Infinity: The Hunt and a few Bits & Bobs.

Hi folks,

Sorry that it's been a while since my last posts. Life has been getting in the way a bit.

But I thought I'd pop on this evening to tell you about a book that's coming out today (Wednesday 11th September) which may be of interest to long term Captain Britain and Marvel UK fans.

Marvel is back into Event Season again, right now. 'Infinity' kicked off a few weeks back, and while Captain Britain himself doesn't sound likely to be playing any part in it somebody close too him certainly seems to be.

This is the cover to Infinity: The Hunt #1, which came out today.

 

 

Take note of the blond at top left, wearing a suspiciously familiar green bodysuit...

 

Yes. That's Meggan Braddock (who does keep on getting booted back to that costume, doesn't she?). And if any further confirmation of it actually being Meggan were required you'll find it on page 1 of the Preview currently up at CBR.

 

 

 

 

 

And it's called the 'CONTEST OF CHAMPIONS'. Inspired by the 80s series of the same name.

 

Meggan's appearance here, alongside Wolverine (the Jean Grey School), Hank Pym (Avengers Academy) and She-Hulk (Future Foundation), is as a representative of Braddock Academy - the school for British teen heroes, which her and Captain Britain have been running of late.

 

Braddock Academy was first mentioned in the pages of Avengers Arena, in which several of its students have been kidnapped and pitted against each other by Arcade, in his new version of Murderworld. Another student, Magic Boots Mel, turned up the pages of an Age of Ultron tie-in issue of Avengers Assemble. This third appearance will no doubt showcase even more of the Academy's student body. Has to make you wonder if Marvel doesn't have some kind of long term plan for them.

 

Infinity: The Hunt is going to be a limited series of four issues. And while the Contest of Champions aspect is going to be the main focus it will apparently be disrupted by Thanos' grand plans for Earth, as detailed in the main Infinity series. The Solicit is as follows:

 

 

Written by Matt Kindt, art by Steven Sanders, cover by Slava Pasarin.

 

* Hank Pym, Wolverine, and She-Hulk bring the students of the Marvel Universe together to announce a new Contest of Champions!

* This Contest of Champions pits the super students of schools all over the Marvel U (including some you've never seen before) against each other.

* However, the Contest is interrupted when Thanos' forces descend on Earth. What do they have to do with the young heroes?

 

 

Matt Kindt I'm not so familiar with, but Steve Sanders you may remember from Kieron Gillen's S.W.O.R.D. ongoing series, a few years back. While it seems a little bit of an odd premise for a tie-in series (and I find myself trying to remember if Wolverine is still supposed to be on Earth in Infinity proper) it may prove quite interesting.

 

Infinity: The Hunt #1 is out today.

 

 

In other news I just thought that some of you might like to take a look over the following...

 

I'm often asked by readers of this blog, and visitors to the Captain Britain & MI13 thread on CBR's forums, as to where people might find a full list of books from the Marvel UK 90s imprint. Well over at Down the Tubes former Marvel UK editor John Freeman has been putting together a list of all the Imprint Years projects from Marvel UK - including a number of those which never quite made it put into print before the closure.

 

You can find the list here. It's pretty extensive, and includes a few interesting hints towards where Marvel UK might have gone had it not closed. For those of you looking to fill holes in your collection, but not knowing what you should be looking for, this may also come in very handy.



 

And finally, I've had another Blog post up over Weekly Geek Speak's website. This time a lengthy post on the subject of Crossovers. You can find that article here. So if you're inclined, drop in over there too.

 

Until next time.

 

Mark

(Sword)

More Heroclix...

Well, the mysterious 'Mr Friend' linked to this HeroClix product on the last post and I felt I just had to post it up here.

Cop a load of this...

 

 

 

It's only the Excalibur lighthouse. Not just Excalibur, but the ruddy lighthouse too!

I have no idea how half of the things translate when actually playing the game but their card, which can be seen below (click and open for an enlarged version), includes a skill named 'CHASED BY NAZI DINOSAURS... FROM ANOTHER DIMENSION!'

Which has pretty much wins it for me.

More details on HeroClix' own website.

Sword

So, looks like we're finally going to see Captain Britain in Avengers Arena.

So, it's coming. The first post Marvel NOW initiative appearance of Captain Britain. In the pages of Dennis Hopeless and Kev Walker's Avengers Arena.

