Take two ticks to tinker with the thought of trying the Terrifyingly Tragic Treasury Edition of Joe Hill’s terrific terse tales.

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That’s a fair share of Ts, folks.  You’ll notice that one of the above T words is not “terrible”.  I would shudder at the idea of associating that word anywhere near Joe Hill’s work, as he is one of the most gifted writers in comics today.  Having made a name for himself on his masterpiece, Locke & Key, as well as The Cape miniseries, Hill has quickly become a respected name in the industry.  The fact that he’s Stephen King’s son also helps.  If you’ve devoured the five hardcover volumes of Locke & Key and are looking to fill the void in your life until volume six comes out, the TTTE special is a perfect option.  Containing his Kodiak one-shot, The Cape stand alone issue, and his Locke & Key short story “Open the Moon”, all of which are nominated or won industry awards.   

Fantasy adventure comics have been on the rise lately, what with Pathfinder, the Dungeons and Dragons series, Demon Knights, Conan, and, now, Amala’s Blade.  Striking a tone somewhere between humor and action, Amala’s Blade #1 is the first part of a four part miniseries following the titular assassin hero.  Amala is the head assassin in the kingdom of Naamaron, but has fallen out of favor due to her brash, boastful ways.  So, the emperor does the only logic thing:  send her on a mission that will likely result in her death.  Now, Amala’s skills are put to the test, with a failing grade equaling an end most fowl.  Illustrated in a style that bridges sketchy Indy artists like Becky Cloonan and cartoony pop like Avatar the Last Airbender, Amala’s Blade is feisty fantasy.

If you’re daughter’s ever tried to run past the rebel blockade in a giant spaceship shaped like a fist, Vader’s Little Princess might warm your heart.  You might also enjoy it if you and your daughter are huge Star Wars fans.  Jeffery Brown releases his second Star Wars children’s book detailing the awkward difficulties of raising a daughter who is your worst enemy.  Drawn in the same simplistically charming style of Brown’s Incredible Changebots, Cats Are Weird, and Vader and Son, Vader’s Little Princess is made up of vignettes detailing Vader’s struggle with common fatherly duties.  Tea parties, teaching Leia how to fly TIE fighters, and keeping her from leaving the house in only her slave girl bikini are the tasks of the day for Papa Skywalker.  Grab a copy and bond with your daughter over your shared geekiness.

A legacy can be an awful burden.

The legendary duo of Mark Millar and Frank Quietly (The Authority, WE3, New X-Men) reteam for the first time in years to bring you Jupiter’s Legacy.  This soon-to-be-hit series from Image Comics begins in the far future when all of Earth’s heroes have given up and left the world’s protection to their kids.  But being a better superhero  than your parents can be a demanding task.  Trust us when we say that this series will bring the violence, sexuality, and cinematic action unlike anything else out there (except maybe Saga, that book’s pretty raunchy).  Grab the hit comic of this year before it vanishes from the shelves.

 

We’ve trudged through the snow and ice just to bring you, dear readers, the newest installment of New Game Stuff.  Okay, fair enough, it’s not that bad out now and, yes, we could have posted this from home, if need be, HOWEVER, there is new gaming stuff and we are going to tell you about it.

First up, with Magic Game Day arriving on the morrow, it’s time for the Gatecrash Event Decks to show up.  For this set, the decks focus on Boros and Simic, meaning red/white and blue/red/green, respectively.  The Simic Guild deck comes packed with killer green cards, like a Thragtusk and a Wolfir Silverheart, while the Boros deck includes ton of money cards, like Clifftop Retreat, Champion of the Parish, Spark Trooper, Silverblade Paladin, and more.  So, lets do the math, not only can you play these competitive decks in tournaments and do well, but you’ll also make off like a bandit with all the money rares included in them.

Expand your spellcasting playbook with the Forcemaster vs. Warlord expansion set for Mage Wars.  Within this set are all the spell cards, mage cards, spellbooks, markers, and rules that you’ll need to incorporate these powerhouses into your base game of Mage Wars.  And, whoo boy, these two robed wizard-types are packed full of the butt-kicking.  Forcemaster likes to kick other players in the face with her mind and whip them about like a ragdoll with her telekentic prowess.  On the other hand, the Warlord has his minions soldier on for him while he brings the death from above with his brutal war magic.  Either way, you’re going to be challenging your opponent like never before.

If you just can’t wait to see how Peter Jackson ends his Hobbit saga (or you can’t read…but then you’d probably not be looking at this), create your own ending with the second Hobbit saga expansion for the Lord of the Rings LCG game, On the Doorstep.  Within this expansion are three additional scenarios that take two players across the Wilderlands, pitting them against giant spiders, Smaug, and the armies of Bolg on a cooperative journey.  Of course, to topple these challenges, you’re going to need new heroes, treasures, and player cards.  Luckily, you don’t have to venture across the Misty Mountains cold to find them, because they’re all contained within.

