Dark Horse Comics has announced a new project by Bob Burden, creator of the Flaming Carrot. And it sounds like bonkers fun, as you’d expect from Burden.
Hitman for the Dead is about an assassin who loses his soul in a card game, and “takes up with a crew of vagabond serial killers roaming America, administering one of the last surviving rituals of the Spanish Inquisition, avenging the wrongfully slain, and freeing their souls to pass on and find peace.”
“This project started out as a strategy to promote the new 400-page Flaming Carrot Omnibus that we have coming out in September from Dark Horse,” Burden said. “The story was an experiment. I wanted to change directions, blow out the pipes so to speak, and do a down-and-dirty hardcore thriller/horror/detective thing that would diverge from my humor stuff. Unlike Flaming Carrot, people instantly get what Hitman For The Dead is about and we feel it has a very viral potential.”
To promote the new series, Dark Horse is selling a limited edition “Hitman For The Dead novella” in a vintage paperback format at their booth at Comic-Con International, which serves as a prequel to the comic book. There’s also a website you can visit for more information, preview art and to get the preview novella, which is available as a PDF.
“I had a completed comic book script from a few years back – a good, solid story – but could I turn that script into a novel in the few weeks I had left in June and have it ready for San Diego Comic Con? I had to go for it. Originally called Silence Of Night, Hitman For The Dead was an idea that I had been kicking around for a while. Will it work as collateral promotion for the now obscure and seemingly forgotten Flaming Carrot and get it on people’s radar screens? It’s an experiment, and we’ll see how it goes,” Burden added.