I've actually held off with posting about Avengers Arena up until now. It's a book which has upset a lot of readers from the outset. Fans of characters from Avengers Academy, The Runaways, Darkhawk, and that kid from the Sentinel series Marvel did a few years ago. 

Why? 

Because from its very concept Avengers Arena is not going to be good for their health. 

Anybody who's ever read Battle Royale (or seen the film adaptation of it) will find the very deliberate aesthetic rather familiar... 

Because it is. Intentionally so. The villain of the piece even tells you (thought not in quite so many words) that this is where he got the idea.

What villain, you say?

Well, the clue is in words 'Murder World' appearing on the cover to issue one. Who remembers a guy named Arcade? Old Captain Britain, Spider-man, and X-Men villain? Redheaded fella with a penchant for creating elaborate games designed to kill superheroes?

Him. 

He's had a run in with X-Factor in recent years, and a brief encounter with some of the Secret Avengers, but in his spare time it seems he's been somewhat ramping up his 'Murder World' concept. Gone are the giant pinball machines and Alice in Wonderland themed death contraptions... 

He's gotten himself his own personal Murder World Island.

An island in an undisclosed location, which he chosen to populate with teen heroes, kidnapped from around the Marvel Universe, who are then pitted in a game of survival. Against themselves. The one teen left alive will be allowed to live. But in order to get there they'll have to kill all of the others. Some comrades. Some strangers. Kind of brutal.

The kind of stuff which makes certain fanbases very angry (there have already been petitions).

But naturally, these are teen heroes we're talking about here. They're not likely to just capitulate to such requests to kill each other. Which is why Arcade has made it perfectly clear that anybody who protests, or refuses, will also die. By his very own hands. 

Which might initially seem an idle threat, or indeed a little beyond Arcade's usual MO. But then this happened at the end of issue one.

Yeah. It would seem Murder World is not the only thing to have received an upgrade...

But Arcade, and his new-found near omnipotence aside, why is this book of particular interest to this Blog? Well, because while the majority of teens on this Island (and Darkhawk, who is not a teen any longer) are established members of The Runaways (Chase and Nico), Avengers Academy (Reptil, Hazmat, Mettle and X-23), have been a sidekick for Drax the Destroyer (Cammi) or spent time operating hacked Sentinels (Juston) the series also introduces a new set of teen characters who started to be referred to by writer Dennis Hopeless in his early interviews for the book only as the students of 'Braddock Academy'. With no further context offered.

When poked by another poster over on Twitter, however, Dennis Hopeless stated that it was:

Which certainly guaranteed that I'd be on board for the duration.

So, it seems that holding on to old grudges of being beaten TWICE by Captain Britain, Arcade has decided to kidnap some of his new students. We've not seen a lot of them in the four issues of Avengers Arena so far, but here's who they are:

Nara: Described as '...an Atlantean with abandonment issues'. One of Namor the Submariner's people, but so far we know nothing more than that.

Cullen Bloodstone: '--Of the Monster Hunter Bloodstones'. Presumably that makes him the Son of Ulysses Bloodstone, and younger sibling of Elsa Bloodstone.

Anachronism: Whose real name is 'Aiden,' but has chosen that codename. He dresses very much like a junior version of 2000 AD's Slaine, and carries a HUGE axe around with him. He has apparently inherited '...the body of an immortal Celtic Warlord...'

Katy Bashir: Who pretty much sums herself up, above. She's principally a Flier.

And finally, the guy who's on the cover to issue 5:

Kid Briton: Who is an alternate universe, teenage, Captain Britain. Although, to what extent was not readily apparent.

Until now. 

I've been holding off posting about these guys since November, simply because I wasn't certain that they were ever going to be shown to be truly linked to Captain Britain or British Marvel. I had hoped, but a Twitter response is not the same as in-panel proof. Well, today Comic Book Resources have put up a preview of Avengers Arena #5 which now puts any question of the matter beyond doubt.

That certainly looks like it's Braddock Manor in the background. I have no idea what they are fighting there, but it's certainly Elsa Bloodstone, Spitfire, Meggan Braddock and Union Jack trying to contend with it. Which for me is all the link I need.

As for Kid Briton? Well, the preview not only features Captain Britain, but confirms that Kid Briton is also 'Brian Braddock'. A younger Brian Braddock from an alternate Earth. A guy OUR Brian Braddock feels has potential, but...

So, basically it's a bit like 'What if Captain Britain had all that power but was an impetuous ass-hat?' :) 

Kid Briton was 'pulled out' of his native dimension? Whether that was 'rescued from' or brought to ours for training, of course, remains to be seen. Only time will tell...

