Month: October 2017

Whedon returns to Dark Horse’s ‘Buffy’ comics for new miniseries

Whedon and Erika Alexander will co-write a new miniseries starring Giles, who goes back to class as a high school student.

Joss Whedon makes his triumphant return to the Buffy the Vampire Slayer universe with a new four-issue comic book limited series — Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Giles.

In the lead up to New York Comic Con, Dark Horse Comics announced that the Buffy creator will work with co-writer Erika Alexander of Concrete Park fame on the series. Artist Jon Lam, colorist Dan Jackson, and cover artists Steve Morris and Arielle Jovellanos round out the team.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Kim Dwinell on ‘Surfside Girls’

The animator discusses her first graphic novel, surfing, the ocean and more.

Kim Dwinell has been teaching and working in animation for years, but this years she’s written and drawn her first graphic novel, Surfside Girls, Book One: The Secret of Danger Point. The book, which is out now from Top Shelf, is a beautifully painted young adult mystery/adventure story. Two 12-year-olds, Samantha and Jade, live in the sleepy beach town of Surfside and become involved in s series of strange occurrences that include the titular Danger Point, ghosts, the town’s history, and a group of boys who find what they think is a baby pterodactyl.

There’s a timeless quality to the adventure, but Dwinell is also threading other more complicated stories in the background, stories of the town, of the history of California, and the result is a book that manages to capture some of that spirit and energy found in Scooby Doo and a lot of other old mystery stories that so many of us fell in love with as kids, and establishing a rich setting. This is Dwinell’s debut book, but the way she uses design and layout throughout show just how much she understands about how comics work. Summer is over, but I reached out to Dwinell to talk about the book, her background in animation, and the ocean.

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Dynamite announces ‘Pumpkinhead’ by Cullen Bunn

Bunn tapped to write original comic book projects based on the cult classic horror film series.

Horror writer extraordinaire Cullen Bunn will have the opportunity to put his stamp on one of his favorite monsters, Pumpkinhead, in a new series coming from Dyanmite Entertainment.

“I’ll admit, when I heard that Dynamite had acquired the rights to do this book, I immediately contacted them asking to pitch for the series,” Bunn said on his website. “Good ol’ Pumpkinhead may be my favorite movie monster, and I’ve always had the urge to add my own spin to his story.” (Bunn has already decorated his Twitter page in honor of the announcement).

Dynamite announced the series in the lead-up to New York Comic Con. No artist was announced, but the series is set to launch in February.

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Lemire, Sorrentino reteam on creator-owned ‘Gideon Falls’

The ‘Green Arrow” and ‘Old Man Logan’ team is joined by colorist Dave Stewart for ‘a suspenseful ongoing supernatural/horror series’ at Image Comics.

Jeff Lemire and Andrea Sorrentino breathed new life into Green Arrow and Old Man Logan at DC and MArvel, and now they’ve teamed up on a creator-owned series, Gideon Falls, at Image Comics. Dave Stewart will color the new ongoing supernatural/horror series.

“Gideon Falls has been percolating in my brain for a long long time. A lot of the ideas have been with me for over a decade, but I just never found the right time or way to pull them together…that was until I started working with Andrea Sorrentino,” Lemire said. “Andrea and I quickly developed an incredible chemistry while working on Green Arrow and Old Man Logan. And, as much as we loved working on those books, we were dying to create something all our own too, and now we have with Gideon Falls, one of the weirdest and wildest things either of us has ever done. We are excited to be at Image and excited to be unleashing Gideon Falls with the incomparable Dave Stewart joining us on colors.”

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Gaiman + Dark Horse double down with ‘A Study in Emerald,’ more ‘American Gods’

Rafael Albuquerque, Rafael Scavone and Dave Stewart will turn Gaiman’s Sherlock Holmes/H.P. Lovecraft story in a graphic novel, as P. Craig Russell and Scott Hampton return for more ‘American Gods.’

Dark Horse Comics has been turning Neil Gaiman’s short stories and novels into comics over the past few years, and in the lead up to New York Comic-Con, they’ve announced two new projects with the writer of Good Omens and American Gods.

This week brings word that Rafael Albuquerque, Rafael Scavone and Dave Stewart will adapt Gaiman’s “A Study in Emerald,” a supernatural mystery set in the world of Sherlock Holmes and H.P. Lovecraft’s Cthulhu. Per the release, “The heart-pounding tale features the brilliant detective and his faithful partner as they attempt to solve a horrific murder of cosmic proportions. The complex investigation takes the Baker Street investigators from the slums of Whitechapel all the way to the Queen’s Palace.”

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comiXology, Marvel announce ‘Black Panther: Long Live The King’

Novelist Nnedi Okorafor and artist Andre Araujo team up for a new miniseries from the comiXology Originals line.

comiXology and Marvel have announced another miniseries as part of the comiXology Originals line — Black Panther: Long Live The King, a six-issue bi-weekly series written by Nnedi Okorafor and with art by Andre Araujo.

