Sunday, July 26, 2009

Saturday and Sunday at CCI 2009



So the con is wrapping up as I type this. All I can say is THANK GOD. I wasn't even there this year, but yet I still am in overload mode here at home with the sheer coverage of the event via the various news outlets. I can't possibly touch on ALL of the announcements that were made on mostly Saturday with a little bit of Sunday thrown in, but I will summarize some of the news that I found interesting.

The Guild goes to Dark Horse. The Guild is an online show from Felicia Day of Dr. Horrible's fame. The new comic based on this property will be written by her too. Fun for kids of all ages!

Sergio Aragones comes to Bart Simpsons Comics #50! Even more fun for kids of all ages!

Haunt by Kirkman and McFarlane come to Image. Yep, you read that right McFarlane is going to do some comics again, after Kirkman gave him shit publicly last year at the con for not doing enough or hardly any comics. Written by Kirkman with collaborations by Todd. Penciled by Ryan Ottley of Invincible fame, with layouts by Greg Capullo and INKED by Todd. Yes, Todd can't seem to bring himself to draw actual interior pages for this book by himself, but I think he's doing the covers and I remember reading somewhere that Todd will be (gasp) penciling the interior for Spawn #200. How much to do you want to bet that Spawn #201, #202, and #203 will come out BEFORE #200? Anyway, I'm sure Haunt will do quite well.

The BIGGEST news imo that come out of the con on Saturday was that Jim Shooter would be joining Dark Horse to helm the revision of the classic Gold Key characters that we've come to associate with Jim over the years: Magnus, Robot Fighter and Solar, Man of the Atom to name a few. I've been witnessing Dark Horse as they Archive and reprint the old Gold Key stuff in hardcover over the last few years and I remember they did a few crossovers years ago with Magnus and other licensed properties, but it never crossed my mind that they would revamp these characters yet again AND that they would bring Jim Shooter on board for it. Very interesting indeed.

Dr. Horrible comics announced for sometime in the next year from Dark Horse. Took long enough for god's sake! Can't wait! Here's hoping Joss will be writing!

Speaking of Joss, another related announcement from Dark Horse concerns everyone's favorite comedian, Patton Oswalt. He guest starred on Joss' Dollhouse TV show last year and asked if he could pen a Wash-centic/Firefly comic. Apparently this has been green lit at Dark Horse. More info soon I hope.

Zachary Quinto (new Spock) has teamed with Archaia to produce a comic book series at some point soon. Oh boy, I'm SO excited to see ANOTHER Hollywood type making their way into comics. That other guy from Heroes has tried comics at both Top Cow and Boom, I think, and they all fell flat. I expect this new Spock series to do the same, but I suppose I might be tempted to give it a shot. Archaia has had some great series, like Mouse Guard, so maybe they will encourage him to come up with something cool. I can't wait for that dog from Frasier, Eddie, to be debuting his new comic at Boom next year! Hollywood folks just LOVE playing with comics!

Max Allen Collins announced the final installment of his Perdition crime series will be coming out from Vertigo Crime soon, entitled Return to Perdition. This is actually news worthy, how about that!

IDW announced that Bill Willingham will be taking over the writing chores for Angel starting with issue #28. His exclusive contract with DC expired and just look at all this new projects! Good for Bill!

New Tank Girl comics have found a home at Image.

Geoff Johns will be, as most everyone has heard by now, executive producing and scripting the forth-coming live-action Flash movie. The fans will are SO happy to hear about this! The other Flash related news that come out is that Johns will be penning a Blackest Night: Flash mini series and after that he will indeed be the writer for the new Flash ongoing that will start up after Blackest Night wraps.

Marvel announced new all original content Amazing Spider-man web comics. Supposedly will tie directly into the thrice a month Amazing Spider-man floppy.

Boom announced they signed Coheed and Cambia's Claudio for a new comic entitled Killaudio. The kids are just going to LOVE this, as long as they still LOVE Coheed and Cambria. For the life of me, I can't figure out why they have the following that they do, BUT any way to get more youngins into comics, I will willingly support. His other ventures at various publishers, Good Apollo and Amory Wars did ok, not as well as MCR's frontman Way's Umbrella Academy, but ok.

Speaking of Way and Dark Horse he will have a new series besides the next Umbrella Academy mini-series over coming out sometime in the next year called The True Story of The Fabulous Killjoys. Art chores by Becky Cloonan. According to Way who was ALL OVER the con floor, Killjoys is basically about a guy that wants to get his Ramones records back. Sounds like a LOT of fun! Between the idea and the art, I will definitely be checking this book out!

Colorist Laura Martin signs an exclusive with Marvel! Congrats to Laura! She is one my favorite colorists. Thank the gods that she already finished coloring Planetary's final issue that will be shipping in October if the planets align accordingly.

One of the coolest announcements that probably wont' get the attention it deserves is a new project announced by one of my favorite publishers of books ABOUT comics: Two Morrows. They will of course continue their line of quality books we've come to expect from them, but they will be launching a series that all the true comic historians should purchase: American Comic Book Chronicles. One volume devoted to each decade from the 1930's forward. The more significant decades, the 1940's and the 1960's, will be devoted to two volume a piece. Can't wait for these! Once done, all volumes should be proudly displayed on every comic fan's bookcase.
Well, that is my quick wrap-up of the CCI 2009. Maybe next year I will find my way back out there. If not, I will travel there via my computer again, like the rest of the comic-buying public that can't afford to make the yearly pilgrimage to Mecca, I mean San Diego.

4 comments:

  1. New Magnus Robot Fighter by Jim Shooter? Woohoo!!!!

    Shooters work on Magnus, Solar man of the Atom, and Rai and X-O are still among my all time favorites. For the first couple of year, just about everything that came out from Valiant was really great stuff, then for some reason it all fell apart.

    With Shooter back on Magnus and Solar maybe will see some of the old Valiant stuff back in print too. I thought I read that Darkhorse bought out the Valiant stuff recently from Acclaim but I'm not sure.

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  2. Some of the old Valiant has been reprinted in hardcover, some of the non-gold key based characters like: Archer and Armstrong, X O Man o War, and Harbinger are all available in hardcover, one volume a piece. We do carry them at the shop, or if they are out of stock I can always order them for you if you are interested.

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  3. Didn't valiant 'reform'?

    http://www.valiantentertainment.com/


    They've been super quiet.

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  4. Yes they did sort of, for at least the third time. All very odd. Maybe we will see more from them at some point. The cool thing is Shooter is making his way back to two of the big characters people have come to think of as synonymous with him: Solar and Magnus. The fans can rejoice!

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