‘Absolute Power’ corrupts absolutely in DC’s July titles

Amanda Waller and friends have big plans for DC’s heroes and villains.

DC has revealed more details about their upcoming Absolute Power crossover series, including a companion series titled Absolute Power: Task Force VII and Absolute Power: Origins, which will tell the “definitive history” of Amanda Waller.

These follow the Free Comic Book Day issue in May and the prelude issue that comes out in June that we learned about earlier this year.

The press release also gives some information on Amanda Waller and the Trinity of Evil‘s plans — using Failsafe, Brainiac Queen and Amazo to capture the super powers of every superhero and villain on Earth. As a squad of Amazo robots captures the powers of DC’s mightiest heroes, leaving them powerless, a “league” of resistors led by Batman starts to form. Each issue of Absolute Power: Task Force VII will be by a different creative team and will be focused on a different Amazo who has stolen someone’s powers, including Last Son (Superman), Depth Charge (Aquaman) and Jadestone (Green Lantern).

You can find more details on Absolute Power and the tie-ins below.

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DC announces ‘Absolute Power,’ DC Finest and a return to Wednesdays

DC made several announcements during the ComicsPRO industry meeting this week.

If you’re wondering why so much comic news broke today, it’s because ComicsPRO, the Comics Professional Retail Organization, is hosting its industry meeting over the next three days. As a part of that meeting, comics publishers are presenting some of their future plans to attendees and, in many cases, releasing that news into the wild.

DC was one of many publishers on hand to talk to retailers, and gave several updates on their future plans. But let’s not bury the big news — DC announced at the conference that they plan to move the release of their new issues back to Wednesday. DC moved the release date of their comics from the traditional Wednesday to Tuesday back in 2020, when they moved away from Diamond to Lunar Distribution and other distributors. It was, and remains, a controversial move, and from what I’ve heard retailers gave this news a standing ovation at ComicsPRO today. The shift will occur in July.

In other news …

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Slugfest | Soule + Alburquerque continue ‘The Shrouded College’ storyline in a new miniseries

Plus: News and announcements about Star Wars, Sea Serpent’s Heir, Richard Corben, Kingdom Come, Stranger Things and more.

Slugfest is a roundup of cool announcements about projects coming to a shelf near you. Hit the links for more information.

Charles Soule and Alberto Jiménez Alburquerque will present the second of seven interconnected miniseries in “The Shrouded College” saga that started with Soule and Will Sliney’s Hell to Pay.

The Bloody Dozen will run for six issues and kicks off in December.

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Waid + Lupacchino revisit the original Teen Titans in a new series

‘World’s Finest: Teen Titans’ will spin out of Waid’s work on ‘World’s Finest.’

Readers of Mark Waid and Dan Mora’s World’s Finest know that the Teen Titans, Robin in particular, have played a key role in the series. Now the younger heroes who will one day become DC’s premiere superhero team will have their pasts explored in World’s Finest: Teen Titans by Waid and artist Emanuela Lupacchino.

“I’ve had so much fun writing the Teen Titans in Batman/Superman: World’s Finest that DC asked for more, and I couldn’t be happier,” Waid said. “Taking our cue from the main World’s Finest book, the series is set in the not-too-distant past, when Robin led the team—including Bumblebee and Mal Duncan—as they answered calls for help from kids worldwide and dealt with their celebrity status. The real fun for the wonderful Ema Lupacchino and me is revealing many surprising secrets about who each of the Titans really is. Even longtime readers will be stunned by these untold revelations.”

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Waid + Hitch team for ‘Last Days of Lex Luthor’ Black Label series

The ‘JLA: Heaven’s Ladder’ team is back together for a story that spins out of ‘Superman: Birthright.’

Mark Waid and Bryan Hitch, who previously worked together on JLA: Heaven’s Ladder, will reunite for a new Superman miniseries under DC’s adult-oriented Black label imprint.

Superman: The Last Days of Lex Luthor will feature the Man of Steel traveling far and wide to find a cure for a dying Lex Luthor, and will extend the story Waid told in Superman: Birthright. Waid and Hitch will be joined by inker Kevin Nowlan and color artist David Baron.

“For the first time, Superman’s fighting the tide of public opinion, embarking on a mission that billions of people outright oppose. But he has his reasons—partly because of who he is, but partly because of a debt he feels he owes—and readers of Superman: Birthright might already guess what that perceived debt is,” Waid said. “Together, Superman and Lex are racing the clock in search of a cure as they travel the breadth of the super-universe, from Atlantis to Kandor to the Phantom Zone, all spectacularly re-imagined by Bryan Hitch.”

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DC announces ‘Lazarus Planet’ event at New York Comic Con

Mark Waid will oversee an event that spins out of the upcoming ‘Batman vs. Robin’ series.

DC has announced a new crossover coming next year, Lazarus Planet, that spins out of Mark Waid’s work on both World’s Finest and the upcoming Batman vs. Robin series.

