On Vacation, No One Can Hear You Promote
I’ve spent the past few weeks working quadruple-time to afford myself one of those rarest of treasures in the freelance world: a vacation. And while we had to contend with some unfortunate lingering illnesses, it ended up being one of the best trips my partner and I have ever taken. But the flip side of hustling to prepare for, and then taking, a vacation is that my responsibility to actually, you know, remind people about the books I write falls by the wayside. So please enjoy this fast and dirty newsletter, mostly written during my 12-hour overnight flight back to the frozen wasteland we call home.
ALIEN: PARADISO
It’s fitting, as we leave a slice of paradise, that I get to focus the most on ALIEN: PARADISO #1, which came out this week from Edgar Salazar, Peter V. Nguyen, and yours truly. I’ve spoken ad nauseam about my devotion to the Xenomorphs—I saw the original films VERY young and ALIEN remains my single favorite film of all time. I was both ecstatic and intimidated when editor Sarah Brunstad emailed me with the subject line: “More Alien?” What do you do to bring something NEW to Xenomorphs in 2024? Audiences just saw Fede Alvarez bring the films back to fundamentals. My predecessors on the Marvel comics had told kickass stories about marines and research scientists and new forms of Xenomorphs. So, after much soul-searching, an image came to me: a Xenomorph standing in the surf against a setting sun.
With PARADISO, I wanted to give readers an ALIEN story set somewhere they’d likely never see on film. The Paradiso resort is a sun-kissed luxury colony accessible only to the wealthy—which includes some who come about their money by ill-gotten means. Our cast is made up of criminals, undercover Marshals, and innocents caught in the crossfire, but it was crucial to me that no one, including the Marshals, know what’s going on when it comes to the Xenomorphs. What makes ALIEN so frightening is the unknowability of the monster stalking the Nostromo, so we’ve set PARADISO at a point in the timeline where our cast is woefully unprepared for what they’re about to encounter. There aren’t dozens of Xenomorphs swarming the slot machines, and no one rushes in pulse-rifles-blazing—this is a stalk-and-kill horror story with criminal noir elements.
Edgar brought his ample sci-fi experience to the table fleshing out our cast, and I’m excited for folks to meet Tsula, Ricky, Dash, Lydia, and the rest. And Peter joined us for very special pages from the point of view of the Xenomorphs themselves, which we planned to up the tension wherever possible.
Getting to tell a full-length ALIEN story was a bucket-list item I never thought I’d check off. Our cast may not have enjoyed their stay, but I hope you’ll check into ALIEN: PARADISO.
TIMESLIDE
And out in a few terrifying short weeks is the year-end capper that is TIMESLIDE, a double-sized behemoth that pits Bishop and Cable on a time-traveling mission to preserve mutantkind’s place in the timestream. As with the preceding TIMELESS issues, we’ll also be generously teasing storylines and events for 2025 and beyond. I won’t go too in depth about this here, since I just did an exhaustive X-Men Monday for my good pal Chris over at AIPT—check that out for the full scoop. But if you’re curious to get your first look at X-stories for 2025, as well as glimpses at all sorts of Marvel events and storylines beyond the confines of the mutant office, TIMESLIDE has you covered, along with a blistering original story brought to guns-a-blazing life by Ivan Fiorelli and Frank D’Armata. This was my “dry run” with Ivan ahead of NEW CHAMPIONS and it was just page after page of awe.
AND SPEAKING OF NEW CHAMPIONS
This lil’ book is coming up real soon too! On…January 8th?! Wow, jeez, what a way to kick off the new year with a cast of BRAND-NEW KIDS taking on the big ‘ol Marvel Universe. My NEW CHAMPIONS artistic collaborator Ivan Fiorelli, colorist Arthur Hesli, editor Alanna Smith, and I have been having a BLAST building out this new corner of the 616 and developing this crew. Who will be a hero? Who will be a villain? Who will leave the team? Who will barely be canon?! You’ll have to pick up the issues to find out for sure, but rest assured we’re swinging for the fences here and doing our best to make these kids a vital addition to the Marvel ranks, and give them every opportunity to stick around beyond the pages of this series.
Ivan has given them each SO much personality, and has really embraced the madcap, tuned-up, manga-informed vibe I hoped to bring to the table here, and it was also a treat to welcome back my Spider-Woman collaborator Ig Guara for five pages of #1, which will help catch readers up to speed and guarantee you can come to this new series fresh. (speaking of, SPIDER-WOMAN BY STEVE FOXE Vol. 2: THE ASSEMBLY is out now, collecting the issues Ig and I did together—as well as the debut of half of the New Champions kids!) If you’re a fan of books like Generation X, New X-Men: Academy X, Young Avengers, Strange Academy, and, of course, Champions, I hope you’ll give us a shot!
And if you want to hear me expand even more on what’s to come, check out the interview I did at CBR, where I tease many more specifics when it comes to guest stars, Magnetrix’ possible mutant connections, and more!
WHAT ELSE, WHAT ELSE…
CHASM: CURSE OF KAINE wrapped up a couple of weeks ago, just before Thanksgiving, and I remain very thankful I got to borrow the Clone Bros. (and Janine!). Extremely fun, dark lil’ romp over there with Andrea Broccardo, who I’m stoked to see doing some Amazing Spider-Man issues now. Hopefully not the last time you’ll see me in Spider-territory…!
BEASTLY BUDDIES continues apace and remains one of my career highlights. Armand Bodnar has become a real bud of mine, and we’ve just been having a blast doing this kooky, spooky little project. Looks like there’s a brief pause before the next installment, but rest assured more will be along ASAP!
And a little farther off on the horizon still yet, but get your preorders in for LET THIS ONE BE A DEVIL #1, out February 19th from Dark Horse Comics. Co-written with James Tynion IV, illustrated by my All Eight Eyes collaborators Piotr Kowalski and Brad Simpson, and lettered by Blue Book’s Tom Napolitano with edits from the lovely Greg Lockard, LTOBAD is our swing at a definitive Jersey Devil horror story, incorporating the “true” folklore into an original narrative. It’s also the first of our new “A True Weird Story” series, which will spotlight other cryptids and monsters in similar tales. I’ll talk more about it as it approaches, but for now, tell your shop to reserve a copy, and check out The Closet artist Gavin Fullerton’s moody cover above!
MERRY & GAY
Before I bounce, I did a slew of fun podcasts recently, in case you want to hear EVEN MORE from me. A while ago, I guested on the lovely and mysterious Chris Condon’s podcast, which you can hear if you subscribe to his Patreon here.
I was honored to be Comic Book Yeti’s Cryptid Creator Corner’s 300th(!) episode in what was apparently my seventh(!) appearance. Chatting with Byron is always such a blast that I had no idea we had banked so many. You can check that out wherever you stream your podcasts.
And I had the great pleasure of finally circling around to IDEAS DON’T BLEED, hosted by Matt Rosenberg, Ethan S. Parker, and Griffin Sheridan. See if you can guess which of the three was not actually on the call when I recorded! It’s a mystery. Check out episodes one and two at those links or through your preferred podcast app to learn about some cryptids that are REALLY stretching the definition.
And that’s it for me, likely until after the holidays. Be merry, be well, read some comics just for fun, be kind to each other, buy my books so I can keep doing this, or don’t—it’s a free country (for now).
xoxo