Archives 2023

While Brian Michael Bendis is best known for his runs on Daredevil, Avengers, and, most recently, Superman, he also has several terrific independent comics and graphic novels. Torso, Scarlet, Murder, Inc, and Powers, just to name a few. but it all started with the series Jinx. hence the name of Bendis’s imprint, Jinxworld. If you’ve ever read these works, they all have a familiar tone, one that goes very well with the Dark horse Comics catalog. Well, after nearly twenty-five years, Jinxworld is now a part of the Dark horse Comics family.

With Jinxworld, Dark horse Comics gets a major boost to Their library of Titles

Originally, Jinxworld was going to fall under the DC Black label imprint, but that never happened. So when Bendis’s DC exclusive contract ended this year, it allowed him to find a suitable home for his indie world. before DC Comics, since Bendis was exclusive with Marvel, their short-lived indie imprint icon published the titles. aside from releasing previous titles, Dark horse Comics will also publish Bendis’s future projects.

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So, what can we expect? A continuation of Pearl, a Yakuza crime drama he created with fellow Peabody award-winning creator Michael Gaydos. Their Jessica Jones run served as the main inspiration for the award-winning Jessica Jones Netflix series. along with Pearl, we’ll get a new story in the Murder, Inc world. but the biggest thing that Dark horse Comics gets out of their Jinxworld deal? A brand new indie comic epic from Bendis and artist Stephen Byrne (they relaunched the delightful wonder twins for DC Comics).

When Bendis first started out, he couldn’t get his work off the ground like many writers. However, as he says in the announcement, “I wished those books were published by Dark horse back when we first made them.” Well, now they’re home!

Do you have a favorite Bendis indie comic? Or are you more excited for what he’ll do with Jinxworld now that it’s with Dark horse Comics?

(featured image: Jinxworld/Dark Horse)

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by Josh Crawley

We’re going to do some link blogging this week! I know what you’re saying. “You’re still moving, Josh?!” Honestly, I actually left my copy of Previews at the store and I really didn’t feel like driving back just to get it to write a column. Let’s see what I can find and babble about this week (as pet dog The Bounty hunter plays in the background).

Pop chart lab Superpowers

Be sure to take a peek at the The Illustrious Omnibus of incredibly Powers. While an argument could be made about, say, Iron Fist’s placement not with the Mastery of Martial Arts, it’s still pretty epic.

A bunch of people were laid off from Dark horse yesterday, including someone I had contact with on a few occasions (on Tales of The concern agent shorts written by Hilary Barta): Dave Land. For some interesting insight from a former DH employee, head over to Comics Alliance, and be sure to read the comments (at least this one). one of the things I find really interesting is the mention of the Jim Shooter Gold crucial books. It makes me wonder if they shipped late because they weren’t selling, if they weren’t selling a lot more because they started shipping late, or if neither influenced the other.

The American Panther name sounds pretty lame, but this design looks just the opposite.

Mark Millar has four new titles coming out soon. Honestly, I really wish the books that were running four months or so late could actually ship before announcing a lot more stuff that, a lot more likely than not, will ship horribly late. and just so no one accuses me of being too negative: I really hope Leandro Fernandez gets the attention he’s long-deserving of for his amazing art.

Retroactive JLA

DC recently announced on The source blog a bunch of the artists for their Retro-Active summer one-shots. Sadly, the accompanying artwork carries the note “…this art is style guide art and is not artwork from the actual issue.” I understand wanting to have a piece of artwork to opt for a blog post, but I’d rather have the usefulness of one post instead of five separate articles with artwork that’s generally useless.

Also, I think it’s been a while considering that I pimped the Doughnuts & top Cow podcast, but this week’s pimping will be a touch different. If you’re on Facebook, you can “Like” our page and get interesting replies from professionals to comments we have on the podcast. Don’t believe me? Troy Hickman has already proven you wrong!

And that’s it for this week, dear readers! good journey!

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November Vol. 1 HC

One night. One city. three women. November.

PORTLAND, Ore. 07/08/2019 — Image Comics is delighted to reveal the very first in a sequence of three graphic novellas by Matt fraction (Sex Criminals, Hawkeye) as well as Elsa Charretier (Star Wars, infinite Loop), with colors by Matt Hollingsworth, exquisitely crafted lettering by cartoonist Kurt Ankeny, and book style by Rian Hughes, titled November.

In November, the lives of three women intersect in a dark criminal underground. As terminate as well as violence tear with their city over the program of a single day as well as night, they discover that their lives are bound together by one man—who seems to be the cause of it all.