I was already on board with this book. I'm twice as on board now. 

But characters I have a vested interest in aside, it's actually been a really solid, character focussed book so far. Forget the controversy, it's actually really well put together. I cannot recommend it enough.

But if you need a British Marvel based incentive? Well, there ya go.. :)

Avengers Arena #5 is out next Wednesday (27th February).

Michael Ryan's concept art for the New Excalibur Meggan that never was...

It's been quite a while since I even thought of Chris Claremont's New Excalibur. I have reread it once since it was first published, and much as though it was a series which got a lot of stick at the time for its cast choices and story logic I must admit to still having a certain fondness for it.

Yes, it wasn't quite the Excalibur that most people had hoped for, but ultimately I do still believe that before a series of unfortunate results derailed it Claremont had a very distinctive plan for the book. Those early issues actually read pretty well, and the Hellfire Club strands he was bringing over to the book (from similar ongoing plots in his Uncanny X-Men and Xtreme X-Men runs) actually showed a lot of promise.

For those who may have forgotten, the regular artist for the first year of the book was Michael Ryan. I had previously known of his work from his tenure on Bob Weinberg's Cable run (Which still remains my own personal favourite run of Cable's original series) where he did some great work. Art Deco style future landscapes. Those three creepy sisters. Cable reuniting with his 'sister' Rachael Summers.

In particular I was always impressed by how he drew long-haired female characters, that art deco styling very much in play. Something I was looking forward to seeing applied on New Excalibur. Especially on Dazzler, for example. Or Meggan Braddock (née Puceanu).

Of course, when New Excalibur kicked of, that wasn't ever the case. All the female characters on that book very much had short hair (I can still recall the Dazzler fans screaming blue murder about that. No. Really.) and Meggan wasn't on the team, having been sucked off into another dimension at the end of House of M. We would eventually see her return to the Marvel Universe during Paul Cornell's Captain Britain & MI13 but it was certainly intended to have happened sooner. It's going back a while, but I certainly do remember X-Men Editor Nick Lowe having mentioned in an interview online that the intention had always been to bring her back onto New Excalibur, while the series was still going. They just ran out of time.

But he did then offer up some Michael Ryan concept art.

While clearing out my old PC the other week (A machine which only boots one time in five, but which I've kept around purely because it holds our Master iTunes library) I came across that image, remembering that back in 2008 I had intended to post it up. Better late than never, eh?

I actually really like this design. At the time Meggan was a character who had really been stuck in that same leotard for most of her existence in American comics. A change was long overdue. Ryan's redesign here stays true to the essence of her classic costume, but gives her a bit more individuality. The boots and the almost frock coat like central part of the costume also finally makes her look a bit more grown-up. Too many writers seem to want to keep Meggan as this odd, naive child from Claremont's original Excalibur run; a phase she grew out of quite some time ago, now. 

I also kinda like the Celtic braids. 

Sure, I also like how Meggan turned out as Gloriana in Captain Britain & MI13, for different reasons, but if this is how she'd turned out back in 2007 I'd have been more than happy.

This weekend, for the mindless fun of it, I decided to try and see how this design might actually look following the suggested notes for colouring on Ryan's design. Here's what I came up with.

Firstly in a more traditional green and yellow:

And in the also suggested green and white:

I actually find myself preferring the white, to a degree. Green and yellow are much more 'Meggan's colours', but I don't know....

Which do you prefer? Let us know in the comments field.

Could New Excalibur have done with a shapeshifter on their roster? Well, it wouldn't have harmed them. What could have been...

ICFD Cover of the Week - 20th January 2013

This week's cover is the slightly time worn cover to my copy of The Mighty World of Marvel (Vol2) #7, from December of 1983.

Creases, scuffs and all...

Yeah, I did debate removing those while touching up the contrast levels, but opted not to in the end. I like to think it gives it character. :)

The Mighty World of Marvel (As a British publication) first ran from 1972 to 1977, before changing its name to 'Marvel Comic,' and later 'Marvel Superheroes'. It was an anthology title, in the British tradition of such, which reprinted US material featuring mainstays like Spider-man, The Hulk, The Avengers and X-Men to rotating in runs of Nick Fury, Tomb of Dracula and even Planet of the Apes reprints later in its life.

