Books

The Question: The Deaths of Vic Sage seems like a book designed in a lab to get me to buy it. It takes one of the most talented writers in comics today in Jeff Lemire, and teams him with the classic comics great who defined Vic Sage in Denys Cowan, and adds in literally the only

Move over, Batman, there’s a new hero in the DC Universe with a secret identity who wears black, sports black eye makeup, hangs out in a cavernous setting, and is associated with bats. Of course I am referring to Svengoolie, the horror movie show host who emerged from the gotham that is Chicago, and can

Batman is getting a new creative team in January, as James Tynion IV and Tony S. Daniel take over the book to stear the Dark Knight in a whole new direction. Unfortunately, that direction seems to lead to more pain for the Caped Crusader, who will be in the process of recovering from both his

This Wayward Son discussion includes major spoilers for both Carry On and Wayward Son.  Wayward Son, the sequel to Rainbow Rowell’s queer wizard romance Carry On, hit shelves earlier this month. The book picks up roughly a year following the ending of Carry On, which saw Chosen One Simon Snow defeat the Insidious Humdrum and

Stephen King’s novel The Outsider is becoming a limited series at HBO, which has given the adaptation a 10-episode order.  The story of The Outsider puts a mind-blowingly monstrous twist on traditional murder fiction. Here, police detective Ralph Anderson fields an investigation in the fictional Oklahoma town of Flint City that upends the local populace when a well-liked local

If you’ve been following Justice League over the last year or so, you’ll know that this isn’t a book that does small stories. If you’re going to roll out the heaviest hitters in the DC Universe, then the threats and situations you put them in have to get even bigger and wilder to compensate. For

Resistance Reborn has a unique place in Star Wars novels: situated between The Rise of Skywalker and The Last Jedi, it’s one of the closest moments the canon has come so far to telling new stories set in the thick of the Sequel Trilogy. With about a year between Episodes VIII and IX and no

We currently live in a world where powerful bigots “fan the flames of a racial fire” instead of stoke violence with their savage racism. Where everything shy of uttering a racial slur in anger is merely “denounced by some as racist” or “racially charged.” So it’s easy to be concerned, when you hear about a

DC’s new Batman/Superman book is more than just a World’s Finest team up story. Instead, it’s a meditation on what makes Batman and Superman so different from each other, and a celebration of the shared values that make them heroes and friends. But it also explores the nature of heroism in the DC Universe, by

This article contains spoilers for the Crisis on Infinite Earths comic, and possibly the TV version. There’s an old saying in the DC universe: Red sky at night, sailor’s delight. Red sky at morning, sailors take warning. Either way, there’s probably a Crisis coming. That’s not really a saying, but for such a multiverse-shattering series

Delilah Dawson has been a powerhouse Star Wars author since her novel Phasma told the radiation-soaked backstory of the First Order enforcer. Since then she has published several novels outside the Star Wars universe (most recently No Country For Old Gnomes with co-author Kevin Hearne). She’s now part of Batuu history with her novel Black Spire,

The Marvel Universe is known for superheroes but it’s also home to some of the greatest classic monsters ever to shamble onto a comic book page. Beginning in the early 1970s, some scary residents moved in. Marvel has its own Dracula, its own Frankenstein Monster, its own Mummy, its own werewolf (two actually) and even

“If you think Vision changed Vision forever, Batman/Catwoman will change Batman and Catwoman forever,” writer Tom King says of the 12-issue limited series that will conclude his four-year run on the character. While King has spent 85 issues physically and emotionally breaking the Dark Knight, it’s these final 12 issues that could very well define his run.  For those

Alchemy and family swirl together in the cerebral new novel from prolific Seanan McGuire, whose wide-ranging novels have received acclaim across the worlds of science fiction and fantasy. Middlegame is a study of Rodger and Dodger, alchemically-influenced twins created to fulfill a dark destiny. At New York Comic Con this year, we sat down with

It’s hard to believe, but the Justice Society of America hasn’t been a major presence in the DC Universe in nearly a decade. Seemingly wiped from existence by the onset of the DC’s New 52 reboot in 2011, other versions of the JSA did eventually appear, but not in their original incarnations as the elder