“November is a criminal offense thriller about three women linked by unforeseen as well as terrible circumstances—the type of random encounter with chaos as well as darkness that upends lives without warning, walking the line between mishap as well as catastrophe,” stated Fraction. “As a serialized series of novels, the style of November provides us the area as well as time to check out who these women were before as well as after whatever altered for them, in a sprawling story of chaos as well as coincidence where whatever occurs according to a pattern, however no plan ever goes off without a hitch. It’s the type of story only comics can tell in the method only a comic can tell them, as well as I couldn’t request much better collaborators than Elsa, Matt, as well as Kurt.”

Charretier added: “Characters so to life they draw themselves, scripts that feed my creativity for days on end, November is the most difficult job I’ve worked on, as well as working together with such a skilled team has been whatever I dreamed it’d be.”

Born January 14, 1969

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Avengers: absolute Vision book 1

by Robert Greenberger

Ever since Roy Thomas agreed to Stan Lee’s request that the next Avenger be a robot, the Vision has been one of the most prominent as well as withstanding members of the ensemble. The bad synthezoid has likewise been put with the wringer, assembled, disassembled, tortured, reprogrammed, as well as so on to the point where his backstory is a jumble of contradictory stories. What has not altered is that in many methods he stays one of the core elements of The Avengers as well as a mainstay in the marvel Universe.

In a curious collection of stories, marvel is releasing Avengers: absolute Vision book 1 as well as while it contains some stories featuring the character, it’s got a great deal more packed into it so the title is somewhat misleading. You may thing this collects whatever from his unforgettable very first appearance in 1967’s Avengers #57, however that is far from the case. For the record, the book contains 1982-1983’s Avengers #231-241 as well as annual #11-12, outstanding Spider-Man annual #16, amazing four #256, as well as physician strange #60.

For completists, the book starts off with the inconsequential 1982 Avengers annual from J.M. DeMatteis, series penciller Al Milgrom as well as inker Jack Abel. It’s a team-up with the Defenders which DeMatteis had been composing at the time as well as includes the cosmic being Nebulon.

The glue holding this assortment together is writer Roger Stern, who was composing stories that further interconnected the marvel Universe. The former Avengers editor ended up being its writer as well as continued to stir the pot with comings as well as goings while likewise well diverse the stories from cosmic threats to earthbound dilemmas. We begin the mammoth collection with the introduction of Monica Rambeau, ending up being the latest hero to wear the name Captain marvel (courtesy of Stern, John Romita, Jr. as well as John Romita, Sr.), as well as she goes from Avenger-in-Training to full member when Iron guy quits. Saturn’s Eros, stuck on Earth, seeks out the team to ended up being a member, earning his location after saving them from, yes, the Plant-Man, who threatened president Reagan. He then takes the name of Starfox as well as lives as much as his reputation by flirting as well as bed linen his method with the stories.

Meanwhile, Annihilus has put a seemingly impenetrable null-barrier around the Baxter building over in FF. As the Vision attempts to utilize his phasing power to penetrate the barrier, he is shut down as well as it takes weeks before he regains consciousness, paralyzed as well as stuck in a holographic form. as well as since we’re speaking about Annihilus as well as Marvel’s very first family, there’s an problem of FF that tangentially crosses with Avengers #233 with John Byrne guest pencilling the book. The barrier is pierced thanks to a tip from the Avengers’ newest member to the team’s next newest member.

With that success, the focus shifts from the comatose android to his lover, the Scarlet Witch. problem #234 recounts her origin as Hawkeye, who broke his leg a bit earlier, gets his very first sky cycle. Over in physician Strange, Wanda as well as the team come to the Sorcerer Supreme’s aid as Stern kicked off the browse for the book of the Darkhold storyline, pitting the mage against Dracula. since the book was safely in Avengers Mansion, he counted on his future allies for help.

Avengers #238

After that breather, Spider-Man turns up for a few problems as the concern of his location on the team is debated when more, foreshadowing his ultimately membership. however one arachnid provides method to one more as the final arc includes the spirit of Spider-Woman. Basically, her spirit was trapped on the astral airplane thanks to Morgan LeFay so it took the integrated efforts of Avengers as well as physician strange to rescue her.

The story flow is interrupted for assistant Editor’s Month as Mike Carlin brings the team to talk show hold David Letterrman’s stage for a silly as well as fun one-off. Additionally, there’s the 1983 Annual, which came from expense Mantlo, Butch Guice, as well as Rick Magyar, as the team, the FF as well as the Inhumans crowd the problem as the world governments face the truth that the heroes assisted the Inhumans establish their new house on the Moon.

Most of the Avengers problems are drawn by Al Milgrom as well as Joe Sinnott so it is emblematic of the home style that was in vogue during this period, with a clearness of storytelling trumping distinctness.