This second volume began in 1983, primarily as an opportunity to reprint a number of specific US limited series. Sadly, it actually only lasted 17 issues, but reprinted early 80s runs of things like Vision and Scarlet Witch, Cloak and Dagger and in this case the justly classic Chris Claremont and Frank Miller Wolverine limited series from 1982.

I usually use this feature to display original UK cover artwork, which readers outside of Britain and Ireland may not have seen before. But this week I decided it might be interesting to showcase how US art was sometimes incorporated into the covers of UK reprints. At its base this is Miller's cover to Wolverine #3, with the image moved the bottom right of the cover, allowing space to add info on the other strips included to the left side of the cover.

The Alan Davis Captain Britain panel has then been added to the cover, along with a brief list of other content. Oddly Miller's image goes uncredited.

MWOM #7 has a couple of landmarks moments of its own though.

For one, you'll notice the 'Featuring The Daredevils' tag under the logo. The Daredevils was a Marvel UK anthology title which ran from January 1983 until November of the same year. It was designed to be more of a 'mature readers' title, reprinting slightly more sophisticated and pulpy material such as Frank Miller's Daredevil, Alan Moore's Night Raven text stories, and a few select Spider-man tales. It was also the home Alan Moore and Alan Davis' Captain Britain stories...

The Daredevils folded with #11, and became part of The Mighty World of Marvel with this very issue. Ironically, the only character who truly didn't survive this transition was Daredevil himself. :)

The second part of Jamie Delano's Night Raven text story 'Quiet Town' appears in MWOM #7, but the other landmark this issue supplies is through its Captain Britain strip. Remember, this was the first outing for these Alan Moore and Alan Davis stories, in their original black and white format. When The Daredevils was cancelled their Jaspers Warp storyline was well underway. This issue's strip, 'The Candlelight Dialogues,' is set in a concentration camp in Sir James Jaspers' newly created anti-superhuman world, and it actually serves as a pretty solid introduction for new readers to Captain Britain. But it's the campfire framing of the story which is of particular note. And the introduction of a certain chain-smoking teenager.

That winged girl (On the left in that final panel) is none other than Meggan Puceanu (Later 'Braddock' through marriage) in her very first Marvel Comics appearance. Sure, she doesn't look a lot like she does these days, in this early formative stage, but that's her. A Moore/Davis creation, yet to truly take shape.

If you actually find an issue or two of Mighty World of Marvel knocking around, it's well worth holding onto them. Granted, I had to adjust the contrast a lot to take the yellow out of that page I scanned, but the sturdy card stock covers have weathered an awful lot better than much of my older Marvel UK comics. The coloured pages from the Claremont/Wolverine stories also look pretty nice in that larger UK page size ratio.

Merry Christmas from It Came From Darkmoor...

From Captain Britain vol 2 #14 (December 1986)

Story & Pencils by Alan Davis, Inks by Mark Farmer, Colours for the collected edition by Steve White.

This is the final page from the final issue of the second British Captain Britain series. A landmark issue. A watershed moment.

The many panels of this page would be picked up on in future issues of Uncanny X-Men, New Mutants and Excalibur in the US, but this was the final page of the British produced Captain Britain comic.

But that is not actually my reason for bringing it up, here. I've come back to this issue in particular because (And I know that this is somewhat of a rarity these days) a Christmas Issue. Marvel UK did not do many of those, but this story (For me at least) captures the spirit of Christmas in a way which is so very typically British.

'Should Auld Acquaintance...' begins on Christmas Eve with Brian and Meggan setting in front of an open fire flowing right through to the chimes of Midnight on New Year's Eve; covering the whole of Christmas Week.

(And for the benefit of American readers here in the UK it really is a week, not just Christmas Day. Outside of Retail most Offices close down for Christmas week. I kid you not.).

It has everything. From old friends dropping round unannounced...

To scenes out in the snow.

From children opening presents on Christmas Morning...

To reunions with Loved Ones... with a little Christmas magic.

From trying to find that perfect Party Attire...

To that frantic dash as the clock chimes twelve on New Year's Eve.

And, in the spirit of the New Year, two men who have never seen eye to eye find common ground, agree to bury the hatchet, and look to the future.

2012 has been a funny old year. I'm glad to have reached the end of it, and I'd like very much to take this opportunity to wish you all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. Go home. Eat, Drink and be Merry. Spend quality time with your friends, family and other loved ones. Yeah. Even the ones you don't necessarily get on with so well.

Because it's Christmas. Let this be your watershed moment.

