Johns + Fabok’s ‘Three Jokers’ will arrive in August

Geoff Johns, Jason Fabok and Brad Anderson’s long-awaited project gets delayed due to the coronavirus.

DC Comics has announced a new release date and revealed more preview art for Three Jokers, Geoff Johns and Jason Fabok’s Batman/Joker story that was scheduled for June.

“As more stores are finding ways to operate and service their customers, our release schedule is under constant review,” said SVP and Editor-In-Chief Bob Harras. “From placing orders to on sale, moving Batman: Three Jokers to August will enable more stores to order and sell this incredible story that Geoff and Jason have crafted.”

Check out the preview art below, featuring colors by Brad Anderson:

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Mail Call | Clownhunter joins the ‘Joker Wars’

Plus: X of Swords, Star Wars manga, free Scooby comics and more.

Mail Call is a roundup of the announcements we received from publishers in our mailboxes recently. Hit the links for more information.

Marvel is hyping up their next X-Men event with some new promo art for X-Men: X of Swords, which was announced right before the pandemic at C2E2. Jonathan Hickman, Tini Howard and Pepe Larraz bring you X-Men: X of Swords: Creation #1 in September.

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Warren Ellis writing T-Rex Batman is the news the world needs right now [Update: No, it’s not]

Ellis joins many other writers in two anthologies that tie into DC’s ‘Death Metal.’

Update, June 30: Following allegations of sexual misconduct, DC Comics has removed the Warren Ellis-written story from Dark Nights: Death Metal Legends of the Dark Knights #1. And good riddance to it.

Original story:

DC Comics put out a press release today detailing two new titles related to their upcoming Death Metal event by Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo. Dark Nights: Death Metal Guidebook #1 and Dark Nights: Death Metal Legends of the Dark Knights #1 are both anthologies, containing various stories related to the event by a host of creators.

The guidebook will “showcase the new factions of Earth and explore the mystery of what happened to the Justice League after their battle with Perpetua,” while the Legends title will be “collection of short tales where demons dwell and reality is overrun by monstrous versions of the Dark Knight.”

Including T-Rex Batman, as written by Warren Ellis.

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DC to release ‘100-Page Giant’ stories digitally

Starting today, look for daily almost-new comics through the DC Digital First program.

DC Comics today announced that they will make stories from their 100-Page Giant anthologies available digitally, starting today with a Superman story by Robert Venditti, Paul Pelletier, Drew Hennessy and Adriano Lucas. Additional stories will be added daily for at least the next week.

“Comic book fans want more access to content than ever before,” said Jim Lee, DC Chief Creative Officer and Publisher, in a press release. “This strategy is intended to get daily content to fans immediately, and also to ensure that when comic shops open back up for business, they will have new content and product that their customers will want. In the meantime, we will have properly stoked and protected the demand for comics, keeping fans interested in our characters and stories.”

Here’s the line-up for the next seven days:

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DC spotlights medal of honor recipient in ‘Our Fighting Forces 100-Page Giant’

Brad Meltzer, Jim Lee and Scott Williams team up on a story featuring U.S. Army Specialist Salvatore A. Giunta and Batman.

DC’s upcoming Our Fighting Forces 100-Page Giant, part of its line of anthologies available at Walmart and comic shops, will include a previously announced story about U.S. Army Specialist Salvatore A. Giunta, the first living person since the Vietnam War to receive the U.S. military’s Medal of Honor.

The eight-page story is written by Giunta and Brad Meltzer, with art by Jim Lee and Scott Williams. And it also features Batman. Here’s the description:

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Johns + Fabok’s ‘Three Jokers’ arrives in June

Jokers take the spotlight in this homage to ‘The Killing Joke.’

Geoff Johns and Jason Fabok’s long-awaited Three Jokers miniseries now has a release date — DC Comics will target the first issue for June 17.

Johns said the story would focus not only on the Joker and Batman, but also Barbara Gordon and Jason Todd, both whom have been victims of the Joker in the past.

“It goes back to the beginning when Batman first encountered the Joker, but it’s also The Killing Joke and A Death in the Family that speak to the book and that we’re building off emotionally,” Johns told Entertainment Weekly. “Barbara and Jason have gone through so much, as has Bruce, and it’s really focused on healing, on scars and wounds and what that does to somebody. If you suffer some trauma, you don’t just get over with it and move on with your life, it changes who you are. Sometimes it changes you for the better, sometimes it changes you for the worse. You can heal right, and you can heal wrong. That’s really what the book’s about: Healing right, healing wrong, and surviving.”