It’s an fascinating time capsule of a book, showing what the marvel world was like at this point in its history however the genuine Vision story doesn’t truly begin up until volume two when he wakes up as well as tries to take over the world.

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Avengers: absolute Vision book 1

Classic comic cover from the Grand Comics Database.

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Frank Frazetta’s Egyptian Queen

by Josh Crawley

There are many people who have so extremely inspiring stories about Frank Frazaetta.

I’m not one of them. I cannot reject the excellent creative influence he had on such artists as the Comic Twarts, of which Tom Fowler captures the feel of Frazetta the very best for me, with Simon Fraser (not one of the Twarts however remarkable as all get out) a extremely close second. nor can I share a story on the level of Ron Marz, which virtually gets to the heart of the “Frazetta women legacy.”

His style influenced Masters of the Universe, which is what led me to comics. may not be a huge offer to you, however that directed my life. My LIFE.

His style is what made me recognize anorexic women weren’t “all that.”

Thick thighs, muscled yet curvy stomachs… f*****g sexy. Literally.

Look at some Frazetta. That’s beauty. Take it house with you from the bar. like it like you will never like again, since you may never see it again… however that is the epitome of beauty.

You showed us the goddess in the every day, Frank. I raise every damn single one of my drinks to you, from right here on out.

And you, reader. Don’t trust us to show you the gorgeous beauty of Frazetta women. browse the internet. buy books. Don’t take a look, however truly LOOK.

No, really; look. They’re beautiful.

And if you don’t like it, somebody else will.

Whatever preconceived notions you’re given… they’re wrong. look at these women, as well as then see them in who you already have… as well as like those women. They’re beautiful.

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Josh Crawley has been reading comics for a long time. perhaps not as long as you, however he doesn’t truly care right now. Go like that lovely Frazetta lady in the other room. She is the only thing matters to you, or you don’t matter.

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Psi-Lords #1 Rod Reis cover

Fred Van Lente is the popular writer of such comics as Archer & Armstrong, marvel Zombies, action Presidents, and numerous others. His newest tale introduces Valiant’s newest heroes in Psi-Lords. Van Lente and Westfield’s Roger Ash talk about this mysterious upcoming series.

Psi-Lords #1 preview page 1

Westfield: What can you tell us about Psi-Lords and who are the main characters we’ll meet?

Fred Van Lente: Psi-Lords is a science fiction, action-adventure mystery and treasure hunt, starring four people who we—and they—only know by their codenames: brainy Beacon, protective Tank, brash Artisan, and feral Hazard. They wake up trapped in a unusual prison run by a mysterious group calling itself the “Starwatchers,” and discover that the essential to freeing themselves is to find the most essential prisoners in there: the titular “Psi-Lords.” Along the way, they’ll learn much more about their unusual new powers, their pasts, and their relationship to each other.

Oh, and did I mention this “prison”—The Gyre—is the size of a planet? It’s gonna take them a while to explore it all and meet all of the unusual creatures and terrifying enemies to be found therein.

Psi-Lords #1 preview page 2

Westfield: Did you draw any inspiration for the series from other sources?

Van Lente: I love a lot of that trippy, European science fiction comic albums, particularly Jodorowsky and Gimenez’s Metabarons, and [Psi-Lords artist] Renato [Guedes’] painted style really lends itself to that kind of a treatment. people are going to get blown away when they check out what he’s doing here.

Psi-Lords #1 preview page 3

Westfield: I read the script for the first issue and there’s a lot of mystery in the story. how did that method to the series come about and what is the appeal for you?

Van Lente: I love science fiction that borders on horror—there’s that thrill of discovery, but also the worry of the unknown. Also, because our characters are suffering from amnesia, they get to discover a lot of unknowns about themselves at the same time the reader gets to know them. It really makes the characters and readers go on the same journey at the same time; it’s pretty cool.

Psi-Lords #1 preview page 4

Westfield: You’re working with artist Renato Guedes on Psi-Lords.  What can you say about your collaboration?

Van Lente: I had never worked with him before, and when the pages for #1 started coming in, I realized I would have to step up my own game, which is the best kind of collaboration. As our heroes explore the Gyre, they meet unusual alien races and monsters and large lost civilizations. I keep challenging Renato to draw all this crazy stuff and he keeps blowing away my expectations every time! I couldn’t be happier.

Psi-Lords #1 preview page 5

Westfield: Is there any connection to the old Psi-Lords series?