May Santa bring you everything you wanted, and may 2013 bring you even more.

And I'll hopefully see you back here in the New Year. :)

Mark (Sword)

Panel Beatings: Never let the pacifist Brian Braddock build your Rescue Craft.

From: Excalibur (vol 1) #96 (April 1996)

Words: Warren Ellis
Art: Carlos Pacheco

Knights of Pendragon and X-Men Forever speculation.

You may remember a short while back (March to be precise) I mentioned that Panini Comics would be putting out a first trade volume of the Abnett/Tomlinson/Erskine new age-eco-Arthurian epic, Knights of Pendragon. This is a particular favourite series of mine, and one which I feel was long overdue a collection. It was, I believe, in part the quality output of books such as KoP which actually resulted in Marvel UK being given an imprint of its own.

I have now found the ISBN for the volume itself and it is now available to pre-order from Amazon, with the provisional release date of 8th of October 2009 ( ISBN-10: 1846534313 ). Of course, please remember that this date IS only provisional (Let us not forget the delays over Panini's Captain Britain Vol 3) but anybody who might wish to reserve their copy - and it would be well worth your while - now you can.

While we're still on the subject of Panini during the process of my reserving a copy of the aforementioned volume I also noticed that there is a pre-order page for a 4th Panini Captain Britain volume, subtitled "The Siege of Camelot" ( ISBN-10: 184653433X ). This volume appears to continue directly from vol 3, completing reprints of the Black Knight and Captain Britain stories from the UK Hulk Comicand onwards into the Dave Thorpe, Alan Moore and Alan Davis stories - debuting The Fury. It certainly appears that, and the rumours I have been hearing so far this year seem to support this, that regardless of Marvel's own Captain Britain Omnibus Panini intend to continue printing all of Cap's pre-Excalibur appearances, up until completion. Great respect to them, if this is the case.

Still on a Captain Britain related theme several regular readers have mailed me over the last few weeks with regards to the poster on the right here (Click to Enlarge). It was released by Marvel to coincide with the start of Chris Claremont and Tom Grummett's X-Men Forever.

For those unaware of the series, X-Men Forever is basically a fortnightly (That Bi-Weekly for our American readers) ongoing What If...? series, allowing Claremont to write an alternate history of the X-Men, and X-Men titles, as he would have written them had he not left the the X-Men books in 1991, after the release of (Adjectiveless) X-Men #3. At that point Claremont had been writing Uncanny X-Men, and steering the creative direction of X-Men spin-off titles foe 17 years (Utterly unthinkable in modern comics) and nobody can debate that his leaving had a heck of an effect on X-Men comics through the 1990s.

Several of you have rightly pointed out the notable presence, on this poster, of two very distinctive Marvel UK properties, namely Captain Britain & Meggan. And drawn by Jim Lee they look very impressive too - Meggan in particular:


And upon seeing their presence on this poster immediately jumped for joy at the prospect of their turning up in X-Men Forever.

Please folks, hold your horses.

I don't mean to disappoint anybody (And indeed I may be premature in doing so) but this poster is not new work. It's a re-issue of a poster Jim Lee and Scott Williams did in 1990 or 1991 of every X-Man who was on an X-Men title at that time, accompanied with the phrase "... and the BEST is yet to COME!"


Cap and Meggan appear here because at the time, in continuity, they were both part of Excalibur. As were Rachel Summers, Nightcrawler, Kitty Pryde and Lockheed, who are also pictured.

This is a re-issued poster with modern colouring. It looks damned good, and as it dates from the rough point that Claremont left the X-Books, making it a good fit. At the point X-Men Forever begins these are the teams in play. But I don't think we can take it as read that this will have any indication over whether or not Cap and Meggan will appear.

I mean sure, Chris Claremont has always loved to feature Captain Britain (The character he has always gone back to since creating him in in 1976) and Meggan, wherever he logically can in his X-Writing. Something I've always been kind of grateful for. But this vision of the X-Men is a bit different. In X-Men Forever #1 we already have Kitty and Nightcrawler debating leaving Excalibur to rejoin the X-Men, having returned to New York for Magneto's funeral.

So this one may well play out very differently. I always have my fingers crossed, but you never know.

Anyway, enough of my talk.

If you wish to contact me you can mail me or Tweet me at the usual places (Listed on the right) and feel free to drop your own comments on any of the Blog threads I start.

Until the next time...

Mark
(Sword)