Welcome back to The Rundown, our daily breakdown on comic news stories we missed from the previous day. Have a link to share? Email our team at rundown@multiversitycomics.com.
– Marvel Comics announced that Tony Stark/Iron Man will be proposing to Patsy Walker/Hellcat in the upcoming “Iron Man” #20. Patsy has become a mainstay in Tony’s life since writer Christopher Cantwell relaunched the title, with Cantwell describing her as “the perfect kind of grounded presence in Tony Stark’s hyper-octane world that I believed could help bring more balance to his life.” Tony will come to recognize this and set out to do “the only thing he can think to do in order to keep her near him and connected:” marry her. The proposal and answer will be depicted by artist Angel Unzueta in “Iron Man” #20, which is scheduled for release on May 30, with “Iron Man/Hellcat Annual” #1 set to follow in June. You can see Betsy Cola’s variant cover here.
– DC Comics revealed that writer Minh Lê and artist Andie Tong’s upcoming graphic novel, “Green Lantern: Alliance,” a sequel to “Green Lantern: Legacy,” has been delayed until October. It had been set for release in April. The first book told the origins of Tai Pham, with the sequel set to see him juggling his responsibilities as a Green Lantern with his education and day job; his superheroics will lead him to team up with another hero too, in the form of Kid Flash. “Green Lantern: Alliance” is now set to debut on October 18, but in the meantime you can check out unlettered preview pages here.
– Publishers Weekly reported on three graphic novel deals this week:
– Cartoonist and Woke co-creator Keith Knight launched a campaign to change the online representation of Black people, specifically surrounding “Black mug shots”/police booking photos, by encouraging people to post pictures of themselves online with their favorite drinking mugs. Knight told The News & Observer how, when looking at online news sites, “most of the Black folks you see will be mug shots,” and that when using a search engine for unspecific terms, such as “three Black teenagers,” the results will often be predominantly comprised of police booking photos. Knight hopes that the campaign will affect the search algorithms to break the negative representation that is currently being put out, and to also “make media outlets and police departments reconsider the use of mug shots.”
– Netflix picked up the long-in-development live-action Masters of the Universe film. The film will see Mattel’s 1980s action figure hero, He-Man/Prince Adam, clashing against the villainous Skeletor, who wishes to harness the magical kingdom of Eternia’s power for himself. Kyle Allen (West Side Story) is set to portray He-Man in the adaptation, with the Nee Brothers taking the directorial reigns for the project. The film will be produced by Todd Black, Jason Blumenthal, Steve Tisch, and DeVon Franklin, with the project being overseen by Mattel Films’s Robbie Brenner and Kevin McKeon. The franchise has seen a significant revival in recent years, though only via the animated route, with series such as She-Ra and Masters of the Universe: Revelation, both of which were released on Netflix. Production is scheduled to begin this summer, with a release date not yet announced.
Continued below– Deadline reported that Grant Gustin is close to signing a new deal to continue to star in The Flash, which would lead The CW to renew the show for a ninth season. The deal would see Gustin earning over $200,000 per episode, though the deal would only run for a year and include 15 appearances. At this stage, it is unclear whether the deal would dictate The Flash season nine being a final, shortened run, akin to the eighth and final season of sister show Arrow, or whether Gustin would simply be absent from some episodes in a standard 22-part season. The Flash‘s eighth season is set to resume on March 9.
– Ghibli Park, a theme park based on the works by Studio Ghibli, is set to open in Japan on November 1, 2022, it was announced. The park, when finished, will consist of five areas; the first one to open in November will be based on 1988’s My Neighbour Totoro, and feature a life-size model of the house that the film’s protagonists Satsuki and Mei move to, as well as “a Totoro-like statue built at the back of the house” that visitors will be able go inside, a local official said. The next two sections are scheduled to open in 2023; one based on Princess Mononoke, and the other inspired by Kiki’s Delivery Service and Howl’s Moving Castle. Ticket details, such as their prices and on-sale dates, have yet to be disclosed.
– Finally, writer Dan Kahan published an article chronicling his uncovering of a NFT-based scam involving “Naruto” artwork. In the piece, Kahan describes how interest in the company Bejutsu grew rapidly after its co-founder, Clay Taylor, a university student, announced that they had “officially acquired the exclusive rights to Naruto NFTs and @Naruto on all social platforms.” The company contracted artists to create fan art based on the Masashi Kishimoto-created franchise, though many of them had concerns over the legitimacy of the license, and Kahan, being an avid “Naruto” collector himself, started to investigate the origins of the license. Kahan discovered that its roots had no connection to the “Naruto” creator and shared his findings online, causing many supporters of the project to withdraw and the company to ultimately stop the NFT-selling process. You can read the full story here. “Naruto” publisher Shonen Jump themselves tweeted earlier this month they would not be selling NFTs; the tweet received three times as many likes as its predecessor, which left fans worried at the prospect of such an announcement. (That tweet turned out to have been teasing a stateside merchandising store.)
