Manufactured Past: DC Announces Before Watchmen

Well, it’s official: DC’s putting aside the wishes of Alan Moore and their own long-time policy, and they’re putting out a prequel to Watchmen sometime this summer… either because they want to give some high-toned creators a chance to play in a legendary playground… or possibly because it would be unseemly to send Dan DiDio to stand outside the DC offices jingling change in a styrofoam coffee cup.

The story, called Before Watchmen as a whole, is gonna be released in seven different titles on a weekly basis, by some of the bigger names in comics today, and all with a backup pirate comics story called Curse of The Crimson Corsair, written by original series editor Len Wein and original series colorist John Higgins… which ties this new series to the original on a creator basis, but in a way similar to casting Die Hard 5 starring Reginald VelJohnson and that weasel who played Ellis.

So what are the books, and who’s doing them? Glad you asked:

Kimota! (Don’t Sue Me!): Gaiman / McFarlane Lawsuit Reportedly Settled

It is (almost) official: the long-running lawsuit between Neil Gaiman and Todd McFarlane over the rights to Spawn characters Angela, Medieval Spawn, and Cogliostro that Gaiman wrote into Spawn back in the early 90s is over. I don’t know what’s harder to believe: that this mess has been going on for just about ten years… or that there was once a time when someone thought that Spawn characters had value.

The long, twisted and complete tale is available elsewhere at more reputable Web sites, but in a very incomplete, semi-biased and opinion-laden nutshell written mostly from booze-addled memory: in the early 90s, McFarlane was probably the hottest artist in comics, so he decided that he would take a shot at doing the stories as well. But there was a problem: at the time, he shouldn’t have been allowed to write anything longer than his own name. Seriously: have you read Spider-Man #1? Constant drum sound effects of DOOM, DOOM, DOOM; it reads like it’s being told from the point of view of a twitching boner.

Demotion: Early Curse of Shazam Art, Teasers

A couple months ago, DC Comics announced that Geoff Johns and Gary Frank would be putting together a reboot of Captain Marvel as a backup feature in Justice League starting in issue 7 in March. Which, as an old school Captain Marvel fan dating back to that horrible CBS TV show back in the mid-70s, this was exciting news… provided the thing actually got done in time. After all, this is the same team that announced the Batman: Earth One original graphic novel… more than two years ago (Although to be fair, it is supposedly pretty much done and will be released sometime soon).

But the good news is that it looks like the work is coming in on schedule, because Newsarama scored some uncolored and unlettered pages from the first ten-page installment:

Knife To The Eye! Wait, Which Book Now?

If you’ve been following Marvel’s Battle Scars miniseries that launched from the still-twitching carcass of the Fear Itself event, you know that the prevailing mystery of the story is: who is protagonist Marcus Johnson, and who is his father? Now, a story about a young African-American man who doesn’t know who his father is might sound like one of those “conservative comics” that blew up the comics Internet a couple weeks ago (At least he’s not looking for food stamps, amirite, Newt?), but it’s actually been an intersting little tale.

Like I said in my review last week, the evidence presented is that Johnson comes from a family history of American heroes, that dad has a mortal enemy looking to get at him through Marcus, and his father reportedly might not be able to die. And the smart money has been on Nick Fury being being Johnson’s father. The prevailing theory is that Marvel, what with at the Avengers movie coming out in just a few months with Samuel L. Jackson in the Fury role, was looking to put a more familiar on the head of S.H.I.E.L.D. in the comics. I, however, I predicted Bucky Barnes… mostly because I drink and I am a contrary dick. One more beer before I wrote my review and I might have gone for Dick Clark.

Well, things are starting to look like I’m on the losing side of the argument, because Bleeding Cool recently got their hands on the full-sized cover to the issue 6 of Battle Scars…

Low And To The Left: DC Comics New Logo

Usually news about things like “marketing trade dress” make us yawn and throw blind punches – not in any way necessarily in that order – but for good or ill, this counts as comic news: DC Comics has a new logo.

Rumors have been going around about it all week, but now it’s official: just six and a half years after the last new logo debuted, which was put in place to replace the previous one that lasted about 29 years, DC has a new look. Here it is:

Ah, that reminds me of my childhood. Because it looks like a droopy wang pointing at a roll of duct tape. Which is how I spent weekends when I was in junior high.

