The idea that there’s a community of fill-in-the-blank living amongst us, under our noses, and we haven’t a clue. I think it was the setting, because I like the idea of secret societies. When you were developing Fables, which elements of the story came first?

We caught up with him to talk about the secret origins of Fables, TV shows like Once Upon a Time and Grimm, drawing inspiration from The Shield, and how he’s never felt totally satisfied with the series.

They’re not alone: Willingham is also in a wistful and melancholy mood. Not only is Fables’ longevity rare, its influence has rippled beyond comics to impact popular culture at large.įor fans who were loyal to the series from the beginning, the last issue of Fables ushers in the era of nostalgia that follows the last page of a favorite book. The series - published by DC Entertainment imprint Vertigo - has been nominated for numerous awards and collected 14 Eisner Awards (the comics industry’s top honor), including a Best Writer award for Willingham himself in 2009. Far from merely going for cheap laughs about princesses and wizards having sex, the story has pulled in readers with an action-packed narrative and genuine insights about human nature. There the characters we know from childhood were collected and interwoven in what would become a massive saga of fairy-tale characters living secret lives among us. The story has centered around a version of New York City not unlike our own, but containing a hidden realm called Fabletown. After 13 years, 150 issues, and multiple spinoffs, the long-running, hugely acclaimed Fables comes to an end this week in an enormous 150-page finale. In 2002, writer Bill Willingham began Fables as a comics series with a simple premise: to reimagine fairy-tale characters such as Snow White, Cinderella, and the like by looking at their stories and asking, “What happened next?” That premise in less skilled hands would have proven flimsy, but Willingham has built a remarkable and sprawling comics epic out of it - an epic that is, sadly, coming to a close.

Fables by Bill Willingham