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Happy #NewComicBookDay folks! Once again we're unable to invite you into the store to browse the rack, but we encourage you to click here to see what you'd see if we could.
COMICS NEWS AND VIEWS
DAMIEN WAYNE GETS HIS OWN SERIES
Damien Wayne has always been something of a problem child - understandable given that he was raised by his mother, Talia Al-Ghul one of the deadliest women in the world, to be the perfect assassin and then abandoned as a small boy into the care of a father he'd been brought up to despise. I mean, the kid was never going to play well with others, and he ends up as the youngest child in a weirdly extended family that likes to play dress-up and hit people.
He got a rough start, is what I'm saying.
Well, now he's striking out on his own, intending to cut his ties not only to Batman, but the Bat-Family and even the Teen Titans.
Coming in April, (provisional shipping date 27th April, but we never take such things terribly seriously...) the new title will be written by Joshua Williamson with art by Gleb Melnikov, who seem keen to throw Damien in at the deep end, pitting him against a swathe of new characters as he and his supporting cast seek to deal with some mysteries without the aid of the "world's greatest detective".
And of course, it's Damien Wayne, so it seems fair to assume that there'll be a lot of fighting and the odd arrogant sneer.
Allegedly kicking off a big story for the DC Universe this is a book that will explore Damien's background, his connections to Batman, and if the above variant cover is any indication, also his connections to his maternal grandfather, the assassin and eco-terrorist Ras Al-Ghul.
Not gonna lie - Tim Drake is "my" Robin, and I was not initially a fan of Damien Wayne. He's grown on me though, and I'll be checking out his new adventures with interest. If you want a sneak peek, check out the back-up story Demon or Detective in Batman #106 and Detective Comics #1034.
DARKHAWK GETS 30th ANNIVERSARY ONE-SHOT!
Had you forgotten that 2021 was the thirtieth anniversary of Darkhawk #1? Of course you had - if indeed you ever knew. He was always something of a "c-lister" even back in the heady days of the boom of the early nineties, although he does have his fans and a copy of #1 will go for between £30.00 and £50.00 if it's in decent condition.
Besides, Marvel learned a very valuable lesson when Robert Downey Jnr turned Iron Man from a d-list joke to the powerhouse behind a decade long twenty two movie franchise - never ever give up on a piece of intellectual property.
And so, Darkhawk turns thirty and gets a one-shot special - the giant sized Darkhawk: Heart of the Hawk coming in April. The character's creators writer Danny Fingeroth and artist Mike Manley will return to the character, alongside writers Dan Abnett and Kyle Higgins, with more art by Andrea Di Vito. Together this creative team will celebrate the legacy of Darkhawk, and set the character up up for his future in the Marvel Universe.
Co-Creator Gary Fingeroth said:
"It's an understatement to say that I'm thrilled to team up once again with the great Mike Manley to reveal an untold tale of Darkhawk's earliest days... Hawkamaniacs are always asking me when we'll be returning to the character we established, and I'm glad to have the opportunity to once again tap into the Darkhawk magic with Mike. Hope everybody enjoys this new tale of the high-flying, amulet-wielding hero!"
It's funny. I remember buying Darkhawk #1 from the sadly long gone Nu Earth Comics in York. I'm going to be reading this with both interest and nostalgia.
SPIDER-WOMAN GETS A NEW TWIST ON HER OLD LOOK
Spider-Woman #11, due in April will see Jessica Drew return to a modernized version of her original costume, designed by her co-creator Marie Severin way way back in 1976.
"One thing I've been wanting to do for some time now has been adding my personal touch to a Marvel character, which I've been able to do now with this classic Spider-Woman costume update,"
Said current series artist Pere Pérez, who got the job of updating the classic design.
"Aside from what you can see as the costume redesign, we have also included several surprise functional modifications that will also help to give a new fresh twist to Jessica Drew's heroic abilities,"
he added.
FROM PAGE TO SCREEN
And so, it's time to take a look at the world of comic influenced pop-culture and explore what is going on with the movies and TV shows that have their roots in the comics that we love.
