Hellblazer
Food or Comics? | A dollop of Defenders
Welcome to Food or Comics?, where every week we talk about what comics we’d buy at our local comic shop based on certain spending limits — $15 and $30 — as well as what we’d get if we had extra money or a gift card to spend on a “Splurge” item.
Check out Diamond’s release list or ComicList, and tell us what you’re getting in our comments field.
Action Comics #4
Chris Arrant
If I had $15, I’d start with Image’s new anthology Thought Bubble Anthology #1 (Image, $2.99). That Becky Cloonan cover is great, and seeing that the book holds new shorts from Andy Diggle, Duncan Fegredo and others is enticing. Next up would be a DC three-pack: Swamp Thing #4 (DC, $2.99), Animal Man #4 (DC, $2.99), Action Comics #4 (DC, $3.99). DC really wins this week when it comes to my wallet, and these three books are becoming the key titles in the New 52.
If I had $30, I’d try out Matt Fraction and Terry Dodson’s Defenders #1 (Marvel, $3.99). While I was nonplussed by their previous collaboration in Uncanny X-Men, I remain high on other segments of their work and hope this one lives up to that potential. Next up would be X-Club #1 (Marvel, $2.99), based solely on this eclectic line-up. The X-Club was one of the few parts of the previously mentioned Fraction run on Uncanny X-Men I enjoyed, and I hope this mini makes them a more viable part of the universe long-term. Next up I’d get iZombie #20 (DC/Vertigo, $2.99) for the ongoing adventures of Roberson and Allred and Irredeemable #32. I’m really enjoying what Diego Barreto brings to the book, and Mark Waid continues to deliver.
If I could splurge, I’d get IDW’s collection of Mike Grell’s Shaman’s Tears maxi-series. This was one of the early Image titles, and gave me my first glimpse of Grell’s work and the potential for Image outside the original 7. As the series went on I ended up going back to track down Grell’s earlier work, but Shaman’s Tears holds a special place and I’m anxious to relive it without dusting off my longboxes.
- December 6, 2011 @ 01:00 PM by Michael May
DC Comics releases full cover for Search for Swamp Thing
Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing
Although they previously teased it with two characters blacked out, DC Comics has now released the full covers (plural) for the first issue of Brightest Day Aftermath: The Search for Swamp Thing.
The above cover by Ardian Syaf and Vicente Cifuentes’ is the book’s final cover, with John Constantine and Zatanna appearing where big blobs of black once dwelled. And after the jump is J.G. Jones’ variant cover, featuring Batman, Swamp Thing and Constantine.
- May 4, 2011 @ 10:00 AM by JK Parkin
What Are You Reading?
Daredevil: The Man Without Fear
Hello and welcome once again to What Are You Reading?, where the Robot 6 crew talk about the comics and graphic novels that they’ve been enjoying lately. Today our special guest is Chad Nevett, who talks about comics in several different places around the web — at his personal blog GraphiContent, at our sister blog Comics Should Be Good!, as a reviewer for Comic Book Resources and on the Splash Page podcast. He also writes about wrestling for 411mania.
To see what Chad and the Robot 6 crew have been reading, click the link below.
- November 21, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by JK Parkin
What Are You Reading?
Hellblazer: India
Hello and welcome once again to What Are You Reading?, where the Robot 6 crew talk about the comics and graphic novels that they’ve been enjoying lately. Today our special guest is Bill Reed, who contributes to our sister blog Comics Should Be Good!. To see what Bill and the Robot 6 crew have been reading, click the link below.
- November 14, 2010 @ 12:00 PM by JK Parkin
The revolutionary Rafael Grampá: The Q&A
The artist Rafael Grampá first came to my attention through Gunned Down, a 2005 small-press anthology of Western stories done largely by South American creators. Joining him were then-unknowns Fábio Moon and Gabriel Bá. Although the book didn’t sell well, flipping through it I realized I was holding something special. Moon and Bá rose to fame pretty quickly with works at AiT-PlanetLar, their self-published projects, and comics at Dark Horse and Vertigo. But Grampá’s work was few and far between.
With the release of the anthology 5 in 2007 and his first solo work Mesmo Delivery in 2008, American comics audiences got their first real taste of what Grampá could do. Vertigo hired him to contribute to a milestone issue of Hellblazer; Marvel, with a milestone issue of Daredevil; Dark Horse reprinted the sold-out Mesmo Delivery, which goes for over $125 new at Amazon. Recently Marvel put him as the lead feature in the second volume of Strange Tales, and Dark Horse contracted him for his second standalone graphic novel.
