I acted as a creative consultant for the development of a new IP partnership between DC Comics and GM—Rush City—a six-issue comic book limited series intended to be the brand's next Smokey and the Bandit or Knight Rider.
We met and evaluated the concepts submitted to us by both Titans of the industry-Marvel and DC Comics.
After much debate with GM, we selected DC Comics because of their character Diego Zhao aka Rush, the protagonist of Rush City. Rush was a NYC firefighter with a preternatural knack for finding his way out of tough situations. After being injured in the line-of-duty while rescuing his stepdaughter to-be, everything changed. With the police only being able help after a person is missing for 24-hours, often times that can be too late. That is when you need Rush.
The reason for selecting Rush was it conveyed the Pontiac brand traits of performance, style (but not flash), and speed. Those traits also personified the comic’s protagonist as well as his “trusty partner”—a modified Solstice GXP.
The real trick of this project was managing the client’s inner desire to be a comic mogul. He was great at his job, but Stan Lee he was not.
Thus, getting all parties to play to their strengths was a daily guiding principal on this project.