating computer books.

Conducted at Ken Steacy's Toronto studio over Chinese food, this comedic three-way conversation covers Leialoha's career of "amazing coincidences": meeting Mark Evanier at the 1971 San Diego con, getting on Warlock by bumping into Jim Starlin in Berkeley, inking Howard the Duck #1, and landing Star Wars because he knew who George Lucas was and asked Howard Chaykin in an elevator. He discusses the creative/financial tension between Marvel work-for-hire (fast, paid, owned by Marvel) versus creator-owned alternative work (slow, satisfying, underpaid), explaining why he eventually left Coyote — the bi-monthly schedule was destroying him. He is planning a samurai mini-series with Carl Potts at Marvel and more funny-animal work for Epic.

The colorist for American Flagg! — and in real life Howard Chaykin's wife — explains how she came to the job when Lynn Varley could not handle both Ronin and Flagg! simultaneously, bringing a background in textile design and color theory rather than comics. She describes the severe constraints of the four-color printing process (only 63 color combinations from three primaries at three strengths each) and the additional frustration of having hand separations introduce errors. She is currently coloring the American Flagg! graphic novel using a full-color laser process, which she finds far more expressive, and discusses her deliberate use of antiseptic pastels for the Plex mall environment to convey its dehumanizing sterility.

Miller discusses the comics censorship controversy in detail, recounting how DC's proposed ratings system came about after pressure from religious groups, and how he organized a petition signed by Alan Moore, Howard Chaykin, and Marv Wolfman, which he says led directly to DC firing Wolfman as an editor. He argues that the direct sales market offers genuine creative freedom and that any ratings system would damage the artform by introducing invisible bureaucratic censorship. He also previews upcoming projects: a new series with Dave Gibbons, an Elektra graphic novel, and covers for Lone Wolf and Cub with Lynn Varley coloring.

Features a formal joint statement by Terry Austin, John Byrne, Howard Chaykin, Jay Muth, Trina Robbins, Craig Russell, Alex Toth, and Charles Vess, threatening legal action against Innovation Comics publisher David Campiti for falsely advertising them as contributors to his line; a letter disputes DAK's comics rating-system questionnaire; a third laments the cancellation of the JLA/Avengers crossover project.

Writer/producer Bilson discusses developing The Flash as a CBS primetime series, explaining how the show is inspired by Watchmen, The Dark Knight, and American Flagg rather than campy TV superhero conventions. He covers the casting of John Wesley Shipp as Barry Allen, Dave Stevens' costume design, Howard Chaykin's role as story editor, and the challenge of competing against The Cosby Show and The Simpsons in its time slot. He contrasts the show's grounded, dark tone with prior superhero TV productions and previews plans for costumed villains and moral ambiguity.