Black Panther follows two comiXology Originals/Marvel joints — Immortal Iron Fists (which my kid loves; we hope Pei is going to be ok!) by Kaare Andrews and Afu Chan, and Thor vs. Hulk: Champions of the Universe by Jeremy Whitley and Simone Buonfantino. Both series can bought off comiXology and are available to comiXology Unlimited subscribers.

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Valiant unleashes ‘Harbinger Wars 2’ on two fronts next May

Each issue will feature two stories for the standard $3.99 price.

Valiant is following up their 2013 Harbinger Wars event series with the aptly named Harbinger Wars 2 — which will actually feature two complete stories in each issue detailing two different “fronts” in the war.

Each 44+ page issue will feature two complete, full-length 22-page stories “chronicling dueling fronts in the nationwide battle that will soon consume the Valiant Universe’s most powerful forces,” according to Valiant. Matt Kindt and Tomás Giorello will chronicle “the head-on collision of the Harbinger Renegades and the newly returned X-O Manowar,” while Eric Heisserer, Raúl Allen and Patricia Martín of Secret Weapons fame “will thrust Livewire and her new team of recruits into the center of a power struggle with the potential to tear America apart.” Each issue will cost $3.99 — so essentially you’re getting two comics for the price of one.

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First Second to publish Walden’s ‘On a Sunbeam’

Eisner Award-nominated comic comes to print in 2018.

Tillie Walden’s Spinning, released last month, has been racking up good reviews lately, so it’s no surprise that First Second would want to publish more of her work. And lucky for them Walden already has a completed story ready to go — her excellent “On a Sunbeam” webcomic.

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Shawn McManus looks to Kickstart zombie baseball cards

The former ‘Sandman’ and “Fables’ artist seeks to crowdfund ‘Horror at Home Plate: League of Zombies,’ a 24-card set of zombified baseball players.

Shawn McManus’ comics work runs the gambit from Heavy Metal to Saga of the Swamp Thing to Dr. Fate to Sandman and many other titles, but now he’s turned his pen to something different — baseball cards. McManus is using Kickstarter to fund a set titled “Horror at Home Plate: League of Zombies” — so there’s a bit of a supernatural twist to them.

“This project started when I decided to paint a zombie baseball player just for fun between projects,” McManus said on the Kickstarter page. “I liked the retro look of it so I did another. Followed by one more, and then one after that. Before I knew it I had 24 of them done. I can’t tell you how much fun these were to do. I showed them to some fellow artists at lunch one day and someone suggested that I should do a Kickstarter campaign card set. So here we are. This seems to be a great way to share these cards with more than just family and a few friends.”

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Smash Pages Q&A: Étienne Davodeau on ‘The Cross-Eyed Mutt’

The French creator discusses his latest graphic novel from NBM, a very serious comedy about a security guard at the Louvre.

Étienne Davodeau’s graphic novel The Cross-Eyed Mutt, recently published in a translated version from NBM, has a hilarious premise. Fabien is a security guard at the Louvre and when he meets his girlfriend’s family, they tell him that they have a painting from their ancestor. “Would our ancestor’s painting have a spot in the Louvre or is it an insignificant piece of crap?”

The book is the latest in a series of graphic novels published with the Louvre, and Davodeau uses the situation as a chance to tell a story that, like his Lulu Anew and The Initiates, manages to both poke fun at eccentrics and deeply honor unusual ways of looking at the world – sometimes simultaneously. It is a book that is profound and joyful and very funny about what we love about art and museums, about what we remember, how we see ourselves, and in the end, how we live our lives.

The Cross-Eyed Mutt is in short, a very serious comedy, and it is one of the year’s best books. Thanks to Terry Nantier and Stefan Blitz at NBM, I had a chance to speak with Davodeau about spending time in the Musée du Louvre, his own thoughts on art, and whether we might be able to get my great-uncle’s work into the museum.

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Marvel announces ‘Old Man Hawkeye’

Ethan Sacks and Marco Checchetto revisit the world of “Old Man Logan” with a prequel story about Wolverine’s road trip buddy.

The New York Daily News reports that one of their own, Ethan Sacks, is writing a 12-issue Old Man Hawkeye series for Marvel. This prequel to the Old Man Logan series will be drawn by Marco Checchetto.

“In this story, [Hawkeye is] losing his vision and that sort of forces him to confront something really horrible that happened to him personally 45 years ago, and go on his own hero’s journey while he still can,” Sacks told the Daily News. “It’s very much like a ticking clock that’s forcing him into action.”

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Comics Lowdown: Indian cartoonist Mohan Tadi has passed away

Plus: Seth Mann, Bianca Xunise, Mimi Pond, Noah Van Sciver, Peter Bagge and more.

Passings: Indian cartoonist Mohan Tadi, described by one admirer as “a humanist cartoonist” and another as “the first cartoonist to introduce European satire to telugu journalism” has died at the age of 67. (Telugu is an Indian language.) Born in Andra Pradesh in 1951, Mohan studied at Andhra University and began his career in 1970 as a sub-editor at the Vishalandra Telugu, a daily newspaper. He worked for several newspapers and as an independent journalist as well as a cartoonist; he was also the head of animation for Sakshi News.

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