His work evokes easy comparisons to Geoff Darrow, but deeper analysis shows an appreciation for detail, not for detail’s sake, but to add flavor and weight to the scene he depicts in a panel, a pin-up or a cover. Rather than just drawing to tell you where someone is and what they’re doing, Rafael’s illustrative line adds texture, tone, mood and atmosphere — and that’s before a colorist touches the page. Although well-known by some in the industry, by and large the mainstream comics public doesn’t know the full scope of what the artist is — or could be. Maybe this interview will help.
- October 1, 2010 @ 06:30 PM by Chris Arrant
Vertigo announces Hellblazer miniseries by Spencer and Murphy
John Constantine: Hellblazer -- City of Demons #1
Ahead of its October solicitations, released this afternoon, Vertigo has announced a five-issue Hellblazer miniseries by Si Spencer (Books of Magick: Life During Wartime, The Vinyl Underground) and Sean Murphy (Joe the Barbarian, Off Road).
Called John Constantine: Hellblazer — City of Demons, the hard-living magician is run over by a truck. After a few weeks of hospital rehabilitation, “Constantine finds the London streets very different from when he left them behind as a series of occult murders and mutilations demands his attention. The common denominator points back to the ER where he was admitted …”
The first issue is set to debut on Oct. 13, followed two weeks later by the second.
City of Demons marks Murphy’s return to Constantine. He previously illustrated the “Newcastle Calling” story, written by Jason Aaron, in 2008′s Hellblazer #245-246. The character also played a supporting role in Spencer’s short-lived Books of Magick.
According to Murphy’s DeviantART account, the art for City of Demons will be nearly two years old by the time the miniseries debuts. “Am I upset?” he wrote. “Yep.” You can view some of Murphy’s cover sketches for the series here.
- July 19, 2010 @ 11:00 AM by Kevin Melrose
Quote of the day | Warren Ellis, on the resurrected ‘Shoot’
Hellblazer: Shoot
“I remember that, at the time, someone telling me that the stance was that Paul Levitz would not release the book so long as he was running DC. It never occurred to me that a new regime would feel differently.”
– writer Warren Ellis, responding to news that his 1999 Hellblazer story “Shoot,” which was never published as a result of the Columbine shootings, will finally be released under the new “Vertigo Resurrected” banner
- July 16, 2010 @ 12:30 PM by Kevin Melrose
What Are You Reading?
Love and Rockets New Stories #2
Welcome, welcome, welcome to another round of What Are You Reading. I am very pleased this week to say that our guest is Jeet Heer, the peerless critic and historian who, when not writing introductions for Little Orphan Annie or Krazy Kat collections, can be found at the Sans Everything or the Comics Comics blogs.
Jeet and the rest of the crew have been reading a lot this week and are eager to share, so get clicking on that link pardners.
- August 30, 2009 @ 10:00 AM by Chris Mautner
Robot reviews: Vertigo Crime
Filthy Rich
Filthy Rich
by Brian Azzarello and Victor Santos
Vertigo, 200 pages, $19.99
Dark Entries
by Ian Rankin and Werther Dell’edera
Vertigo, 216 pages, $19.99.
You’ve gotta give DC credit, they’re constantly trying new things. Sure, a lot of their publishing experiments embarrassingly fall on the floor, but the very fact that they have such a lengthy track record of failed imprints — Minx, Helix, Piranha, Paradox Press — says something about the company’s willingness to branch out. They’re restless in their attempt to find new audiences.
Thus we now have Vertigo Crime, a sub-imprint of the current Vertigo line, consisting of stand-alone graphic novels filled with guns, girls and as much noir as you can possibly stand. The first two entries in the line — Filthy Rich and Dark Entries — will be out in stores this month (Aug. 19 and 25 to be exact). How do they hold up? Read on to find out.
- August 7, 2009 @ 02:15 PM by Chris Mautner
Vertigo announces I, Zombie + Halloween annual
House of Mystery
Vertigo today announced a new series called I, Zombie by author Chris Roberson and Mike Allred.
Although a link between the two isn’t mentioned, I’m guessing the title is a subtle homage to the J.M. DeMatteis-written I … Vampire series that ran in House of Mystery back in the 1980s.
So what better place to kick it off than in the current House of Mystery — or, rather in a Halloween annual that will include a House of Mystery framing sequence and new Hellblazer, Madame Xanadu, Merv Pumpkinhead and I, Zombie stories.
- July 13, 2009 @ 02:18 PM by JK Parkin
Process: Jock’s cover layouts for Hellblazer graphic novel
Cover layout for "Hellblazer: Pandemonium," by Jock
At Standard Attrition, artist Jock rolls out some of his cover layouts for Hellblazer: Pandemonium, the upcoming graphic novel by he and original series writer Jamie Delano. (The book was supposed to be released last year to celebrate the 20th anniversay of the title; now it seems scheduled for later this year.)
Pandemonium is set during the Iraq war, as Constantine is hired to root out the cause of demonic possessions among insurgents.
- January 22, 2009 @ 08:59 AM by Kevin Melrose