But maybe hobbits aren’t your flavor (they do have all that hair).

If not, the newest release for the Dungeon Command miniature game, Blood of Gruumsh, is chock full of Orcs for your battling pleasure.  This boxset contains an entire Orc faction, ready to play directly out of the box.  That means there are twelve prepainted figures depicting an owlbear, an Orc Chieftain, a wereboar, and much, much more.  Or if you’re feeling random, slap your Orc faction together with a bit of Elf and Goblin and have an old fashioned D&D hoedown!

Finally, this evening we’re going to write a lot of words.  But we’re going to do it in an order that turns them into a sentence.  And from those sentences, we’re going to tell you the names of four fresh additions to the Pathfinder universe. First up is the Shattered Star Poster Map Folio which provides detailed maps for Varisia, Magnimar, and Kaer Maga.  Next is the Animal Archive which details the fauna of the Pathfinder universe, including armor-wearing triceratops.  The Snows of Summer begins a new Adventure Path known as Reign of Winter.  And, finally, Pathfinder Online: Thornkeep provides GMs all the information they need to run adventures in and under Thornkeep, as well as details on the upcoming Pathfinder MMORPG.

 

You all better get used to hearing about Marvel Comics over the next couple of months, because Marvel NOW! is in effect.  Tonight we’ll highlight three of the five new Marvel NOW! series that start up this coming Wednesday, all of which are perfect jumping-on points for each of the book’s characters.

Since they’re the first family of the Marvel Universe, let’s start off with Fantastic Four #1.  Combining classic with current, Mark Bagley (Ultimate Spider-Man), a veteran of both Marvel and DC comics, lends his artistic talents to wordsmith Matt Fraction (Defenders, Fear Itself, Hawkeye, Immortal Iron Fist) for a fresh take on Marvel‘s oldest series.  Wanting to get away from the constant battles with Doctor Doom and Galactus, Reed and Sue Richards decide to take their family on a universe-spanning field trip.  The series will take a stand-alone approach to its issues, as the Fantastic Four land on a new planet or time period in each issue, getting into trouble each time as they try to teach Valeria and Franklin about the ins-and-outs of the galaxy.  And if you’re less of a reader and more of a collector, Fantastic Four #1 has variant covers in spades.  That’s a Scottie Young Baby variant, a Mark Bagley mural variant, a blank variant, and a couple more for good measure.

Brian Michael Bendis carved himself out a fairly comfortable niche in The Avengers corner of the Marvel Universe over the last ten years, so now it’s time for him to do the same with the X-Men.  All-New X-Men #1, his first X-Book, tells a story no other X-Men book has dared to tell before.  With the fallout of Avengers vs. X-Men, Cyclops and many of the original X-Men members are in drastically different positions from where they started, thus Beast decides to travel back in time, collect the original X-Men members, and bring them to the future to knock some sense into their present-day selves.  With art by the incomparable Stuart Immonen (Nextwave, Ultimate X-Men), All-New X-Men will look great and read crisply.

If you pick up only one of the Marvel NOW! series starting this month, pick-up Thor, God of Thunder.  Jason Aaron (Wolverine and the X-Men, Scalped, Ghost Rider), local writer, dares to tell a Thor epic to rival the classic tales of Walt Simonson.  A three-pronged narrative focuses on Thor of the past, Thor of the present, and King Thor of the future as all three versions contend with a threat the Asgardian has never faced before:  A serial killer of gods.  Along with Aaron’s time-spanning story, Esad Ribic’s (Silver Surfer: Requiem) painterly artwork turns the comic page into a mural, turning a simple comic book into a piece of mythology.  And since of book of this quality deserves it, variant covers abound, featuring artwork from Ribic himself, Scottie Young, and Daniel Arcuna.  Make yourself worthy of Mjölnir a pick up a copy.

Just as a reminder that there are other comic book publishers out there other than Marvel, let’s finish the night with a look at a new series from Image Comics.  Riding a wave of successful series like Manhattan Projects, Saga, Happy, and Revival, Image releases Great Pacific, a grand adventure in an unusual location.  Texas-born Chas Worthington is a trust-fund baby and a grade-A rich boy, inheriting the money of his oil baron father, but that doesn’t mean he has no principles.  Setting out to tackle a task unheard of in his social circle, Chas decides to eliminate the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, a floating mass of trash that continues to build in the North Pacific Ocean (it’s a real thing).  Martin Morazzo’s extremely detailed artwork renders every bit of debris and filth that Joe Harris’ scripts describe, making this another Image book to admire.

 

Preparing for this Wednesday’s Halloween ComicFest and actual Halloween, tonight’s Comic List Highlights features numerous creepy tales of horror and suspense, all of which arrive next new comic day. They may not be free like some of the other books for ComicFest, but they are freaky.

