Cheo Hodari Coker

When you're dealing with African Americans, family is everything. Because we spend so much time talking about how one treats one's family. Telling a black person that you haven't talked to your mother in a week is probably different than it is with other races because people will look at you different.

What Peter Jackson proved with 'Lord Of The Rings' movies is that you could make various changes, and you could pull things around, but as long as it was in the spirit of the storytelling, and because he made The Shire so real, the fans forgave him for the changes.

Let's face it: there aren't a lot of black superheroes. So, in dealing with a black superhero, you're going to deal with ugly history and the beauty of history.

Human sexuality is not always about being labeled. It's about having a human moment, an emotion.

You have to tell a super story that has some fantastical element, but the human element is what's going to keep people watching.

If you're a black person in America, it's really hard to avoid being black. And what I mean is that the reality of your cultural history, regardless of whether or not you talk about it, it's there.

I wanted Luke Cage to very much be an African American superhero rather than a superhero that happens to be black. I felt it was important to give him that cultural grounding but also show that it doesn't make him an obtuse or one-sided character.

The Wire' is, by far, my favorite television show of all time. And I've always said that my aspirations for 'Luke Cage' was that it would be 'The Wire' of the Marvel television universe.

When I was a critic, I reviewed Public Enemy's 'Muse Sick-n-Hour Mess Age' - this is back in '94 - and I called it a 'Dante-esque spiral of the hip-hop hell.' I idolized Chuck D, but I just hated that record, and I did not hold back. Chuck didn't freeze me out. Every time I met Chuck, he always treated me with the utmost respect.

Bob Marley was always ready to deal with the politics of what was happening in the world but, at the same time, not lose sight of the fact that he's a musician.

That's the thing about TV: it gives you so much time to tell your story; it's comparable to comics.

I'm not going to be one of those people who says, 'I'm a showrunner; I'm not a black showrunner.' I'm black when I go to sleep. I'm black when I wake up, period. It doesn't affect my perspective on everything, but at the same time, it's who I am, and I'm proud of it.