"And what I like about it is it makes me happy and I think it makes a lot of people happy to go to the movies and to not think about the problems of the day or the problems of tomorrow or the yesterday and just go on for the ride and have the fun of losing oneself in a fantasy."

"I'll speak for myself, but there's a lot of humor to be found in sarcasm and darkness. You talk to any paramedic, they survive by developing a pretty off-kilter sense of humor."

"All of my characters have a glint of madness."

"If I could have been a marine biologist I would have, but I didn't have that kind of intelligence. Numbers were never my strong point."

"Science does not know its debt to imagination."

"I mean, first of all, let me say whichever superhero first came up with the idea of wearing a cape, he wasn't really onto anything good. The number of times I'm treading on that damn thing or I throw a punch and it ends up covering my whole head. It's really not practical."

"The gift of fantasy has meant more to me than my talent for absorbing positive knowledge."

"It is a steadfast truth that an idea is a delicate seed; water it with curiosity and protect it from cynicism — an essential principle for the reflective life."