First up, for all the kids who still haven’t gone too bed, we’ll start with something a little less spooky. A + X is the new anthology series from Marvel coming out of AvX. Just like the AvX: Versus series, A + X features two separate stories featuring interactions between an Avenger and an X-Man as told by top artists and writers. Issue one has a Wolverine and Hulk story, sure to become a classic, told by Jeph Loeb and famous Hulk artist Dale Keown as well as a Cable and Captain America tale written by Dan Slott and drawn by Ron Garney. A + X is sure to be a fun, fast tale perfect for kids and those who adore classic Marvel missives made in the merry manner!

Alright, all the young’uns off to sleep?

Now for some adult stuff.

Bedlam #1 has been receiving some terrifically terrifying press as being the next huge Image comic series after Happy, Saga, and Revival. Nick Spencer, the notable mad genius behind Morning Glories, Infinite Vacation, and Thief of Thieves, joins forces will the ever-present Riley Rossmo (Rebel Blood, Wild Children, Cowboy Ninja Viking) to weave a narrative of a former psychopath and ruler of a tiny, quite town who used to go by Madder Red but now goes by Fillmore Press. A moody blend of Poe and Lovecraft, Bedlam #1 is an over sized story that’ll keep you hiding under the sheets at day’s end.

Are your teeth chattering in terror yet? No. Then let Steve Niles (30 Days of Night) and Glen Fabry (Preacher) keep you shivering with Lot 13. A rare horror miniseries brought to you by DC Comics, Lot 13 calls back to famous scary films like The Amityville Horror, The Shinning, and Thirteen Ghosts as it relates how a normally happy family stumbles across a haunting apartment complex as they stop over on a cross-country move. Will they all still be alive by the next morning? Read and find out. If you dare.

DC‘s really keeping the hell fires burning this year with another horror series, this one being a one-shot anthology featuring at least ten short comics by, literally, DC‘s top, top talent. That’s Geoff Johns, Jeff Lemire, Paul Pope, Phil Jimenez, Amy Reeder, and one of the last stories by the late, unmatched Joe Kubert. The stories range from a robbery on a futuristic ghost ship, a haunt-for-hire agency, and numerous other inventively chilling campfire yarns. Get in the spirit and pick up this collection about spirits!

 

Point one is usually considered an unimportant amount. But not this coming Wednesday.

Marvel NOW! Point One is extremely important for those who’ve got an interest in the forthcoming Marvel NOW! refresh! This over-sized issue will contain original short stories previewing and leading into future Marvel NOW! titles, including FF, Young Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy, Nova, and Cable & X-Force. That means stories by the likes of Kieron Gillen, Matt Fraction, Mike Allred, and Dennis Hopeless.

Wait, did I say Dennis Hopeless? Yes, former Pulp Fiction employee (like you didn’t already know), Dennis Hopeless. Dennis’ story is absolutely key to understanding his future Cable & X-Force series. It will show how Cable brought the, currently insane, Forge onto the team. Check the issue out for a great preview of upcoming titles. And don’t forget the Scottie Young baby variant!

Speaking of Scottie Young and babies (which seem to be utterly linked these days), A-Babies vs. X-Babies also drops this Wednesday. If you were one of the many who wished Cyclops and Captain America would stop acting like babies during Avengers vs. X-Men, this…is probably not the issue for you. However, if you love cute Marvel parody books lampooning the ridiculousness of giant crossover events, this IS the book for you. And you don’t even have to worry about a baby variant because the whole book is full’a babies!

Nathan Edmondson is one of those up-and-coming young comic writers you always hear about. He’s written great espionage series like Who is Jake Ellis?, Dancer, and Grifter, but now he’s turning his talents to Ultimate Comics Iron Man. This four issue miniseries will delve deep into the history of the Ultimate Universe’s version of the iron avenger, revealing his secrets for donning the armor in the first place. Oh, and did someone say Ultimate Mandarin? Followers of The Ultimates should give this miniseries more than a cursory glance.

It’s a known fact that everyone who reads the engrossing Morning Glories series has said, at one time or another, “I’d love to see this cover artist do interiors!” Well, that has finally happened. Mind the Gap is written by Jim McCann and, more importantly, drawn by Rodin Esquejo, the phenomenal cover artist for Morning Glories. Enough about Morning Glories, though, because Mind the Gap more than stands on its own. Not quite a murder mystery, this coma mystery centers around a sketchy cast of characters, all of which have their own motives for placing the lead character into a coma. But don’t count her out just because she’s unconscious, from her own mindscape she attempts to piece her memories together to catch the culprit. Just like Saga, Prophet, and, yes, Morning Glories before it, this first volume of Mind the Gap (the first six issues) is only $9.99! You can’t beat it!

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