Van Lente: If you’ve read Archer & Armstrong or Ivar, Timewalker, my previous stabs at reimagining 1990s Valiant titles, you’ll know I incorporate elements from them, typically as Easter eggs, as just background elements. Like, just as an example, the Gyre is a “Sargasso Sea in Space”—meaning it’s made up of all these shipwrecks adrift around Nihlio, the Vampire Star. A bunch of the ships are ones seen in the 1990s series, which is certainly very subtle. There a few much more in there, but I can’t reveal them without getting spoilery. Besides, half the fun of a mystery story is watching the audience figure it out on their own, no?

Psi-Lords #1 JonBoy Meyers cover

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Global Frequency

by Robert Greenberger

“You’re on the global Frequency.”

With that call, Miranda Zero summoned some of the 1001 people in her network to crowdsource a rescue operation when all other options had been exhausted. The worldwide collection of operatives included people who were the top of their specific fields, from bio-weapon engineering to scientific researchers to academics, athletes, and even former criminals. She summons them via a unique mobile vid-phone and begins the countdown to success.

This science fiction series was one of the most unique offerings from WildStorm when the maxiseries was published between 2002-2004 and spawned a failed television pilot. The entire dozen issues of global frequency are finally being collected in a single softcover volume. If you missed this before, the package is ideal.

Written by Warren Ellis, this near-science fiction tale features art from a stellar array, including Steve Dillon, Glenn Fabry, Garry Leach, David Lloyd, Jon J. Muth, Brian Wood, Liam McCormack-Sharp, Liam Sharp, Lee Bermejo, Simon Bisley, Tomm Coker, gene Ha, Jason Pearson, Chris Sprouse, and Karl Story. David Baron’s colors unify the package. No wonder this was nominated for “Best limited Series” Eisner award in 2004.

Over the course of the series, we learn more about the operation along with the background of the enigmatic Zero and her dispatcher, Aleph. What we do know about the business is that many of the world’s leading governments help fund the expensive operation. In exchange, their dirtiest secrets are kept in the dark. global Frequency, therefore, is sometimes summoned, but they are typically proactively at work as secrets start to emerge into the light.

Of course, the concept was devised to allow Ellis to explore issues that struck his fancy, allowing him to go from high tech all the way to the paranormal. Each emergency mission allows him to introduce a wide variety of characters, letting him put his writing prowess on display and he rarely disappoints. until they recognize the GF symbol, worn inconspicuously on their person, fellow agents don’t know one another. Obviously, when you bring strangers or mere acquaintances together, start the countdown and unleash them, there are sure to be sparks. given the nature of such missions, no one was guaranteed to survive, adding an element of danger usually missing from most ongoing series. After all, if an agent died on a case, another specialist could always be recruited.

Best, Ellis writes to each artist’s strength so visually, the world of global frequency is stunning in its variety and detail.

If there was ever a concept tailor-made for a long running television series, this was it. Ellis was deeply involved as a producer and mark Rogers, who once wrote Blue Beetle and today masterminds Leverage, wrote the pilot for Warner Bros. Michelle Forbes was cast as Zero and the pilot has been circulating around the web and showed its potential. In 2009, a new pilot was mentioned but nothing ever became of it, more’s the pity.

Looking back, one could argue that this was one of the first series exploring such territory, which has been steadily mined by creators ever since. You can catch a whiff of global frequency in many of the current wave of image titles so its imprint is subtle, but evident. We can still enjoy these adventures, which are well worth your time and attention.

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Global frequency SC

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*George Takei, Mr. Sulu of star trip fan will be guest-starring in this November’s Kevin Keller #6 from Archie Comics. It doesn’t rather have the shock value of the time that The Punisher showed up in Riverdale, however it’s still quite cool.

*DC entertainment has declared Thursday, July 19 as The Dark Knight Rises Day to celebrate the opening of Christopher Nolan’s final bat-film opening in theaters as well as IMAX ® on Friday, July 20.   Fans who go to their regional comic book retailer on July 19 will get a free, special edition comic book featuring a number of special previews of present as well as upcoming Batman comic books as well as graphic novels as well as Batman buttons on a first-come, first-served basis.

*Ed Brubaker will be stepping down as writer on Captain America with problem #19, however will continue on winter Soldier for the near future.

*DC is lastly releasing Doc savage #18, the final problem as well as 2nd part of a 2-part story that never saw the light of day when DC pulled the plug on their Firstwave pulp line last year. However, the problem is only offered for digital Download. Hey, at least you can checked out it!

*Even though this week discovers Alan Moore completing up his latest league of extraordinary Gentlemen project, he has already revealed a new one for 2013 called Nemo: Heart of Ice, starring Pirate Jenny.

