Weekend Con Round up!

It has been made official in today’s Cup O’ Joe panel, Jeff Parker and Gabriel Hardman of the amazing Atlas will be taking over Hulk. Which means I may just be buying my first Hulk title in over a decade.

The Crossgen Sigil and the year 2011 also made an appearance at the panel, which for long time Crossgen fans like myself is nothing but good news.

Alt-adult site SuicideGirls.com is getting its own comic from IDW with both Steve Niles and Cameron Stewart on board. John Byrne will be the next creator on the Jurassic Park comic. A Bleeding Cool rumor proved true as they announced a new Rocketeer title with an all star lineup of creators. Though apparently slated for the far-away date of December 2011, another personal favorite of mine will be returning at IDW: John Byrne’s Next Man, an all new run by Byrne himself. They finish up with the strangest announcement: a crossover called “Infestation” that ties their licensed books like G.I.Joe, Transformers, Star Trek, CVO, and Ghostbusters together and which may very well be zombie related. Odd.

In the most awesome of awesome video game news (and super-power related at least) is the announcement of new crossover game Street Fighter X Tekken. The awesomenest oozes from the very idea.

The new seventies-style exploitation trailer is extremely red band and makes it clear that Machete is nigh superhuman in his abilities as well. Do to its graphic nature I won’t post a direct link here, but you can check it out at Topless Robot.

The Spider-Man panel also confirmed another major Bleeding Cool rumor, with Amazing Spider-Man going biweekly with Dan Slott as the solo writer under the new banner name “Big Time”. Carnage and Norman Osborn will both get minis as well.

Vertigo announced that most of its former DC characters will be returning to the DCU. What this means for the futures of House of Mystery and Hellblazer is anyone’s guess.

Oh, and Marvel was daring enough to put the Infinity Gauntlet on display for everyone. Thankfully no one stole it and used it to reshape the universe in their image.

Super-Powered Comics: The Unknown

Mark Waid has written some of my favorite and least favorite title runs. While some of his work leaves me flat, more often than not he produces some real winners. One of his finest was his 2001 other-world Sherlock Holmes in Ruse. While Waid wouldn’t stay with Crossgen long, he produced amazing work unlike any he produced before.

I never figured he would capture that fire again, but he does in the pages of The Unknown. The book follows the adventures of the real world’s greatest detective Catherine Allinghan and her new confidant James Doyle. It seems Catherine only has six months left to live, and she plans to solve all life’s great mysteries in her remaining months. The only problem is she may not be in her right mind as visions of a strange, deathly figure continue to reoccur in her mind.

They set out to solve the case revolving a quantum box and the disappearance of the man illegally inside of it. In the process, they stumble in to a deeper conspiracy one peeled away in layers as supernatural forces move against Catherine and Doyle. And by the end of the run, we can begin to suspect Catherine’s visions are not delusions... as even Doyle sees the ghastly figure.

Waid imbues Catherine and Doyle with all the life he gave to a certain other pair of detectives eight years ago. Aided and abetted by Dutch artist Minck Oosterveer who imbues every character in the book with life. All of this comes behind stunning covers (on my editions) by Eric Jones, although other variants do exist.

The Unknown wraps the detective story in an occult milieu with a dying woman with near superhuman deductive ability as the star. Beautiful art on top of an excellent story guarantee that even at a $3.99 price point, this one gets a Highly Recommended. If you prefer the $24.99 hardcover (available at a hefty discount at the Amazon link above) is now available.