‘Miskatonic’ returns for its big finale in November

The one-shot ‘Miskatonic: Even Death May Die’ will finish the story started in last year’s miniseries.

Mark Sable and Giorgio Pontrelli will follow up their 2020 limited series Miskatonic with a one-shot this November, titled Miskatonic: Even Death May Die. The one-shot will wrap up the story they started last year.

Miskatonic: Even Death May Die special is a 48-page, oversized grand finale to Miskatonic, the crime/horror/historical fiction set in H.P. Lovecraft’s valley of the same name, picking up right where the series left off in the late 1920s,” Sable said. “The protagonists are the same. Miranda Keller, one of the first female FBI agents, trying to escape from a concentration camp for half-man, half-sea creature, the Deep Ones in the American Southwest.  Her partner Tom Keller, a retired NYPD officer from Lovecraft’s The Horror of Red Hook, is trying to track her down.  All of this is set against the backdrop of America’s first red scare…and a strange supernatural call people are hearing across the globe – the Call of Cthulhu.”

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Hell hath no fury like ‘The Heathens’

Cullen Bunn, Heath Amodio and Sami Kivelä team up for a new series from AfterShock Comics.

AfterShock Comics has announced a new project featuring souls escaping from Hell, and the powers that be sending the worst of the worst after them — The Heathens, led by pirate queen Ching Shih.

Co-writers Cullen Bunn and Heath Amodio, who together founded Hustle & Heart Films, are working with artist Sami Kivelä, colorist Jason Wordie and letterer Simon Bowland on the series. Shih’s team will include several other notorious historical figures helping her on her mission, including Wild West outlaw Billy the Kid, gangster Lucky Luciano and Russian con artist Sofia the Golden Hand.

“Anyone who is familiar with me as a creator knows I love historical figures and time periods,” Bunn said in his email newsletter. “They also know I love infusing stories featuring those characters and time periods with a healthy dose of the supernatural. Heath brought the seed of this idea to me, and I loved it from the jump. It has history, villains, even worse villains, supernatural worlds and redemption — everything that I could hope for in a book!”

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Jack the Ripper rides again in ‘Cross to Bear’ this October

Marko Stojanović, Siniša Banović, Aljoša Tomić and Taylor Esposito send England’s most notorious serial killer to the American West in a new series from AfterShock Comics.

Marko Stojanović, Siniša Banović, Aljoša Tomić and Taylor Esposito will posse up in October for an alternate history take on Jack the Ripper, as they tell the story of how he fled England to hide out in the American West.

Cross to Bear will kick off on Oct. 13 from AfterShock Comics, as the notorious serial killer is pursued by a group with ties to the Crusades.

“The book is about Jack the Ripper fleeing to America in 1889 and heading straight to the Wild West – because his own savagery can avoid detection at the still savage frontier,” Stojanović said. “He is, however, pursued by the Order made up from the descendants of Crusaders knights set on eradicating the unnatural – and what could be more unnatural than the first documented serial killer grabbing all the headlines and causing mass hysteria? Only thing is, these crusaders are far from their usual haunts, and they’ll need help from a man who severed his ties with the other at the price of abandoning his own family.”

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Mail Call | Shang-Chi’s mutant sister debuts in ‘Shang-Chi’ #3

Like fireworks lighting up the night sky comes a barrage of news, previews and announcements from Marvel, Dark Horse, Image, Mad Cave Studios and more.

Mail Call is a roundup of the announcements we’ve received from comics publishers in our mailboxes recently that we haven’t already covered. Hit the links for more information.

Gene Luen Yang and Dike Ruan’s run on Marvel’s Shang-Chi has focused both on family and legacy, and in the third issue Marvel’s Master of Kung Fu finds out he has yet another sibling — and she’s a mutant.

Zhilan is a mutant warrior with a dazzling power: she can turn music into solidified energy. According to Marvel.com, she was exiled by Shang-Chi’s evil father years ago, and now Shang-Chi is seeking her out — as is the Krakoa mutant nation, which will lead to a confrontation with Wolverine.

