Bad Idea, the boutique comics publisher founded in 2020, has announced a new title coming next year from John Wick screenwriter Derek Kolstad, Hawkman and Green Lantern writer Robert Venditti, and Star Wars artist Tomás Giorello.
Planet Death centers on the lone survivor of an invasion force sent to destroy an alien weapon on a hostile planet. After his battalion is decimated, he continues on alone to try and finish their mission.
“Planet Death is my love letter to all of the comics and books I read, movies I watched, and games I played – late into the night with a grin on my face…from Hard Boiled and Ronin by Frank Miller to the films of Alistair MacLean like The Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare to Bradbury, Asimov, and Heinlein, to games like Starcraft and everything in between,” said Kolstad. “Some of my favorite stories are the ones that blend science fiction with elements of the war genre, from Starship Troopers to Aliens and Edge of Tomorrow. With Planet Death we take this tradition and add all those things we love so much about comic books.”
Here’s how Bad Idea describes Planet Death:
Millions of miles from home, hundreds of ships descend into the stormy atmosphere of a hostile frozen world. On board, an army of resolute men and women brace for the coming assault.
They are an invasion force, on an impossible mission — destroy the devastating enemy weapon garrisoned below. Corporal Scott and his battalion are in the vanguard but the human forces are no match for their brutal alien adversaries. Scott’s battalion is dead within moments. He is its lone survivor. The landing force annihilated, the battle is lost.
Against overwhelming odds, Scott dares the unthinkable — cross behind enemy lines, survive the lethal landscape, evade capture by ruthless enemies, resist natural predators, face human deserters and finish the mission singlehandedly. Locked in his suit of full combat battle armor, sustained only by what he can carry, and driven by Earth’s wrath, Scott must do by himself what an entire army could not.
Destroy the weapon.
Return home.
“From my first conversations with Derek, I don’t know how to describe it, other than an engine clicked on,” said Venditti. “Writing the first issue, I was buzzing with adrenaline. I couldn’t stop until I got the whole issue down. I was swept up in Scott’s relentless will—always pressing forward, always pushing ahead.”
Here’s a black-and-white preview:
The comic won’t be released until next March, but Bad Idea will distribute a Planet Death “convention exclusive” giveaway comic at their San Diego Comic Con panel on July 27.