ZACK SNYDER'S JUSTICE LEAGUE WILL BE A MOVIE AND NOT A MINI-SERIES
Speaking personally I don't think that it is possible for me to care less about this. Whether it's a movie or a mini-series it's very unlikely I'll be watching - I never got more than twenty minutes into the original cut before getting bored and doing something more entertaining - there is after all, always paint drying somewhere.
But I know that the fabled Snyder Cut is eagerly anticipated by a lot of people and I'm not here to yuck anybody's yum - so here's the situation. It was widely reported when Warner Bros. decided to bring the Snyder Cut to streaming service HBO Max that it would be released as a four part mini-series.
It is now reported that the cut will now be presented as a single four hour movie. It seems that the initial view was that releasing the cut over four weeks would entice new subscribers to sign up to HBO Max, but deeper consideration the people at the top decided that even spreading the release over four weeks wouldn't guarantee that new subscribers would stick around for more than a month, so they might as well drop it as the movie it was always intended to be.
I've not been able to find information regarding where the Snyder Cut will be available in the UK - Wonder Woman '84 went to Amazon Prime, so maybe we'll find it there.
PAUL "THE VISION" BETTANY IS THE FIRST ACTOR IN THE MCU TO FEATURE ACROSS THREE SEPARATE DECADES
Actor Paul Bettany got his first MCU on-screen appearance when The Vision hit the screen in 2015's The Avengers: Age of Ultron. But he didn't start there. The whole reason he was the perfect choice to take on the role of The Vision was the fact that he had been providing the voice of Tony Stark's invaluable A.I. assistant J.A.R.V.I.S. since that first Iron Man movie back in 2008.
So. That means that Bettany has featured in the MCU in the 2000s, the 2010s and now, with the launch of WandaVision on Disney+ in the 2020s - the first person to appear in all three decades of the MCU's existence. That's pretty cool...
CHARLIE "DAREDEVIL" COX WRAPS UP FILMING ON SPIDER-MAN 3
It is a truth, universally acknowledged that, with the possible exception of Iron Fist (annoyingly it looked like season three might have been where it finally achieved its greatness) the Netflix Marvel Series (Daredevil, Jessica Jones, Luke Cage, The Punisher and yes, Iron Fist) were cancelled too soon - victims not of bad reviews or poor ratings (quite the opposite, truth be told) but of inter-studio politics and licencing issues.
There were many nods in the various Netflilx shows to MCU continuity, so there's no narrative problem slotting those characters into the MCU. So now, Charlie "Daredevil" Cox has been seen filming on the set of Spider-Man 3, and it is reported that he has now completed his filming. Do we know for sure that he was there playing Matt Murdock? Well, no. We don't know for sure. Sony remains tight-lipped but seriously? Charlie Cox is an excellent actor, but would you really cast him in a Marvel movie and have him play somebody else?
Marvel Studios head honcho Kevin Feige has previously confirmed that whe whol raft of Netflix characters are "on the board" in the sense that screen rights have reverted to Marvel so there's no reason why any or all of them can't now start turning up in the movies. Whether we'll get the same versions that appeared in the Netflix shows is an open question - Jon Bernthal's Punisher is particularly hard to imagine finding a comfortable home at Disney - but the recent announcement that Deadpool 3 will be a hard "R" rating demonstrates that anything is possible.
HEROGASM COMING (heh) TO THE SCREEN
We're not going too deeply into this story, so you can read more HERE, but it's a piece of news we just can't let past without any comment at all.
It is reported that season three of The Boys will incorporate the Herogasm storyline which featured in the mini-series spin-off of the same name. If you're unfamiliar with The Boys, it was a hugely popular Garth Ennis series in the nineties, following the exploits of a "black ops" team of violent misfits whose job it was to keep the superheroes in line. It painted a picture of gross political corruption and a world full of superheroes who were arrogant, selfish and utterly depraved.
Sometimes shocking, often offensive but also consistently funny many fans of the comic thought that it would be completely impossible to film. When they did, and did it without avoiding some of the things we thought would be too graphic for TV many of us smiled and said "yeah, but they'll never be able to do Herogasm".
The mini-series was set on a secret "sex island" where the top supes got to go once a year to commit the kinds of sexual depravity that even they couldn't get away with in public. It was the sort of thing you could only get away with in the nineties. It's not un-problematic as a piece of work today, so it's going to be interesting to see how they handle it...