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Jada Pinkett-Smith Shares Love of Comic Books and Playing A “Bad Guy”

The actress hopes to someday turn her own comic book creation into a movie.

Jada Pinkett-Smith is a certified badass as Fish Mooney on FOX’s Gotham. The actress might be pint-sized, but her fierceness is a thing to behold as her character continues her quest for control amid the chaos around her. Pinkett-Smith recently sat down with People magazine to share what it’s been like to play a dark role and how she brings a little bit of Fish Mooney into her real life.
“One of the things that I love about this particular character is that I get to be so outside of myself. It's really a character. Of course there are certain aspects of Fish that I can pull from Jada, but, you know, I just love that Fish doesn't care about being politically correct. She can just be as vicious as they come, and I think I love that,” Pinkett-Smith said.
“It gives me an opportunity to really explore and express my shadow side – my dark side – in a healthy way. Like, Fish really gives Jada an opportunity to get into some stuff that Jada wouldn't and express herself in a way that Jada wouldn't. Fish goes for it, and I love that about her,” she continued.
In fact, Pinkett-Smith says her girlfriends sometimes jokingly call on Fish Mooney to handle certain situations to which she replies, “Be careful what you ask for!”
“And sometimes I do call upon a little Fish Mooney energy sometimes, believe it or not. Not her vicious side but just her strength. Fish will just not back down, no matter what,” she said. “And sometimes I do call upon that energy, that fierceness. She's been a great discovery. You do have to keep her in check, though!”
Gotham is a crime drama based on the characters from DC Comics’ Batman franchise. Pinkett-Smith revealed her own love for various comic book series including The Walking Dead, which has also been converted into a popular television series. She’s such a fan of graphic novels that she took a stab at creating her own comic book, titled Menace, when she was in her twenties. Based on the life, death, and redemption of a young, Black, female troublemaker, Pinkett-Smith shares how the titular character dies in a drug deal gone bad and is given a chance at eternal life if she helps save other lost souls.
“So she takes the deal, and each soul that she saves brings her closer to eternal life and brings her from the dark to the light. She just has this struggle between dark and light. That was pretty much what that comic book was about. She was pretty hot, and her name was Menace 'cause she was a menace!” she said.
Nothing much has come of her early project just yet, but the Gotham star is still clinging to the hope of someday turning the series into a movie.
“I have!” Pinkett-Smith said. “You know, I really have, but I always struggle with the idea of like, ‘Oh man, it's a black female character,’ and just dealing with the politics of, like, ‘Will a studio make a Black character like that?’ And it might not be a role for me. It could be something I'll hold for Willow. Maybe it's something I'll hold for another young actress. But I think there's an opportunity to make it, for sure. I don't know if it will be made for me, necessarily, and that will be fine. I would just love to get it made! But I still have it, and it's a property that I feel still has value.”
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(Photo: Michael Lavine/FOX)

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