Welcome back to The Rundown, our daily breakdown on comic news stories we missed from the weekend. Have a link to share? Email our team at rundown@multiversitycomics.com.
– “Star Wars: Darth Vader” by Kieron Gillen and Salvador Larroca will be ending this August with issue #25. “We’ve always said all the way through, from ‘Darth Vader’ #1, that this was a story with a beginning, a middle and an end,” Gillen says in an interview with IGN. “And we kind of looked where we were after ‘Vader Down’, and we realized we were probably actually nearer to the end than we thought we were.” This series was one of the three ongoing “Star Wars” series at Marvel (the others being “Star Wars” and the newly-begun “Poe Dameron”).
– A few weeks ago, Tess Fowler announced she was leaving “Rat Queens” at #16. Over the weekend, she revealed the reasoning behind her departure was that series writer and co-creator, Kurtis J. Wiebe, planned to bring back original artist, Roc Upchurch. “I found out I was being pushed out to bring in the original artist,” Fowler tweeted. “He was never out of the mix. I just wasn’t allowed the truth, despite asking for fair warning.” For his part, Wiebe claimed the move to bring back Upchurch as “utterly false”, but Fowler shrugged it off, saying, “He lied to me about it. He lied about it when I caught him. Then he admitted it.” Upchurch was dismissed from the book in 2014 following charges of domestic abuse.
Editorializing: knowing Wiebe’s track record with finishing things (namely, he doesn’t; maybe because he’s too busy making a terrible Edge of the Empire podcast campaign that’s essentially him going all Zack Snyder on the Star Wars Universe), the likelihood a new issue of “Rat Queens” ever coming out again seems circumspect.
– Marvel’s Cinematic Universe has grossed about $10 billion worldwide following another strong weekend at the box office for Captain America: Civil War. This now makes the MCU the highest-grossing film franchise of all time. Crazy.
– Speaking of the Marvel Cinematic Universe, it looks like Michael B. Jordan is in talks to join the upcoming Black Panther film in 2018. The film is directed by Ryan Coogler, who’s worked with Jordan in Fruitville Station and Creed. Add the rumors circling that Lupita Nyong’o is also being courted (because she’s already Maz and Raksha, so why not get onboard another Disney train?) and it seems like Black Panther could very well be legit.
– When Shelly Bond was dismissed as Executive Editor at Vertigo last month, there was a huge amount of outcry within the comics community: what kind of world was it where Bond could be fired but alleged sexual harassers were allowed to keep their high-profile positions? Editor Eddie Berganaza was named by several sources, including Janelle Asselin and Nick Hanover. Now, in the face of their harassment issues, DC Entertainment has claimed it will address these matters and expand their policies. DC President, Diane Nelson, said (in a statement to Comic Book Resources):
DC Entertainment strives to foster a culture of inclusion, fairness and respect. While we cannot comment on specific personnel matters, DC takes allegations of discrimination and harassment very seriously, promptly investigates reports of misconduct and disciplines those who violate our standards and policies.
As part of our ongoing effort to provide an equitable working environment, we are reviewing our policies, expanding employee training on the topic and working with internal and external resources to ensure that these policies and procedures are respected and reinforced across the company.
– Philip Pullman, author of The Golden Compass (which honestly still features one of the best cliffhanger endings of all time), is starting a comic strip of his own, illustrated by Fred Fordham. In this long piece at The Guardian, he goes on his childhood love of comics and how they influenced his work, including the His Dark Materials trilogy.
– On Friday we asked, is there such a thing as too many comics-based TV series? Well, the results are in and at the time of this writing, 40% of you said: Yes, but there’s still some room to grow. 26% of voters said that we’ve reached that number, while 24% wanted more. Two people lied and said they don’t watch TV.
Continued belowCommenter David R. Schmitt offered: “Is it really any worse then [sic] the 20-30 cop/lawyer-based shows?”
Anyway, now that ABC cleared house, there’s suddenly room for lots more of these things.
Make sure to check back Friday for our next Weekly Readers’ Poll!