Check out the variant cover by Michael Cho, along with some preview pages by Ruan, below:

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Prepare for the vengeance of ‘Chicken Devil’

Brian Buccellato, Hayden Sherman and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou will tell the story of a fast-food franchise owner pushed to the brink by the Russian mob.

Brian Buccellato, Hayden Sherman and Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou are teaming up on a new story about a chicken.

Well, make that a chicken man, but he wasn’t blown up in Philly last night. Mitchell Moss, a happily married father of two, co-owns the Memphis chain of Hot Chicken restaurants and discovers his business partner owes money to the Russian mob. After the mob attacks his family, Mitch “dons the mantle of the Chicken Devil to fight back.”

AfterShock Comics will release the first issue of Chicken Devil in October.

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‘Almost American’ tells the real-life story of a former Russian spy

Ron Marz and Marco Castiello will help tell the story of former spy Janosh “Jan” Neumann and his wife as they defected to the United States.

Who’s better to tell a spy story than an actual spy? Almost American, by former Russian spy Janosh “Jan” Neumann, Ron Marz, Marco Castiello, Flavio Dispenza and Rus Wooton, will tells how Neumann and his wife defected to the United States in 2008.

AfterShock Comics will publish the miniseries, which sees Marz and Neumann unite in what Marz called “a beautiful friendship,” noting this was likely the first of several collaborations between the two

Almost Americans is the real-life story of husband and wife Jan and Victorya Neumann, Russian intelligence operatives who had to flee Russia for their lives, and wound up in America, caught up in the bureaucracy and red tape of the U.S. government,” Marz said.”The story is that much more fascinating because it’s all true. These are real events that happened to real people, and it gives some pretty fascinating insight into the intelligence world works … and doesn’t work.”

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Mail Call | ‘Spawn’s Universe’ #1 orders exceed 200,000

Check out all kinds of announcements and previews from Skybound, Marvel, Bad Idea, AfterShock and more!

Mail Call is a roundup of the announcements we’ve received from comics publishers in our mailboxes recently that we haven’t already covered. Hit the links for more information.

Never let it be said that kids don’t still love chains. Image Comics and Todd McFarlane Productions sent out a release this week touting that the upcoming Spawn’s Universe #1 has shattered the record for “Image Comics’ top selling, first issue comic book of the 21st century by selling well over 200K units.”

The release goes on to mention that the comic is only the beginning for this year’s Spawn-pocalypse; Spawn’s Universe #1 will arrive in June, followed by King Spawn #1 in August, Gunslinger #1 in October and The Scorched #1 in December.

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AfterShock announces ‘Search for Hu’ by Orlando, Tsuei + Rubine

The new series will debut in September.

Writers Jon Tsuei and Steve Orlando will team with artist Rubine, colorist DC Alonso and letterer Carlos M. Mangual for Search for Hu, a new series from AfterShock Comics.

Search for Hu is about a man, Aaron Tse, who discovers his family has ties to organized crime in the worst way possible, sending him across an ocean to protect his parents.

Search for Hu is a first of its kind cross-cultural action thriller, digging into a shared history of Jewish and Chinese lineage dating back to the Russian Revolution,” Orlando said. “It’s about the cultural connections we never expect, something Jon and I discovered together. But that’s the tapestry. The story is about a man, Aaron Tse, who discovers this part of his family’s past in the most explosive way possible: when it comes back to haunt them.”

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Mail Call | ‘That Texas Blood’ returns with a new story arc in June

Today’s round-up includes announcements and previews from Marvel, DC, Skybound, Image, Dark Horse and more.

Mail Call is a roundup of the announcements we’ve received from comics publishers in our mailboxes recently that we haven’t already covered. Hit the links for more information.

That Texas Blood, the excellent small-town noir series by Chris Condon and Jacob Phillips, returns next month from Image Comics with a new story arc that delves into Ambrose County’s past, “blowing off some of that desert dust and seeing what lurks beneath,” Phillips said.

That Texas Blood #7 will arrive in comic shops on June 30.

