Marc Guggenheim and Howard Chaykin, who previously worked together on Marvel’s Blade and Wolverine titles almost two decades ago, will reunite for Too Dead To Die, a new graphic novel coming from Image Comics.
Guggenheim said the story of a 1980s spy set in the world of today is an idea he’s been planning for years.
“Too Dead To Die is one of those ideas I’ve been thinking about for years before the COVID quarantine gave me the opportunity to actually write it,” Guggenheim said. “I started off writing ‘on spec’ without any particular artist in mind. But 10 pages in, I realized that all the images I was seeing in my head were illustrated by Howard, whom I had the good fortune to collaborate with on Blade and Wolverine. I was writing with Howard in mind without realizing it. Fortunately, Howard was amenable to coming aboard and I love how he’s brought Simon’s story to life. It’s very exciting to be getting Too Dead To Die out into the world after all this time.”
Just when I Thought I was out …
The graphic novel will feature a super-spy named Simon Cross, who was active during the 1980s. Set in the present day, Cross “faces down today’s very different world and a past that has come back to haunt him, forcing him out of retirement for one final adventure.”
While the press release didn’t share these details, Guggenheim hinted in his newsletter that there’s more going with this story than meets the eye. For instance, did you know there was a Simon Cross comic published by Phoenix Comix Group back in the 1980s? I did not know that (there wasn’t), and my extensive research on Phoenix Comix was fruitless (because, again, there was no Phoenix Comix Group).
“One of the things we’ll be doing is taking readers down memory lane and talking a bit about the original Simon Cross comic series that (we’ll say) was published in the Eighties,” Guggenheim wrote in his newsletter. “Howard Chaykin and his team mocked up six covers.” Here’s one of them now:
“Few things delight me more, professionally, at least, than collaborating with Marc Guggenheim,” Chaykin said. “I had a great time drawing this Simon Cross adventure, and I can only hope every reader can share that delight.”
Too Dead To Die arrives in stores Dec. 14.
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