Summary

• Keanu Reeves co-writes BRZRKR comic series, exploring a half-mortal, half-God cursed to endless violence and seeking truth.
• BRZRKR to be turned into film and animated series after Reeves wins Inkpot Award at SDCC for contributions to comic world.
• Reeves and team discuss creating the series, leaving it open-ended, and developing the character's violent fight sequences.

co-written by Keanu Reeves, follows the man known only as B. He is half-mortal and half-God, cursed to a never-ending life of violence. After wandering the world for centuries, the Berzerker finds some sort of refuge in working for the U.S. government to fight in battles that are too dangerous for anyone else. In exchange, he is promised the one thing he desires – the truth about his endless blood-soaked existence, and how to end it once and for all.

At San Diego Comic-Con 2024, Keanu Reeves was awarded the prestigious Inkpot Award. These are given to individuals for their contributions to the worlds of comics, science fiction/fantasy, film, television, animation, and fandom services. The highly acclaimed comic book series is planned to be turned into not only a film but an animated series as well.

Screen Rant caught up with Keanu Reeves, BRZRKR co-writer Matt Kindt, and artist Ron Garney at SDCC 2024 to discuss the comic series. Keanu and Matt reveal how their initial plot points for the series all panned out, as well as why they left it somewhat open-ended. Ron talks about how fun it was to create these incredibly violent fight sequences in the comics.

Keanu Shares The Inkpot Award With His Team

Screen Rant: Congratulations on your Inkpot Award! What was that like?

Keanu Reeves: Very special. Yeah, it was really cool. And it was cool to receive that award and to be, in a way, sharing it with these gentlemen.

Ron Garney: He's too gracious. He deserves it.

Keanu Reeves: No, man. I'm not there without you. I'm not there without all the other artists I've worked with.

Keanu Was Worried About The End of BRZRKR From The Beginning

Screen Rant: Matt and Keanu, was this the arc you always saw happening, or did it evolve over the course of the comics for B.?

Matt Kindt: We had a lot of ideas and then we sort of whittled it down to a big picture, and so we had signposts, we had things we needed to get to. And then, within that, we started to just narrow down issue one. Like, what's that? Issue two. And then sort of work our way to the end. But I think at the end we had ideas for the end, but we hadn't settled on what it was going to be, but I think the process of doing it dictates really what it's going to be at the end. So I wasn't too worried about it. I was a little worried, but I think we did all right.

Keanu Reeves: I was worried.

Matt Kindt: You were worried. You were worried.

Keanu Reeves: We talked about that. We were talking about the end almost from the beginning. The whole time.

Screen Rant: What was the importance to you for keeping it kind of open-ended at the end?

Keanu Reeves: It felt like it was open-ended, but the relationship between the lead character and Diana, the scientist, kind of got cemented to, for me, that was a launch point. That journey was over and so much had been revealed. It's like their relationship.

Matt Kindt: So there's an ending there, but I think the very nature of what he is makes it so how are you going to end it? He's not ending, right? There's a way to never end it.

Ron Garney: Yeah. You don't end it after 80,000 years and all of a sudden, okay, it's all over now. He's dead. Great. Perfect. It just doesn't work like that.

Keanu Reeves: I know. But we do kill him. He dies. I mean, the character dies and then comes back, but then comes back. He gets egged.

Screen Rant: Was that something you always planned on doing?

Keanu Reeves: It became part of the what if, and how. The egg, I think, we came up with together.

Matt Lindt: You were explaining how, at the very beginning, this happens.

Ron Garney: It's weird though, because in the last book, there's a scene where, I don't want to give too much away, but that kind of happens and it's like, how does that happen? Because he's being eaten away and all of a sudden, wait a minute, that's pretty interesting. I make it look like a gnarly egg too. It's not a beautiful egg. It's gnarly looking.

Playing With The Incredible Action Was "Dynamic" For Ron

Screen Rant: How was it for you, Ron, getting to play with all the incredible action? It's insane and violent.

Ron Garney: Dynamic? Insane. Dynamic. That's a good word. That's me. Insane and violent. Not dynamic. That's arguable. But no. Yeah, I really have to get my head into it, and it takes me a bit to get my ball rolling on it. I have to absorb it all, and I go through it and I jump ahead. I'll start working on it, and then I jump ahead of it and then I go back.

Because I tend to, sometimes when you absorb it all, you miss little things. So it's such an epic thing that it requires a lot of energy and focus to get in there and draw armor, this big Genghis Khan's armor and all the soldiers and things like that. It's a very visceral experience to sit and draw these things.

The Sad Keanu Meme Was An Accident

Screen Rant: I love the sad Keanu meme being included. How did including that come about?

Ron Garney: Oh, in the first series of issue one. I didn't know it was a meme, actually. I found out after the fact. I didn't even know about it really. Even then, I looked at a picture and I was like, oh, okay, now I get it. And like he said, "I'm just eating a sandwich, man." It was like everybody reads into it.

John Lennon, there was a guy who came to his house, and he was like, "What did this mean in this song?" He's like, "Man, it's just a song. I put a bunch of lyrics together." That's kind what I think was going on there. The poor guy is just eating a sandwich, and it turned into a whole thing, but it's cool.

All 12 issues of BRZRKR are now available from BOOM! Studios.

Source: Screen Rant Plus