SDCC ’25: “Jim Lee and Friends” had a great surprise guest

On Saturday at San Diego Comic-Con 2025, the “Jim Lee & Friends” panel begins with Lee discussing how this panel has no announced guests, as they are a surprise. Last year, Todd McFarlane and Greg Capullo appeared to announce Batman Spawn, and Scott Snyder and Joshua Williamson announced All-In.

This year, Lee thanks the fans along with Anne DePies (SVP and General Manager of DC Comics) and publicist Kerry Williams. He shouts out his daughter and her new husband in the audience and then brings out his first guest, writer Tom King, current writer of Wonder Woman and Trinity: Daughter of Wonder Woman.

Framing this part of the panel around the past, present, and future, Lee brings up how he and King got to know each other better by going on a USO tour some years ago and tells a story of doing MP training with dogs on base where they wear this protective vest and have to outrun a one of the dogs to a truck. They show funny pictures of the dog catching up to Lee.

Jim Lee and Tom King at the Jim Lee and Friends panel during SDCC 2025

They then discuss the current arc of Wonder Woman, where she faces an old Wonder Woman villain, The Mouse Man, and how that story resonates with current events as he takes over an island to become its dictator.

King says, “She’s against the things that bind us. She’s more into the freedoms and letting us go, and that’s what the series is about. It’s about her as the person who works against the systems that oppress us.”

Next, Lee brings out Bilquis Evely and Matheus Lopes to talk about Supergirl: Woman of Tomorrow with King, starting with congratulations on Evely winning an Inkpot and Eisner Award at her first Comic-Con. They delve into how King and Evely collaborated on the comic series, with Lee showcasing a piece of art from the book where Ruthie, the POV girl character of the story, stands outside a giant, ornate door. They use this to talk about how they collaborated from King’s script to Evely’s art. King jokingly talks about how sparse some of his descriptions were and just how amazed he was at the art that Evely turned in from it.

Jim Lee, Tom King, Bilquis Evely, and Matheus Lopes at the Jim Lee and Friends panel during SDCC 2025

Lee speaks glowingly of her art and asks about her artistic influences.

“When I studied for comics, my teacher showed some Alex Raymond pages from Flash Garden, and I thought about these lines, the beautiful lines, it’s so perfect, everything. One line is beautiful, just one line” Evely responds. Speaking in Portuguese to Lopes, she also mentions other artists, including Hal Foster. She and Lopes, a colorist, are life partners and collaborators.

Lee compliments Lopes: “I love the color of Matheus because it is like a rainbow hue, but it doesn’t feel like it’s a kid’s book. It captures the sense of outer space and other worlds. It asks him about his palette and choices in coloring the book.”

Lee moves the conversation forward as he describes how they all met in person for the first time earlier this year in London during a trip to the set of Supergirl. Speaking about how this book evolved from its humble beginnings as a pitch to its adaptation as a major motion picture, Lee welcomes James Gunn onto the panel in person, to huge cheers from the crowd. 

Gunn compliments Evely and Lopes on their art, and how its beauty is making him emotional and touching him deeply, and how it connects him back to his love of comic art from the past. He says he couldn’t have made Superman without comic creators. He says, “What movies inspired Superman? Oh, is it… You know, you’re doing the Donner movie, right? And I’m like, no, it’s not that. It’s the comics, you know? It’s All-Star Superman. It’s Superman for All Seasons. It’s Birthright. It’s the John Byrne one [Man of Steel]. It’s Jerry and Joe back in the day.”

James Gunn appearing on the stage at the Jim Lee and Friends panel during SDCC 2025

The conversation delves into Gunn and Lee’s shared hometown and how they both became comic book fans, having seen Superman: The Movie in the same movie theater, and eventually going on to lead DC Comics and DC Studios many decades later. Gunn ends up discussing his upbringing and how comic books helped him through rough times in his childhood, as well as how attending a comic convention with his father is one of his most cherished memories. The nature of reading superhero comics and coming into the middle of things is one of the best parts of reading comics. Gunn talks about how he wanted to bring that feeling to Superman, along with all the elements from the Silver and Bronze ages.

Lee decides to give away some Superman: The Definitive History slipcase books to the audience after asking for very random items in return, like Q-tips. Lee highlights Gunn’s practice of creating Spotify playlists for the characters in the movie, emphasizing how music is integral to Gunn’s work.

The panel moves on to discuss Superman’s return to Fortnite for a new in-game event starting on August 2. Gunn says Peacemaker is returning to the game in August as well and discusses how cool it is to see Mr. Terrific and The Engineer in Fortnite.

Jim Lee and Matt Fraction (in a Batman mask) at the Jim Lee and Friends panel during SDCC 2025

After Gunn, Evely, Lopes, and King leave the stage, Lee brings up his final guest, Matt Fraction, the new writer of Batman, who walks on stage with a Batman ’66 mask over his face. Fraction starts with celebrating Jorge Jiménez’s amazing artwork and designs on the title.

Lee asks how he ended up on the title with how Rob Levin (Batman Group Editor) and Marie Javins (Editor-in-Chief) reached out to him, asking if he had any ideas on Batman, to which Fraction talked about how he had thought about Batman since he was three years old, from getting his first comic book. He talks about his goals for Batman a little differently than he did in the DC Gotham City panel earlier in the day.

Here, he says he wants to focus on the battle between Bruce Wayne’s life and Batman’s life, and if there could be a reason for Bruce to be happy enough to stop being Batman. “What happens the night Bruce Wayne thinks, ‘Maybe I don’t have to go out tonight?’ Right? Like, that’s catastrophic. So how can these two guys live under the same roof, as it were? And my take into it was that. Like, how can I tell a story, this Batman story and a Bruce Wayne story, but ultimately trying to resolve how Batman and Bruce can coexist and not destroy them.”

He talks about putting Batman back in the gray and blue suit, along with how it’s a new day in Gotham City that’s big and bright skies and no rain. And a strong focus on cool new Batman gadgets and the tech in the latest suit, as well as how Bruce is different from Iron Man in terms of how he utilizes his technology.

The panel wraps up discussing the new hardcover of Superman’s Pal Jimmy Olsen, which Fraction wrote, featuring a homage cover to the Superman vs. Muhammad Ali comic.