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.
– Oni Press are teaming up with Daniel Noah and Elijah Wood’s production company SpectreVision to launch an imprint called High Strangeness. Arriving in 2025, the imprint will focus on sci-fi and horror comics inspired by paranormal stories, and include podcaster Jim Perry, the host of the mystery series Euphomet, as a creative consultant. Hunter Gorinson, president and publisher of Oni, promises subjects like “aliens, poltergeists, demons, fairies, and other entities [that] all seem to extend like fingers from a hidden hand.” Books and creative teams will be announced closer to the time of High Strangeness’s launch.
– Image announced Ivan Reis has gone exclusive with the Ghost Machine imprint, and that he will reunite with Geoff Johns on “Hyde Street,” a Twilight Zone-esque horror series. Reis subsequently posted a farewell to DC, where he had worked exclusively since 2003. Image also disclosed the contents of the “Ghost Machine” special releasing in January, revealing it will feature preludes for “The Unnamed” (starring characters like Geiger, Junkyard Joe, Redcoat, and First Ghost); sci-fi epic “Rook: Exodus;” time travel adventure “The Rocketfellers;” and “Hyde Street,” and that full series for “Redcoat” and “Rook: Exodus” will begin in April. “Hyde Street” itself will debut later in 2024.
– ComiXology announced three new titles from Eduardo Medeiros, Mateus Santolouco, Rafael Albuquerque and Rafael Scavone’s imprint Stout Club. They consist of “Roderick and the City of Morhil,” by Medeiros, a cartoonish five-parter about a postman in a fantasy world; “Mistland,” by Scavone, Albuquerque, Felipe Castilho, and Felipe Watanabe, a gritty fantasy series about a murder mystery in a frozen wilderness; and “Sliced,” an original graphic novel by Scavone and Guilherme Grandizolli, which follows two rival pizza makers putting aside their differences to battle a new, high-tech competitor. All of these books will be released sometime next year.
– Marvel made several Spider-Man announcements for March, namely that that month’s oversized “Miles Morales: Spider-Man” #18 will mark the character’s 300th issue; Gwen Stacy will star in Melissa Flores and Alba Glez’s special “Giant-Size Spider-Gwen;” and Mary Jane and Felicia Hardy will reunite in “Jackpot and Black Cat,” a four-issue series by Celeste Bronfman and Emilio Laiso. The House of Ideas also launched “Marvel Mutts,” a six-part Infinity series on Unlimited by Mackenzie Cadenhead, Takeshi Miyazawa, and Raúl Angulo, starring Ms. Marvel, her new pup Mittens, and their playmates. New chapters go live every Friday.
– In trailer news, Amazon released the teaser for The Boys season four, revealing Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Billy Butcher’s unnamed old friend, Susan Heyward as Sister Sage (seen encouraging Homelander to become more like Julius Caeser), and Valorie Curry as Firecracker. The Prime Video series will return sometime next year. Meanwhile, Warner Bros. Japan dropped a subtitled trailer for the anime series Suicide Squad Isekai, giving us a first look at WIT Studio’s take on Amanda Waller, Harley Quinn, Deadshot, Peacemaker, and Clayface (who has a surprisingly debonair default look.) That show will also premiere in 2024.
– Robot Dreams, the Spanish film version of Sara Varon’s comic of the same name, has racked up four nominations at the Goya Awards (Spain’s most prestigious film awards), earning Best Animated Film, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Original Music, and Best Editing. Directed by Pablo Berger, the wordless Robot Dreams chronicles the friendship between a dog and a robot in New York during the 1980s. The film, which premiered at Cannes, will be released in the States by Neon sometime in the near future. The winners of the awards will be announced on February 10.
– Per an unusual statement, Disney will stop reporting weekend grosses for The Marvels, which is now officially the lowest-grossing MCU movie after making $197 million worldwide ($80.7 mil domestic) in theaters. Meanwhile, io9 has published an overview of how Disney and the Hollywood trade papers have tried to insinuate director Nia DaCosta was responsible for its failure, culminating in comments from CEO Bob Iger at a summit last week, where he claimed not enough executives were on set to supervise the movie. Iger, incidentally, was one of the major forces responsible for the SAG-AFTRA strike that adversely impacted the film’s release, having previously argued the guild (and the WGA)’s demands were “not realistic.”
– Finally, Doom Patrol‘s Mark Sheppard suffered several “massive” heart attacks over the weekend. The British actor, whose credits also include Supernatural and Doctor Who, stated he had experienced a 100 percent blockage in his left anterior descending artery, aka a “widowmaker” heart attack, and is very lucky to be alive. “If not for my wife, the Los Angeles Fire Department at Mullholland and the incredible staff at Providence California St Joseph’s – I wouldn’t be writing this,” he said. “My chances of survival were virtually nil.” Multiversity wishes Sheppard’s family all the best during his recovery.
