Welcome 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.
It was C2E2 over the weekend, and we live-tweeted Marvel’s Next Big Thing panel, Valiant’s presentation, and DC’s Superman and Batman announcements (with Joëlle Jones’s new Catwoman ongoing receiving its own coverage). We also reported on Marvel’s New Media strategy, the latest “Britannia” series from Valiant, Image’s “Bully Wars,” and Lion Forge’s “Quincredible.”
– IDW Publishing and Oni Press announced they would team-up for a four-issue “Rick and Morty” and “Dungeons & Dragons” crossover, written by Patrick Rothfuss (The Kingkiller Chronicles) and Jim Zub (“Avengers,” “Champions”) with art by Troy Little (“Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas”). The series, which begins this August, sees the whole Smith family getting sucked into an epic quest when Morty asks Rick to teach him how to play the game.
– Vertigo group editor Jamie S. Rich confirmed he has been made editor of the Batman line of comics, succeeding Mark Doyle. Doyle, in turn, will take over from Rich at Vertigo.
Kodansha made several announcements:
– Garrison Girl, an “Attack on Titan” prose novel by Rachel Aaron (Heartstrikers), which will be published by Quirk Books on August 7.
– “Battle Angel Alita: Holy Night and Other Stories,” a collection of short stories published in Japanese from 1997 to 2006, but never collected in English until now. This 300-page translation will be released in October.
– “The Ghost in the Shell: Global Neural Network,” an anthology featuring four original stories from the respective creative teams of Max Gladstone & David López, Alex de Campi & Giannis Milonogiannis, Brenden Fletcher & Lorenzo “LRNZ” Ceccotti, and Genevieve Valentine & Khoi Pham. The book, which is out September 18, will see one of the stories released early on Free Comic Book Day (May 5).
And now for comics news unrelated to C2E2:
– Cartoonist Olivia Jaimes takes over classic comic strip “Nancy” as of today. Jaimes takes over from Guy Gilchrist, who ended his two-decade run in February, and is the first woman to oversee Nancy’s “adventures” since the character’s debut in 1933.
– Disney and Lucasfilm premiered the second Solo: A Star Wars Story trailer during American Idol. It features, among other things, the first look at Paul Bettany’s crime lord Dryden Vos. A new poster is also visible on the official website.
– The Los Angeles Times reported on why Disney can’t use the word Marvel in its theme parks (namely because of their old agreement with Universal Studios).
– JC Lee, daughter of Stan Lee, spoke to Bleeding Cool to refute reports that her father is being abused. However, she did confirm rumors that samples of her father’s blood had been stolen, explaining the notion of a “blood signature” similar to the one KISS gave for their comic books had been considered once, but expressed surprise that someone had taken them.
– Colombian cartoonist “Matador” stated he would stop posting his work on social media following death threats. Matador is currently being sued by Colombian presidential candidate Iván Duque Márquez for portraying him as a pig.
– Chinese author Joey Yu, co-creator of the graphic novel project “Split Earth Saga,” received the first Terran Prize. The prize, which is awarded by a team headed by George R.R. Martin, gives writers from overseas the chance to join the Taos Toolbox workshop held over the summer.
– Before the weekend, we asked what was your favorite wrestling comic book: 41% of you decided it was Box Brown’s biography “Andre the Giant: Life and Legend,” with Image’s “Ringside” in second place with 29% of the vote.