*No more Akbar as well as Jeff! Matt Groening has decided to end his Life In hell comic strip after 30 years.

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Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies

by Robert Greenberger

Mike Gold had a bold idea. He wanted DC Comics to produce a weekly comic book, 48-pages thick and imitate the success of Britain’s 2000 AD. executive Editor Dick Giordano was fascinated by the notion of a weekly, having tried without much success to use the Charlton characters to launch a weekly, something I discussed in detail way back in Comic book artist #9. but here was Mike, newly arrived from first Comics and brimming with fascinating ideas, among them Wasteland and this weekly, anthologies to explore new ideas. Somehow, it was chose that action Comics would house this bold new idea, starting with the upcoming issue #601.

Mike announced Barbara Kesel and I were working on features for this book and we hashed out characters to be featured and who would edit which ones. He had figured out that staggering storylines and characters would imply every few weeks we could create an event, goosing sales just as the sellers might begin lowering their orders. He knew the weekly would feature Blackhawk based on his success with the Howard Chaykin-produced prestige format miniseries and because green Lantern’s solo book was being cancelled, he could find a new home here. Superman, of course, had to be a fixture, having not missed an issue because 1938. Mike hit on the notion that it would be done like a weekly Sunday page, keeping Curt Swan, who had lost out on drawing the man of Steel in the John Byrne revamp, connected to the hero. We then drafted a list of other then-popular characters that might not sustain a solo book but could easily deal with a rotating feature.

It fell to me to figure out a rotation based on writers reporting on the length of their serials plus identifying which hero would grace each cover. For me, the best part of working on that book was commissioning the covers, getting people like Alex Toth, John Severin, and Mike Kaluta to contribute. In some ways, the covers were the best part of the series. Anyway, the rotation implied that Black Canary would be the first new feature to be added followed a few weeks later by Nightwing.

Action Comics weekly #613. Cover by Michael Kaluta.

At the time, Nightwing was extremely popular thanks to Marv Wolfman and George Perez’s dealing with of him in the pages of new teen Titans. Barbara, who was working with Marv on the title, got the Nightwing gig and of course that implied she was now editing her boss. Over the 42 issues of the series, there were two Nightwing serials, both involving Speedy, playing off their friendship from the Titans. For the first time ever, the two serials along with Nightwing’s origin are being collected in Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies. The solicitations sadly are using the weak Gil Kane cover instead of the much more atmospheric Kaluta cover or a choice between the much more content-accurate Jon Bogdanove & Murphy Anderson or Tom Grindberg covers.

Kicking things off will be the Dan Mishkin-penned origin from secret Origins #13, a time when the series was also 48-pages, pairing a golden Age story by Roy Thomas with a much more commercially viable modern age origin edited by yours truly. Dan fit this in between new teen Titans #16-19 as Dick, just turning 20, tells his backstory to Jericho while hanging out on Tamaran. given the acrobatic nature of the character, I turned the art over to newcomer Erik Larsen, who was already working with me on Doom Patrol.

Action Comics weekly #618. Cover by Jon Bogdanove & Murphy Anderson.

From there the book moves into the serial from ACW #613-618 by Wolfman, Chuck Patton and Tom Poston. “The Cheshire Contract” has fast ask Nightwing for help in stopping Cheshire from assassinating an ambassador. given Nightwing’s recent split form Batman, the two former sidekicks take time to talk about what this has implied to the former young boy Wonder. This turns out to a critical fast tale in that he has been chasing Cheshire so he could finally meet Lian, the child they conceived together.

The second serial, “Rocks and hard Places”, was longer — nine parts – and a bit much more ambitious so Marv brought in his animation buddy Cheri Wilkerson to cowrite then take over. While mostly unknown today, from 1984-1992 she was a prolific animation scribe, having dealt with the Batman and Superman animated series among numerous others. Illustrating the tale was new talent showcase alum Tom Mandrake although the schedule required Vince Giarrano to step in and pencil two parts for Tom. The story, running from issues #627-634, picks up with fast in Ireland, taking time off from heroics to bond with Lian. This also picks up on the revelation that he had been fired from the CBI, the government agency he headed for a time and something was certainly rotten. They investigate, getting framed for a crime in the process, and the two have to expose the corruption.

For the record, there was also a solo fast five-parter towards the end of ACW’s existence. Written by mark Verheiden with art by Louis Williams, Frank Springer, and Frank McLaughlin, it was the first story to show fast attempt to raise Lian as a single, super-hero parent. The action also takes place at an aids clinic, one of the earliest comic book references to the insidious disease. A shame it wasn’t included here.

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Nightwing: Old friends and new Enemies

Classic comic covers from the Grand Comics Database.