Lazarus Planet, a series of seven one-shots, will see the DC Universe “rocked to its core” as “dangerous and transformative chemicals” are released into the atmosphere, causing some ordinary humans to develop super powers and already empowered metahumans to find their abilities have changed. It’s chaos, baby!

NOTE: This story contains some spoilers for the upcoming Batman vs. Robin, which hasn’t even started yet.

Here’s the teaser art, which features Batman and Robin, as well as Power Girl, Poison Ivy, Cyborg and the Monkey Prince:

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What Are You Reading? | World’s Finest, Shadow War Zone, Grim and more

See what the Smash Pages crew has been reading lately.

Welcome to What Are You Reading?, our look at what the Smash Pages crew has been checking off their “to read” list lately. Today’s edition includes thoughts on Batman: Killing Time and a new Shaolin Cowboy miniseries coming this week.

Let us know what you’ve been reading lately in the comments or on social media.

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Waid + Asrar team for ‘Batman vs. Robin’ this fall

The event series will run for five issues beginning in September.

If things have seemed tense between Batman and Robin lately, well … as the saying goes, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

With a post that exclaims “The Bat is out of the bag!” artist Mahmud Asrar reveals that he’s working on a new Batman vs. Robin event series with writer Mark Waid and colorist Nathan Fairbairn.

“BATMAN vs ROBIN is a five part event by Mark Waid and I coming this fall from DC Comics to shake things up for Bruce’s world,” the artist said on both Tumblr and Twitter.

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Humanoids will donate some proceeds from new graphic novel to benefit Ukraine

Portions of proceeds from ‘Makhno: Ukrainian Freedom Fighter’ will benefit the Ukrainian nonprofit Razom.

Makhno: Ukrainian Freedom Fighter arrives in stores this week, and publisher Humanoids has announced plans to donate some of the proceeds they make from it to the Ukrainian nonprofit Razom, which supplies medical aid to Ukrainian fighters on the front lines.

The graphic novel was created by Philippe Thirault and Roberto Zaghi, and was published through Humanoids’ Life Drawn imprint. It arrived in stores today.

It’s a fitting choice, as the graphic novel spotlights Nestor Makhno, the real-life Ukrainian revolutionary from the early 20th century, who served as the commander of an independent anarchist army in Ukraine. They fought the Ukrainian National Republic, the Central Powers of Germany and Austro-Hungary, the Hetmanate state, the White Army, the Bolshevik Red Army and other factions that sought to impose their authority over southern Ukraine.

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Humanoids will preview ‘The Incal Universe’ on Free Comic Book Day

Mark Russell, Yanick Paquette, Pete Woods and more will contribute new stories based on ‘The Incal.’

Humanoids’ Free Comic Book Day offering for 2022 will preview an ambitious new graphic novel line based on The Incal, the classic graphic novel by Alejandro Jodorowsky and Mœbius.

“Four decades after its publication, the world of The Incal remains a shock to the system and a transcendent work,” said Humanoids CEO Fabrice Giger. “This new Incal Universe project, to which Alejandro Jodorowsky has given his blessing, will open the door for a new generation of readers to discover all new adventures featuring John Difool, the Metabaron, Kill Wolfhead and the Incal.”

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Waid + Mora bring Batman + Superman (+ Seinfeld?) together for ‘World’s Finest’

DC resurrects the long-running title next March.

Mark Waid made his return to DC last year with a short Dark Nights: Death Metal story, but he’ll be back in earnest next year writing Batman/Superman: World’s Finest.

The new series will feature artwork by Dan Mora and will debut in March, but readers can get their first glimpse of what to expect in Detective Comics #1050 in January.

Here’s the cover:

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Ahoy expands the ‘Wrong Earth’ multiverse with one-shots by Simone, Waid + more

‘The Wrong Earth: Trapped On Teen Planet’ will kick off the series of one-shots next March.

Mark Russell, Gail Simone, Mark Waid and more will help expand the multiverse introduced in The Wrong Earth, the humorous superhero comic created by Tom Peyer and Jamal Igle. Publisher Ahoy Comics has announced five one-shots by five different creative teams that will arrive next year.

If you aren’t familiar with The Wrong Earth, imagine Adam West Batman and the Batman in The Dark Knight Returns switching worlds. Ahoy’s title featured the campy Dragonflyman of Earth Alpha switching places with the gritty Dragonfly of Earth Omega, resulting in chaos, a pretty clever comics miniseries and subsequent sequels.

And now imagine that multiverse getting bigger.

“Words will be written, words will be deleted, and nothing will ever be the same,” Peyer said. “This is Crisis on Infinite Earths, minus the line-wide consequences that made it interesting. This is Secret Wars without toys. This is the kind of epic, superheroic storytelling that publishers and CFOs love, where the tail of wealth-enhancing variant covers wags the dog of art.” 

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