RB: One of the awesome things about this series is that my editor, Jordan White, early on encouraged me to just worry about making the best digital comic that I could, and not worry about how it would translate into print.  That was music to my ears, because that’s exactly how I had approached Power Play, and I really believe that when you’re showcasing something new like Power Play or the Infinite Comics, you have to go all in and not hedge your bets.  You have to show people what makes this something special that they can’t get anywhere else.  If we did this in a way that was easily translated into print, people would be asking why we didn’t just do it in print?  So to me, one of the specific goals of this project was to show people things that can’t be shown in print.  To really be true to the medium that we’re exploring, and make as much use of what works well digitally as we can.

There’s already been a print version of the first chapter, which we used to promote the series, and I believe that there are plans to do a print collection of the whole thing when it’s done.  Figuring out how to do that will bring some new challenges, and there will most likely be bits that have to get trimmed down because they don’t work in print, but it’ll be interesting to see how that comes together.

How much input do the writers have in the flow of the book and do you go back and forth more for an Infinite book?

RB: Every comics project I’ve ever worked on has had a unique relationship between myself and the writer, and the digital comics are no different.  With the AvX story I did with Mark Waid a year and a half ago, the script was tight, and the story was actually already storyboarded by Yves Bigerel, so I just stuck to the decisions that were already made.  With Power Play, since it’s creator owned I’m involved with every step of the process, and Kurt Christenson  and I will just talk about the basic plot beforehand, and then I go ahead and execute it in whatever way I want.  Deadpool is somewhere in the middle.  Gerry and Brian give me pretty lose plots to start from, which leave me plenty of room to do my thing, and then they go in afterwards and bring it all together with the final script.  There’s plenty of phone and e-mail conversation in between all this as well, but for the most they just trust me to kick ass on my end, and I trust them to kick ass on theirs.  So far it’s worked out pretty well that way!

We’re starting to see quite a few generic conventions appear in Infinite and Guided View digital comics now, how important is it for you to continue pushing boundaries and create new conventions, how do you think you’ve done that in Deadpool?

RB: That’s the whole point, isn’t it?  Pushing the boundaries and finding new ways of telling stories that haven’t been done before is one of the biggest appeals of doing a comic this way!  It’s rare that you find an artistic opportunity to truly do something new, and explore new ground that hasn’t already been well-trodden by other artists, so that’s one of the most fun parts of the series for me.

I think I’ve been succeeding in that pretty well with this series.  I’ve taken stuff that I’d learned in the past, like the intro screens when a new character shows up that’s similar to something I did in Power Play, and I’ve also brought in some new things, like how I handled the credits sequences.  I’ve also done a lot more with multi-panel screens than I had done in the past.  And the great part is, every time I do something new, I immediately think of newer, better ways to do that thing next time!

How important has Power Play been in getting you involved in Infinite comics and when will we be seeing more?

RB: Power Play was essential in getting me these gigs, because it gave me a portfolio that showed that I knew how to approach this new kind of comic– not many other people have that!  I was actually showing Power Play to my Marvel editors before they had even started talking about Infinite Comics, and with my past history with Deadpool, I think I was a natural fit for this project.

As for future Power Play plans?  There’s definitely some stuff in the works, and some exciting opportunities for it.  It’s just about figuring out where it fits into my work schedule for the rest of the year.  Right now we’ve been pretty much doing a chapter a year.  I’d like to do more than that, but I can’t make any promises at this point.

We’ll just have to wait and see!

Deadpool: The Gauntlet Infinite is available from ComiXology and via the Marvel Comics app for £0.69/$0.99