Don’t Need No Civil War: Avengers Vs. X-Men #1 Cover

According to various Twitter feeds, the winter Marvel Editorial Retreat is starting today in New York. So, possibly to fend off questions from the outside world like, “So if Cable’s a time traveler with less than 24 hours to live due to a crippling and debilitating illness, and he wants to take out The Avengers, why is setting up a boat with a bunch a deathtraps a better plan than whacking Captain America’s mom in 1920? It probably wouldn’t be hard; Steve Rogers didn’t need the Super Soldier serum because he came from hearty stock,” and, “What Marvel character will Matt Fraction be killing next? And is Matt aware of what ‘dead’ actually means?” they’ve released Jim Cheung’s cover to the upcoming first issue of Avengers Vs. X-Men for us to drool over.

Who Knows What Evil Lurks In The Pants of Men? Dynamite Reprinting Chaykin’s The Shadow

Howard Chaykin’s reboot of The Shadow for DC Comics back in 1987 tends to be overshadowed (Get it?) by other stuff around the same time period, including The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, and Chaykin’s own American Flagg! and Black Kiss. Partially because all those books are so damn good, and partically because DC lost the Shadow license a long while ago, preventing the book from staying in print. Turns out that maybe the Conde Nast guys who own the character didn’t think there was a long-term future in letting Chaykin’s successor, Andy Helfer, graft The Shadow’s head onto a robot… although in retrospect, it was probably a more realistic take on the character than Alec Baldwin.

But Chaykin’s original miniseries, Blood & Judgment, is some of the best comics from the 1980s that you could find. Excellent art with a logical and interesting way of bringing Lamont Cranston from the 30s to the 80s… although it felt more like the 70s what with the way Chaykin wrote Cranston as banging anything that walked, moved or crawled in a skirt, usually without even bothering to check for an adam’s apple first. Plus, the book contained splash pages that you could put against anything from Dark Knight you, if you’re anything like me, xeroxed and tacked to your wall in high school.

How To Terminate A Terminator In One Easy Step – Rob Liefeld To Take Over Deathstroke At DC

According to Comics Alliance, comics illustrator and mangled foot enthusiast, Rob Liefeld, is set to take over both art and writing duties on Deathstroke from the current team of writer Kyle Higgins and artist Joe Bennett beginning with issue nine. This is a very interesting turn of events, particularly in light of the fact that DC also recently turned the writing of Hawk and Dove over to Liefeld from Sterling Gates (best porn name ever, by the way), a title on which Liefeld already had penciling duties, only to then turn around and cancel the whole damn thing. So, in order to save the title, it was necessary to destroy the title. Apparently.

Seems auspicious for Deathstroke, eh?

But, on the off chance DC decides not to send Slade Wilson off to the great Retirement Home In The Sky For B List Villains, how does Rob Liefeld plan to ruin plot the book that I’ve currently been enjoying for the past five issues?

Look, Ma! Deathstroke! No feet! After the jump.

Roll Me Over, Lay Me Down and Do It Again: DC Comics New New 52

Well, we knew it was coming – the DC brass all but told us it was – but DC’s New 52 is now the New 46.

DC has announced that they are canceling Men of War, Blackhawks, O.M.A.C., Mister Terrific, Static Shock, and, in the interest of at least some justice, Rob Leifeld’s Hawk & Dove, after their respective eighth issues.

But since DC’s multiverse includes 52 worlds, and because the only words that rhymes with “46” are “ticks,” “dicks,” and “pricks,” they will be releasing six new regular books in May, including:

Wednesday Night Fights

EDITOR’S NOTE, 1/12.2012, 10:20 p.m.: Three new Avengers Vs. X-Men fight promos have been added to the media gallery below!

It has been a busy and interesting week, including the release of a bunch of Avengers Vs. X-Men promo posters, which we’re just too shitfaced to post for you.

Don’t look at us like that.

Okay, since you’re so nice, and not calling us racist, sexist pigs (Don’t ask. Please).

Now that we have the business out of the way, it is, in fact, Wednesday night, which means this…

…means the end of our broadcast day.

But it’s a decent-looking take (Then again, so was last week’s and other than Fatale? Guh.): New Frankenstein: Agent of S.H.A.D.E. with O.M.A.C. guesting (More Goddamned periods to type? Seriously?), Bendis’s and Bagley’s Brilliant, Batman & Robin, and Crisis on Infinite Midlives’ favorite: The Strange Talent of Luther Strode!

Plus we’ve got new Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Batwoman, Batgirl, and many other female-friendly comics! That we read and enjoy (I told you, don’t ask)!

But to review them, we gotta read them. Which means: see you tomorrow, suckers!