There’s never a bad season of the year for reading. Whether it’s winter, summer, spring, or fall, there’s a reading habit that goes oh-so-well with the season. But there’s something about fall—when the leaves are changing (at least in some parts of the world) and the nights are getting longer—that makes me want to curl up

This article contains major spoilers for Marvel’s X-Men reboot, House of X and Powers of X. House of X and Powers of X are now complete, and the event, which was billed as a huge reset for the X-Men comics universe, did everything promised. It took a major retcon for one of its characters and

The Secret Spiral of Swamp Kid, DC’s latest middle school graphic novel, is a perfect read for the Halloween season. The Secret Spiral of Swamp Kid has earned rave reviews from literary outlets such as Kirkus Reviews, School Library Journal, and Booklist who herald it as “a comedic win”, “an excellent and inviting foray into

Cinema’s premiere Count Dracula will be donning his opera cape again. Bela Lugosi had a love-hate relationship with the bloodsucking role that made him an icon. He occasionally felt straitjacketed by the horrific typecasting, but he loved the cape so much he wore it in several films including Plan 9 from Outer Space, and was

Tochi Onyebuchi brings a keen eye for world-building and momentum-filled action scenes to his young adult novels. From the Pokémon-like Beasts Made of Night duology to the upcoming fantasy novella Riot Baby, he’s making waves. At NYCC 2019, we sat down to talk to him about pop culture influences, the process of building a novel,

The Joker is the most recognizable villain in all of comics, and as such, there are as many takes on him as there are creators who have worked on a Batman comic. Fortunately for us, for every Jared Leto out there, there are fifteen awesome comic stories. So if you’re coming out of the Joker

It is Harley Quinn’s mad, mad, mad, mad world, and now the Birds of Prey are just living in it. Such is the case with Harley Quinn And The Birds of Prey, the four-issue DC miniseries launching in Feb. 2020 from the creative team of writer/artist Amanda Conner and writer Jimmy Palmiotti. Announced last week

There are big changes coming to the DC Universe. That shouldn’t come as a surprise, as DC continuity is always in flux, something recently illustrated in the pages of Doomsday Clock, which introduced the concept of a “metaverse” that allows for events of the past to shift as new stories are told. But still, superhero

Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series is more than just one of the most popular fantasy stories of the literary world, it has influenced an entire generation of fantasy authors to tell stories of their own. With Amazon starting production on a Wheel of Time series adaptation and Tor poised to release Warrior of the

When it was announced that writer Tom King would be ending his Batman run a bit earlier than originally intended, it didn’t take long for the internet to start speculating about King’s sudden departure. After all, the award-winning Batman and Mister Miracle scribe was well on his way to his planned 106 issues when his

In July, readers of The Walking Dead comics got their final surprise from creator Robert Kirkman when it was announced that issue #193 was to be the series’ last installment. Kirkman had reached an endpoint with the story and didn’t want to go on just for the sake of going on. Presumably the makers of the TV

Marvel has been going through a bit of a deck-clearing with its Star Wars comics of late, leading many to wonder what the company was setting up. Now we know: announced at NYCC, 2020 will see a relaunch of the main Star Wars title, which will now be set between The Empire Strikes Back and Return

The X-Men books are in the midst of a critical and creative reinvigoration, and at New York Comic Con, Marvel announced the first new book after the initial relaunch: Wolverine, by Ben Percy and Adam Kubert. Kubert is one of the definitive Wolverine artists. He drew, among other issues: Wolverine #75, the Fatal Attractions issue

With Donny Cates taking over the writing duties on Thor, there was room for a new writer to pick up Guardians of the Galaxy. And at Marvel’s Next Big Thing panel at New York Comic Con, the new team was announced: Juan Cabal (Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man) on art, and Al Ewing (Immortal Hulk) writing.  Ewing is currently lighting

Wave two of the Sandman Universe is coming at the end of October, and DC Comics released an advance preview of the one shot that kicks it all off - The Sandman Universe Presents Hellblazer #1. In it, we see John Constantine doing what he was born to do: betraying friends, scheming, and maybe, in a flash