When Jeph Loeb writes for DC, it tends to have an impact, whether it’s the exploration of comics’ most interesting friendship that is Superman/Batman, or the iconic Batman: Hush, which remains one of the most widely read Batman comics to date. So, the fact that Loeb’s latest DC book, the Jim Cheung-illustrated Batman/Wonder Woman: Truth, seems to draw inspiration from both of those earlier projects means you’re probably going to want to pay attention. Offering a slick, emotional adventure focused on two close, but very different allies that’s set within the Hush universe, the one-shot finds Bruce and Diana teaming up after the Joker and Harley Quinn steal the Lasso of Truth.

We recently got the chance to talk to Loeb about how this new book came together, the DNA it shares with Superman/Batman and why keeping the Joker and Harley together for this story was essential.

Jeph, you’ve recently become pretty involved with DC after a while away. How has it felt getting back into this universe of characters over the past couple of years?

It's been so much fun. I mean, look, it was kind of a happy accident or a tragic accident, one or the other. I hadn't planned on doing any more stories and then Tim Sale and I started talking about The Last Halloween. And while I was doing that, Jim Lee called and said, "We're going to do Hush 2."

So, we set off to do it and have been having a blast. Every time I think this is the last one that I'm going to do. But then I found an opportunity to work with Jim Cheung, who's somebody that I have literally chased down the street to try to work with ever since Young Avengers. And at the same time, I really loved the concept of what we accomplished on Superman/Batman, where we went to A-list artists like Ed McGuinness, Michael Turner and Carlos Pacheco, who we knew it was impractical to ask to be on a monthly comic. But if we could do a monthly comic that was made up of largely standalone stories, but they were stories that really counted, like the end of President Luthor and the reintroduction of Supergirl. It really was intended to be sort of your gateway drug. And I thought, let's do that again [with Jim Cheung]. But let's do it with Batman and Wonder Woman, so that you really get a balance of both sides of the DCU.

You don’t often see comics pairing up Batman and Wonder Woman. Was that part of the appeal of telling this story to you?

As far as I know, there are not a lot of stories with just Batman and Wonder Woman. Now I just know that somewhere Mark Waid is reading this and screaming, "Don't you know? Haven't you read Brave and the Bold #84?!"

And for that, I apologize to Mark. But they seem like such an unlikely pairing, and yet, there's something about how regal, elegant and smart she is, and how she truly believes that the best way for people to exist with each other is to try and understand each other. Whereas, Batman doesn't have that interest at all.

So, to have an opportunity to have these two characters trying to find the truth in a situation was very appealing to me and it also allowed for great banter. And I love when two characters care about each other. One is completely walled off. One is completely open. And somehow, that enables them to work together. What made it appealing more than anything else was that Jim Cheung has the exceptional ability—I mean, it really is extraordinary—to draw expressions. To the point where there were a number of times where I just took out the dialogue because Jim sold it. Like it was there. Sometimes it's just the way he lifts an eyebrow or he purses a lip. It's pretty extraordinary.

One thing we see in the Hush universe that we don’t see in the current DCU is Harley Quinn and the Joker are still operating together. Do you like writing them as a pair?

Well, look, I have to give credit to Paul Dini, who created Harley in the first place. It's pretty exceptional when you have a character who is as important to the Batman universe as the Joker is and to give him a foil, to give him a Robin to his Batman, was brilliant and could have gone incredibly badly. But there's kind of a Looney Tunes aspect to Harley Quinn's character. There's a fun that's involved.

I wanted them to be able to work together. Now, it's important for the readers to know, this story takes place a few weeks after the original Hush ends. And there were some very emotional moments at the end of that story where I wished I had another thirty pages. Batman had gone through the ringer. But what excited me about it was that we got permission from the powers that be to forever change the relationship between Batman and Catwoman. They were going to take off their masks.

And that led to years of stories where people could now do Bat and the Cat. Tom King did some great stories with it, which led to what was going to be a wedding and then was not going to be a wedding. (Which I thought was the right choice in case anybody's interested in my opinion.) But I think having two characters who so clearly care about each other, what was it like right afterwards? And if you've ever been in a relationship, it's messy is what it is. And whenever anything's messy, that's good storytelling, or at least I hope it is.

What I liked about Batman/Wonder Woman: Truth was here was an opportunity to tell a story that begins with someone who's as clearheaded as Diana. Then you’ve got Batman, who's completely walled off and not admitting anything happened, and Catwoman, who's actually dealing with it. And then you add to it two elements.

One is the Lasso of Truth. What it does is it's like any secret, which is there are two parts to a secret. There's the answer, but there's also the question. And the question tells you more about the character than the actual answer. If you only get one wish from the genie, what the wish is says more about you than what happens to you afterwards. That fascinated me.

And then you bring in Harley and the Joker, who represent chaos, so that whatever it is that was going on for these three people, you have to add an element which now makes truth almost impossible to find because insanity's involved. That was where it all began.

You’ve done Superman/Batman, and here you’re doing Batman/Wonder Woman and Joker/Harley Quinn. What’s another unique hero pairing you think might be fun to write one day?

It's so funny. I often get asked questions like that: "Is there a story you want to do? Is there character you want to write?" And I don't ever approach it from that point of view. I really approach it from, is there an artist that's available that I would be lucky enough to be able to work with? I don't want to give away my secret wish list, but Jim Cheung was definitely on it. And once I knew Jim was available, I knew it was Batman and Wonder Woman. That's just where I knew I wanted to go.

So, if you threw out an artist's name, I would say to you, "Well, it might be interesting if we did... "

I'll give you one that's not possible. If Bernie Wrightson were still here and could do what he did in his day, I would really love to do Swamp Thing and Deadman.

Batman/Wonder Woman: Truth #1 by Jeph Loeb, Jim Cheung and Jay David Ramos is available this week in print and as a digital comic book.