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.
In case you missed it, Dark Horse announced “Extraordinary” and “Lifeformed Vol. 2,” as well as “Joe Golem: Occult Detective – The Conjurors.”
– Tom Taylor (“Injustice: Gods Among Us”) revealed three covers for “DCeased” #1. The first cover is drawn by Greg Capullo (“Batman”), with variant covers being provided by Yasmin Putri (“Nightwing”) and Francesco Mattina (“Suicide Squad”). He also revealed that the series will feature artwork by Trevor Hairsine (“Divinity”), Stefano Gaudiano (“The Walking Dead”), James Harren (“Rumble”) and Rain Beredo (“Champions”). Taylor started teasing the new series last week. You can check out Putri’s cover here and Mattina’s cover here. “DCeased” #1 is set for release on May 1.
– DC Comics also released the first cover for Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s upcoming three-part miniseries, “Batman: Last Knight on Earth.” You can take a look at it here. “Batman: Last Knight on Earth” #1 will be released on May 29.
– Oni Press announced “Rick and Morty” #50 will be an oversized 48-page issue featuring contributions from creators like Kyle Starks, Marc Ellerby, Andrew Maclean, Tini Howard, Jarrett Williams, Sarah Graley, Josh Trujillo, Rii Abrego, Benjamin Dewey, and Sarah Stern. The comic also comes out May 29.
– The UK Royal Mail has unveiled a series of Marvel Comics stamps to mark the company’s 80th anniversary. Drawn by Alan Davis, inked by Mark Farmer and colored by Laura Martin, the first line of stamps showcase Spider-Man, Iron Man, Captain Marvel, Thor, Captain Britain, Hulk, Peggy Carter, Doctor Strange, Union Jack, and Black Panther. A second line, consisting of five black-and-white stamps, will when put together depicts the heroes in battle with Thanos. The stamps will be available in UK post offices from March 14.
– Boss Fight Studios have announced that their new 6″ “Sam and Max: Freelance Police” action figures will come packaged with new illustrations, and a new comic strip by creator Steve Purcell. After debuting in their comic book series in 1987, the pair quickly rose to fame and went on to star in their own video games, the first of which was Sam & Max Hit the Road, as well as a cartoon TV series in the ’90s. Most recently, Purcell created a webcomic featuring the pair called “The Big Sleep” which was published on Telltale’s website to coincide with the release of Telltale Games’s Sam & Max Save the World. The figures are set for release later this year.
– BlackFacts.com, the data-driven website which documents historical and cultural contributions of people of color, have announced a partnership with Black Sands Entertainment to showcase their new graphic novel and anime. The graphic novel, “Black Sands and The Seven Kingdoms,” tells the story of the City of Kerma, which dominated the gold trade in the region in the third millennia BCE. BlackFacts.com was founded in 1997 “as a way to showcase that people of color could take advantage of the technology revolution and build something that they own and control.” You can visit the comic’s page on the site here.
– Deadline reported that Netflix’s The Punisher and Jessica Jones have been cancelled. The news comes a month after the second series of The Punisher began streaming. Netflix issued a statement thanking all of the cast and crew of both series for their work, concluding that “they are grateful to Marvel for five years of our fruitful partnership and thank the passionate fans who have followed these series from the beginning.” Shortly after the announcement, Marvel Television issued their own statement, echoing the credit to the “different super-talented showrunners, writers, directors, cast and crew” who were involved in all of the series, before hinting at the future: while Netflix “may have decided they no longer want to continue telling the tales of these great characters… but you know Marvel better than that.” Jon Bernthal took to Instagram to describe playing Frank Castle in The Punisher as “an honor,” and Krysten Ritter posted that it had been a “dream to play Jessica alongside my amazing cast and the best crew in the business.” The third and final season of Jessica Jones is still scheduled for release later this year.
Continued below– EW released an exclusive clip from the upcoming animated short film, Spider-Ham: Caught in a Ham, which will be featured on the upcoming Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse home release. The short was directed by Miguel Jiron and produced by David Schulenburg, and follows Spider-Ham (John Mulaney) as he fights against villains. Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse is set to be released on digital platforms on February 26, and DVD/Blu-Ray/4K Blu-Ray on March 19.
– Popular Canadian cartoonist Michael de Adder has apologized for his cartoon depicting the SNC-Lavalin controversy. The cartoon, which caused uproar on social media, depicts former justice minister Jody Wilson-Raybould and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in opposite corners of a boxing ring, with Trudeau being instructed to “keep beating her up” because “solicitor-client privilege had tied her hands.” Many people were concerned with Adder’s portrayal of violence against Wilson-Raybould, which he has now apologized for, stating that he did not intend to “offend women, make light of domestic violence or trivialize indigenous issues,” and promised “to strive to not offend people like I did with this cartoon.”
– Finally, during the weekend, over 2,762 cosplayers showed up in Lauchringen, Germany, to break the world record for the largest group of people dressed as Smurfs. NPR reports Guinness World Records has yet to confirm the feat, which is currently held by a British gathering of 2,510 people from 2009. However, the Record Institute for Germany verified that number on its website, and have provided a certificate for the participants.
