Donny Cates (born September 14, 1984) is an American comic book writer from Texas, known for his association with Marvel Comics. He started in the early '10s, and though he kept a low profile for most of the decade, his prominence in Marvel Comics exploded in the tail end towards the '20s after he signed an exclusive contract with the company and began writing many of their flagship titles.
Cates is known for his Darker and Edgier takes, often playing into nostalgia of the gritty '90s and the early '00s, while bringing those concepts into the present day and making them work. He's a noted fan of Ultimate Marvel, and has stated he's very much into the idea of spearheading a reboot of the brand. Cates is also a longtime fan of Venom, and being the one who will write the primary run going forward is a dream come true.
As said, within Marvel he's become one of their most important writers who does multiple projects at any given time with no signs of slowing down. He may be on track to supplant Bendis in this regard.
In 2023, Cates was seriously injured in a car accident and developed amnesia, losing memories of the six months prior. While not a Career-Ending Injury, Cates has since stepped back from multiple titles he's been writing to recover.
Selected bibliography:
Marvel- Cosmic Ghost Rider — Tongue-in-cheek comic starring an alternate universe Frank Castle as the titular character.
- Death of the Inhumans — A five-part miniseries that served to put the Inhumans on a bus.
- Doctor Strange — His Star-Making Role in Marvel.
- Guardians of the Galaxy — A Soft Reboot of the Marvel Cosmic and the titular team.
- Marvel Knights 20th — Miniseries dedicated to the Marvel Knights imprint.
- Silver Surfer: Black — Story recalling Norrin Radd's past.
- Thanos — An alternate take that shows what happens if the Mad Titan wins.
- Thor — A relaunch for Thor detailing his new status quo as ruler of Asgard.
- Venom — Cates' primary series since Marvel: A Fresh Start, notably something he's wanted to do since he was a kid.
- Absolute Carnage — The Bat Family Crossover event from the run, though functionally more of a Crisis Crossover if anything.
- King in Black — The sequel to Absolute Carnage, and a proper Crisis Crossover.
- Hulk — The sequel to Immortal Hulk.
- Banner of War — A crossover event between his Thor and Hulk runs.
- Buzzkill (Image)note
- God Country (Image)
- Interceptor (Heavy Metal)
- The Paybacks (Dark Horse)
- Crossover (2020) (Image)
Tropes:
- Arc Welding: He has a habit of tying his previous stories into the ones he moves on to. Knull appears as the main antagonist in Silver Surfer: Black, and the blackened Silver Surfer himself shows up in his Thor run. Cosmic Ghost Rider seems to be his signature character since he appears in the previous two comics, as well as his Guardians of the Galaxy run.
- Author Appeal:
- He's a noted fan of Ultimate Marvel. Venom includes both Miles Morales and the Maker as prominent supporting and antagonistic characters, respectively. Both of them would be very unexpected and left-field for another writer. He's gone on record saying that he would love to write a reboot of the Ultimate line, if given the chance.
- One of the first things he did in his Thor run was to restore Thor's long hair as he really liked the look, especially from the 1990s.
- Cosmic Horror Story: Most of Cates' writing leans heavily on cosmic, primordial horror against a gritty, real-world backdrop.
- Crisis Crossover: Crossover is a deconstruction of this trope.
- Darker and Edgier: Cates' style leans towards this, often with more violence and bleaker artwork while being focused on the darker side of things. It's not to the level of, say, Mark Millar or Garth Ennis, but it is above the general titles.
- Expy: In a deleted Tweet, Cates admitted that Cosmic Ghost Rider was based on the DC Comics character Lobo.
- Genre Throwback: Venom deliberately styles itself after The Dark Age of Comic Books where the character made it big, but uses a '10s standard of storytelling to keep it compelling. Absolute Carnage practically banks on nostalgia from that era, what with it being a sequel or
Spiritual Successor to Maximum Carnage. - Paint It Black: As a part of the general examination of the Dark Age of Comics his storylines literally drench characters in black as he builds a story arc.
- Promoted Fanboy: A long time Venom fan and now writing the main run since 2018. He's also making Absolute Carnage, which is more or less the sequel to Maximum Carnage.
- Reconstruction: He takes the grim styles of the '90s and early-'00s and makes them fit, mainly by injecting modern sensibility and depth into the writing.
- Running the Asylum: He used Venom to canonize story elements he thought of as a kid, seeing this as the golden opportunity to implement them.
- Wanting Is Better Than Having: In one of his notes about the work behind his Thor run, he talks about how much he loves comics but actually making them took something out of him.
- What Could Have Been: He's had plans for a revival of Ultimate Marvel, but various circumstances including his car accident forced him to step back and allow Jonathan Hickman to take over with his own ideas, resulting in the creation of the new Ultimate Universe, though Cates is fully supportive.