“Returning to Ambrose County and these characters is like going home in many ways. They feel like old friends more than old creations and none more so than Sheriff Joe Bob Coates. I’m beyond excited to explore a bit of Joe’s past in this next story arc as we travel back in time to 1981. We’ll see new places, meet new people, and explore ideas we haven’t before. I’ve always believed that the beginning years of any decade are the hangover of the previous one, and I am absolutely thrilled that we are allowed to dissect this over the next six issues with our merry band of Ambrose Countians,” said Condon. “But don’t be fooled, we aren’t viewing the past through rose-colored glasses. I’ve said before that Texas is America’s mystical land, but every fantasy world has a minotaur lurking in the dark or a dragon breathing through smoking nostrils over armor-clad corpses. Our Texas is no different. The shadows there stretch to the horizon, devouring all light. But there are some who see the darkness and strike a match to light the way. I hope that you’ll join us on our trip down Highway 90, into the heart of Ambrose County and into the dark depths of the past. But don’t you fret, we’re not out of matches yet.”

Check out the first issue’s covers:

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Milligan + Kowalski bow down to the ‘God of Tremors’ in August

The new title from AfterShock Comics is a ’19th Century gothic horror of exorcism, demonic worship and epilepsy.’

Peter Milligan, writer of X-Statix, Shade the Changing Man and so much more, will team with Bloodbourne and Sex artist Piotr Kowalski for a story of “gothic horror of exorcism, demonic worship and epilepsy” in God of Tremors, a new one-shot from AfterShock Comics.

“It’s a story of dark secrets, shameful longings and terrifying changes,” Milligan said. “A Gothic tale of isolation and horror. Aubrey is a young man living in a straight-laced, 19th century English Victorian world, whose father is a vicar, renowned for his fiery speeches against the evils of new scientific ideas. When Aubrey has his first epileptic seizure it begins a harrowing series of ‘exorcisms,’ as both Aubrey and his father are convinced his condition is the work of the devil. Hidden away in his father’s country estate, Aubrey’s only release is walking in the wild woods that surround the house. It’s deep in these woods that Aubrey discovers an ancient stone pagan effigy that slowly changes his and all his family’s lives.”

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AfterShock will unleash ‘Clans of Belari’ in July

TV writers Rob and Peter Blackie team up with artist Daniel Maine for the new science fiction series.

Rob and Peter Blackie, the creators of the TV series Frontier, are teaming up with artist Daniel Maine for a new science fiction comic titled Clans of Belari.

Set in the Belari system, “an isolated, feudal dystopia located in the farthest reaches of the galaxy,” the comic will feature a girl named Te’a, and her adoptive father “Gummy,” as they unite the system’s clans against an alien threat.

“For a long time, we have been interested in a sci-fi story that imagines what life could be like for a human establishment on a distant planet facing similar struggles as we face on the Earth today,” Rob Blackie said. “As soon as we travelled across the galaxy, so to speak, it opens up the fantastical and what we sometimes call ‘space magic’ of the genre. That is just exciting and fertile territory for exploring character and story.”

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Mail Call | The Avengers brace for ‘World War She-Hulk’

Plus: More news and announcements from Marvel, DC, Dark Horse, AfterShock, Top Cow, Skybound and more!

Mail Call is a roundup of the announcements we’ve received from comics publishers in our mailboxes recently that we haven’t already covered. Hit the links for more information.

Marvel is dusting off a classic event title for an upcoming Avengers storyline — “World War She-Hulk,” which references the popular “World War Hulk” story from 2007.

The new storyline will find She-Hulk declared a global menace, so the Winter Guard decides to bring her in.

“When the Russian Winter Guard invade Avengers Mountain to arrest She-Hulk, it sets off a global espionage adventure that takes us from the notorious assassin training academy of the Red Room to an undersea kingdom on the verge of violent revolution,” said writer Jason Aaron. “Along the way, traitors will fall, regimes will crumble and the dark evolution of Jennifer Walters will reach its bloody red crescendo, all as we build toward the epic events of Avengers #50.”

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