Mike Marts named editor in chief of Mad Cave Studios

Marts will oversee editorial for Mad Cave, Maverick and Papercutz.

Comics veteran Mike Marts has left his position at AfterShock Comics to become executive vice president and editor in chief of Mad Cave Studios.

Marts brings more than 30 years of experience in the comics industry to the company, including roles as an executive editor for Marvel Comics, group editor for DC Comics and editor in chief for AfterShock, where he has been for the last eight years.

“We are thrilled to welcome Mike Marts to Mad Cave Studios. He’s a proven leader and gifted storyteller with a keen eye for talent and quality,” said Mark London, CEO + CCO of Mad Cave Studios. “Not only does Mike himself have 30 years worth of editorial experience, but also he has proven to be a valuable source of guidance for young creators along the way. As Mad Cave continues to establish itself in the growing comic book and graphic novel industry, we can’t think of a better person than Mike to take the role as executive vice president and editor in chief.” 

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Rich Koslowski explores money, fame and super powers in ‘F.A.R.M. System’

The creator of ‘Three Fingers’ returns with a new graphic novel from Top Shelf this November.

It’s been more than a decade since Top Shelf released a triple threat of creative graphic novels from Rich Koslowski — Three Fingers, the faux “behind the scenes” mockumentary about the world of animation and a certain iconic mouse; The King, about an Elvis impersonator who just may have been more than that; and BB Wolf and the Three LP’s, with writer J.D. Arnold, which mixed the tale of the Three Little Pigs with a blues aesthetic.

Since then, he’s certainly kept himself busy with other work for various publishers, including Archie Comics, but this November he’ll return to Top Shelf for F.A.R.M. System, a new graphic novel that combines baseball’s minor league set-up with superheroes.

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Sunday Comics | 24/7 Comictober Fest

Check out comics from Melanie Gillman, Ryan Cody, David Lopez and more.

Here’s a round up of some of the best comics we’ve seen online recently. If we missed something, let us know in the comments below.

October not only brings a change in the weather and the spooky Halloween season, but also a plethora of art challenges and events. Although there’s a bit of shadow over Inktober these days, that hasn’t stopped artists and creators from taking whatever prefix they want, sticking it in front of “-tober” and running with it on social media.

So yes, the fun continues all throughout the month, whether it’s Batober, Jacktober, Comictober or, yes, even Inktober. Let’s take a look at a few examples:

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Quick Hits | A quick awards round-up

The Harvey Awards announce their Hall of Fame inductees, Tripwire honors comic creators and more.

It seems to perpetually be awards season, so today seems like a good day for another quick awards round-up post. Congrats to everyone being honored!

The Harvey Awards steering committee has announced four creators who will be inducted into their Hall of Fame this year: Neil Gaiman, Roy Thomas, Gilbert Shelton and Marge Buell.

“The first time I was given a Harvey Award, it was 1991, 31 years ago, I had a whole career or two ahead of me and Harvey Kurtzman was still alive,” Gaiman said in the press release. “It was the award that bore his name and was thus the most important award I had ever received. Now, with over three decades of comics career behind me, it’s just as thrilling to hear that I get to join a Hall of Fame named for Harvey. He was one of the greats, and so many of the people who have been inducted already have been people I looked up to over the years. So this is an unalloyed delight for me.”

The four creators will be inducted during the Harvey Awards ceremony at the New York Comic Con, which is coming up next weekend. Check out the list of all the nominees for this year’s Harvey Awards.

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It’s Alive publisher Drew Ford passes away

Ford died from COVID related pneumonia earlier this week.

Drew Ford, who published comics and graphic novels under the It’s Alive banner, passed away from COVID-related pneumonia, according to his wife, Aki Uesugi.

Uesugi has started a GoFundMe page to help pay for the funeral and other expenses, where she shares more details on what led to Ford’s death. While Ford has been declared brain dead, he is still on life support as his organs will be donated.

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Canadian comic creator festival returns today with new vigor

Canadian-made comics are celebrated at the Panel One Comic Creator Festival.

In an era of Hollywood-infested comic cons, the Panel One Comic Creator Festival in Calgary, Alberta offers a show that puts all the attention on comic creators in Canada. I spoke with Joey Gruszecki, President of Panel One.

What is Panel One?

Panel One is a non-profit organization dedicated to the promotion and advancement of Canadian comic book creators and artists at all stages of professional development, from hobbyists to professionals. In addition to our various programming and community building activities throughout the year, our primary focus is on the annual Panel One Comic Creator Festival. 

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IDW to publish ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’ comic in December

Kirsten Beyer, Mike Johnson, Megan Levens and Charlie Kirchoff bring Captain Pike and his crew to comics.

Earlier this week IDW announced plans to publish Star Trek: Strange New Worlds-The Illyrian Enigma, a new miniseries set between the first and second seasons of the Paramount+ show.

The show’s co-executive producer, Kirsten Beyer, will co-write the miniseries with Mike Johnson, who has written a ton of Star Trek in the past. They’ll work with artist Megan Levens and colorist Charlie Kirchoff, who have worked on previous Star Trek titles for IDW.