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DC shares details on their 2020 Free Comic Book Day titles

Wally West and Wonder Woman take center stage in this year’s ‘gold’ title.

DC has revealed the contents of their two Free Comic Book Day 2020 titles, which were first announced in December without any details.

Their gold title, Generation Zero, “sets the stage for the past, present and future of the DC Universe, ” according to the press release. It will feature Wally West, who has gone through a lot recently in DC continuity, if you’ve been following the story that started in Heroes in Crisis.

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DC deletes Batman image from social media after receiving Chinese complaints

An image promoting ‘The Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child’ sparks complaints of ‘support of Hong Kong’s rioters.’

DC Comics deleted social media postings last week featuring a promotional image from the upcoming Dark Knight Returns: The Golden Child one-shot by Frank Miller and Rafael Grampa after receiving numerous complaints from Chinese commenters.

The comments said the image looked like it supported the pro-Democracy protests currently occurring in Hong Kong. The Global Times out of China said it “implied its support of Hong Kong’s rioters,” noting that many critics saw “Batman’s gesture as supportive of Hong Kong’s unrest and violence.”

Grampa, the artist of the piece, had a one-word response to the attention the piece received: “Surreal.” Here’s the image in question:

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DC celebrates Batman Day by announcing a new creative team

James Tynion IV, Tony S. Daniel, Danny Miki and Tomeu Morey will take over ‘Batman’ in 2020.

It’s Batman Day, and to celebrate, DC has announced the new creative team that will take over the flagship Batman title next year. James Tynion IV, Tony S. Daniel, Danny Miki and Tomeu Morey will chronicle the adventures of the Dark Knight in January.

“I loved writing stories for EternalDetective Comics and even Batman/Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, but my desire to tell a Batman story, one focusing solely on Bruce Wayne instead of an ensemble, is what drove me back to the Batcave,” said Tynion. “I want to dig deep into the Bat himself and tell an epic story that pushes him to his absolute limits. I want to tell a Batman story like the kinds I grew up loving, one that embraces the horror and gothic elegance of Gotham and dives deep into Batman’s greatest villains.”

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‘Red Rain’ Batman sinks his teeth into ‘Secrets of Sinister House’ one-shot

DC’s annual Halloween anthology features new stories by John Layman, Paul Dini, Rafael Albuquerque, Tom Raney and more.

DC’s annual Halloween anthology will return in October with a new story set in the world of Batman & Dracula: Red Rain, among other stories.

Rafael Scavone and Rafael Albuquerque will co-write the story about vampire Batman, with art by Rafael Albuquerque. Albuquerque’s the co-creator of American Vampire, so he’s very familiar with fanged monsters. Released in the 1990s and created by Dog Moench and Kelley Jones, Red Rain was one of the earliest “Elseworlds” stories published by DC. It spawned two sequels.

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Ellis + Hitch reunite for ‘Batman’s Grave’

The 12-issue series will take readers into the minds of Batman and Alfred.

Warren Ellis and Bryan Hitch, the team that reignited the comics medium with their take on The Authority at the turn of the century, will reunite for a new Batman maxi-series. Kevin Nowlan joins Hitch on art.

Titled The Batman’s Grave, the 12-issue series will see the Dark Knight take on a case that “forces him to inhabit the mind of a murder victim with a half-eaten face—without filling the empty grave next to those of his parents.”

“My very first work at DC was two issues of Legends Of The Dark Knight,” begins Ellis, “so it’s been 25 years since I did a full-length story with the Batman. I’ve decided to revisit the crime scene where my career in American comics began, and I’m so grateful that my old comrade Bryan Hitch is doing this midnight run with me. It’s been too many years since we last did a long campaign together.”

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Holy cowabunga: Batman, Ninja Turtles team up for action figure sets

GameStop will offer these figures from DC Collectibles exclusively this fall.

Batman and the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have met many times now, both in the pages of comics and in an animated movie. So the only logical place this relationship could go next is action figures.

DC Collectibles will release a series of action figures from both universes, as the Bat family and the Turtles appear in two-packs that’ll be exclusive to GameStop starting in September, with a price of $49.99 each, or $249.99 for the whole set.

Check them out below:

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