“What ultimately draws me to any project is the characters, and after only one short season, I’m already so deeply invested in the entire cast of Strange New Worlds,” Levens said. “It’s remarkable that they’ve been able to successfully bring together new interpretations of classic characters we’ve known and loved for over half a century, and fresh faces that are already as compelling and relatable as their more established crewmates. Bringing this cast onto the comic page for the first time has been a delight for me, both as a Trekkie and as an artist!”

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Comixology Originals will publish the debut graphic novel from Xavier Saxon

‘Night at the Belfry’ arrives on the platform Oct. 18.

Comixology Originals has announced plans to publish Night at the Belfry, the debut graphic novel by writer and artist Xavier Saxon.

The story is about a 73-year-old former postman who starts remembering his time as a recreational boxer in the 1980s and “hatches a life altering plan to regain the control he believes he’s lost.”

“Night at the Belfry is my first book and I am super proud of it, but it is not where I would have expected myself to start off in the world of comics,” Saxon said. “I don’t have much of an interest in boxing, I’m not a seventy-plus year-old retiree (yet), and my preferences in terms of fiction have always skewed more towards the fantastical, genre-based stuff. “The idea came from a few places. It started purely visually, the idea of a boxing match in a church belltower. But as I developed the story I became fascinated with the idea of applying undue importance to an, in retrospect, insignificant period of one’s own life. Mostly, though, the book came from a place of frustration. I wanted to finish something. And now that I have, I hope what I’ve made will resonate with readers.”

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McNamara + Massaggia explore history, privacy + serial killers in ‘Past Tense’

The new graphic novel from Dark Horse Comics arrives next year.

Jason McNamara and Alberto Massaggia will team up for a new graphic novel, Past Tense, that’s set to come out from Dark Horse next year. They’ll be joined by colorist Paul Little and designer Sonia Harris on this new story about serial killers and the loss of privacy.

“To me, horror works best when it reflects real-world concerns,” McNamara said. “If we have a modern bogeyman, it is our loss of privacy. I wanted to couple that with my fascination with unsolved mysteries. What if we could send a hidden camera back through time, not to change history, but to view it as it truly occurred?”

McNamara is the writer of Ghost Band, The Cicada, Sucker, The Rattler and many other graphic novels and comics that feature monsters, serial killers, dystopian futures and more. So he’s no stranger to horror — they probably play pool together. Massaggia, meanwhile, is the artist of the Behemoth Comics series Hotline Miami: Wildlife.

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Snyder + Jock open the ‘Book of Evil’

The creators of ‘Batman: Black Mirror’ reunite for a new illustrated prose series for Comixology Originals.

As part of his eight-book deal with Comixology Originals, Scott Snyder will once again team with artist Jock for The Book of Evil, a “visionary serialized horror story” that blends Snyder’s prose with Jock’s illustrations.

The story follows four young friends growing up in world where over 90 percent of the population are born as psychopaths, but they don’t know it until they become a teenager. Despite the danger, the four friends “set off together on a journey that will take them down the roads and rivers of this transformed America in the hope of finding a place where goodness still lives.”

Snyder shared more about it in his newsletter:

“It imagines that not long from now, 92% of the population start being born sociopaths. Nobody knows why, nobody knows if it’s a toxin or a mutation or evolution. But suddenly, the vast majority of people being born present as sociopaths when they hit adolescence. So when you’re about 13 or 14, you switch over into either being part of the majority, a psychopath, or you’re one of what they call ‘subs,’ a ‘subhuman’ person who still has the vestigial limb of empathy or compassion or a conscience, and you’re relegated to the terrible hard labor of this world. So it’s a really dark book,” he said. “I’m very, very, very proud of this one. It’s prose with spot illustrations and it’s presented as the journal, like an artifact by a kid in this world named Homer, who’s growing up with his three best friends in the slums that they keep kids in until they present one way or another. And it’s about an adventure they have to try and escape all of the terrors of this future.”

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Can’t Wait for Comics | Pour yourself a glass of ‘Pink Lemonade’

The Roadie! Tim Drake! Flawed! Sgt. Rock vs. zombies! And Saladin Ahmed wraps up his run on Miles Morales: Spider-Man in this week’s comics.

Welcome to Can’t Wait for Comics, your guide to what comics are arriving in comic book stores, bookstores and on digital.

I’ve pulled out some of the highlights below, but for the complete list of everything you might find at your local comic shop and on digital this week, you’ll want to check out one or more of the following:

As a reminder, things can change and what you find on the above lists may differ from what’s actually arriving in your local shop. So always check with your comics retailer for the final word on availability.

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D + Q will publish Winnie-the-Pooh by Travis Dandro next year

The graphic novel adaptation of the A. A. Milne/E. H. Shepard classic will wander into stores next year.

Drawn and Quarterly has announced that Travis Dandro, the creator of Hummingbird Heart, is working on a new Winnie-the-Pooh graphic novel for the publisher.

“It’s amazing to see Travis make a turn from his hilarious and heart-rending autobiographical series of graphic novels to one of the most sublime children’s classics. Seeing a cartoonist of this kind of skill reinterpreting great literature is rare and thrilling,” said Executive Editor Tom Devlin.

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