Emerald City Comicon 2013 News Round-Up

Each year, Seattle's Emerald City Comicon is one of the first shows to kick off the convention season. Though not exactly as big as SDCC or NYC in size and scope, ECCC still tends to have some interesting announcements from various publishers. This year was no exception.

We've put together a breakdown of all the major announcements this past weekend, including Gail Simone taking over Red Sonja at Dynamite, the continuation of The X-Files mythology at IDW, and various tidbits from Marvel and DC.

Dark Horse Comics

The biggest news from Dark Horse this weekend was the announcement of an ongoing Mass Effect series. Mass Effect: Foundation will be written by Mac Walters, who was the story lead on Mass Effect 3 and penned all four of Dark Horse's previous Mass Effect comics. Little was revealed about the premise of the series, other than that it will star a "strong female character" and will have some ties to the upcoming Mass Effect 3 DLC "Citadel."

Dark Horse held a "Star Wars in Comics" panel to discuss their various Star Wars projects. Regarding the continued mystery of how Disney purchase of the franchise will impact Dark Horse's efforts, there haven't been any conversations between Lucasfilm and Disney yet. For now, the publisher is treating the situation as "business as usual."

Gabriel Hardman discussed the upcoming Star Wars: Legacy series. The book will star Ania Solo, descendant of Princess Leia and Han Solo. Though set in the same general time period as John Ostrander's Star Wars: Legacy book, this series will focus more on new characters.

Dark Horse also held a Hellboy-specific panel. There wasn't much in the way of announcements (especially since Hellboy in Hell is an ongoing series). However, work has begun on more material in the Baltimore spinoff franchise. Mignola also noted that there's been no recent news regarding the possibility of  third Hellboy movie.

DC Comics

With the recent announcement of new cancellations in the New 52, we knew it would only be a matter of time before DC announced new titles to replace them. Alongside previous announcements like Batman/Superman and Scott Snyder and Jim Lee's Superman Unchained series, DC will be launching Trinity of Sin: Pandora in June, with the creative team of writer Ray Fawkes and artist Daniel Sampere (who are currently collaborating on a short Batgirl arc). The series will follow Pandora as she takes charge of her life and begins resisting the forces that have been punishing her ever since the events of DC's FCBD issue last year.

Similarly, the current Phantom Stranger series will be re-titled Trinity of Sin: Phantom Stranger that same month. We have to wonder if this means DC will complete the Trinity of Sin and give the Question his own series in the build-up to the Trinity War event.

A few other interesting tidbits came out at DC's panels. Scott Snyder discussed his Batman run on multiple occasions. He mentioned that this month's Batman #18 will reflect on the death of Damian Wayne through the eyes of Harper Row. Snyder later revealed that issues #19 and #20 are comparatively lighthearted and will act as an homage of sorts to Batman: The Animated Series. Issue #21 will begin a long story arc that, unlike The Court of Owls and Death of the Family, won't be tying into other books. Snyder compared this storyline to The Black Mirror.

Regarding his upcoming Green Lantern Corps and Red Lanterns runs, Joshua Fialkov noted that he'll be coordinating closely with Green Lantern writer Robert Venditti and Green Lantern: the New Guardians writer Justin Jordan to ensure all four books tell a larger, cohesive story.

Unfortunately, artist Kevin Maguire confirmed rumors that he'll be leaving Worlds' Finest with issue #12 being his last.

In happier news, DC announced a new Vertigo project at their "All Access" panel that brings back a venerated franchise. Brian Azzarello and Eduardo Risso will be teaming on Brother Lono, a sequel mini-series to 100 Bullets.

Finally, the usual fan questions about the possible debuts of Wally West and Stephanie Brown in the New 52 came up, but panel attendees remained as cryptic as ever on that front.

Dynamite Entertainment

The big news from Dynamite this weekend was obviously their signing Gail Simone to write Red Sonja. Simone will begin her run in July as Dynamite relaunches the title with a new #1. Walter Giovani will pencil the series, while a number of prominent female artists will provide covers, including Nicola Scott, Colleen Doran, and Stephanie Buscema. In an interview with CBR, Simone noted that she won't be radically overhauling the character, but is hoping to humanize her and broaden her appeal with readers.

It was also announced at the show that Matt Wagner's The Shadow: Year One has been slightly extended from eight issues to ten.

IDW Publishing

If you're wondering what happened to Joey over the weekend, his head popped over the weekend when he learned of this next piece of news. IDW revealed more about their upcoming X-Files series at the show. As many fans were hoping, the book is actually titled X: Files's Season 10. In the vein of TV-to-comics continuations like Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Season 8 and Smallville: Season 11, the series will pick up where the second X-Files movie left off.

As the series opens, Agents Mulder and Scully are reinstated as FBI agents and tasked with investigating the deaths of various people connected to the X-Files. The book will be written by Joe Harris and illustrated by Michael Walsh and colorist Jordie Bellaire. X-Files creator Chris Carter is providing feedback and guidance on the series.

Last week we reported that IDW has acquired the rights to Cartoon Network's various original animated series. The publisher revealed a bit more about what to expect. Their output will be a mix of reprints of DC's prior material and original stories. The Powerpuff Girls will be the first to debut this summer, followed by Samurai Jack.

For the Bronies out there, IDW will be publishing a "Color Me" variant of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic #1 that includes black and white versions of the issue's many variant covers.

Image Comics

Image held a "Skybound on the Rise" panel that focused on Robert Kirkman's creator-owned comics imprint. While Kirkman wasn't in attendance, his artistic collaborators Ryan Ottley and Charlie Adlard were. It was announced at the panel that Guarding the Globe is ending due to the events of Invincible #100, but it will be replaced by a "spiritual successor" named Invincible Universe. Phil Hester and Todd Nauck will helm the new series. Fans of Angstrom Levy can expect that villain to re-emerge in Invincible #103.

Regarding the Walking Dead, Adlard teased the debut of a major new character named Ezekiel in issue #108. Unlike Invincible, there are no plans for Walking Dead spinoff titles.

The next series to join the Skybound imprint will be Ghosted, from writer Joshua Williamson and artist Goran Sudzuka. The series is billed as Ocean's 11 set in a haunted house rather than a casino, with a group of con artists and ghost hunters working to steal a ghost from a house. This mini-series will kick off in July.

Marvel Comics

Marvel was surprisingly quiet over the weekend, electing to save their tease of Joe Madureira's new project until today. However, a few interesting details could be gleaned from their various panels. Fans of Matt Fraction's Hawkguy series can look forward to an issue that revolves around sign language as Clint's hearing loss returns. Other upcoming issues will revolve around Clint's brother Barney moving in and Pizza Dog solving a mystery.

Fraction spoke on behalf of Brian Michael Bendis regarding Age of Ultron, calling it Bendis' "swan song" on the Avengers franchise. Editor Sana Amanat reiterated that the series would build towards other major events in the Marvel Universe, and that cosmic characters like Nova and the Guardians of the Galaxy will play a larger role moving forward.

Kelly Sue DeConnick discussed her trepidation at tackling her first Marvel crossover, Avengers: The Enemy Within, which will take place in the pages of Captain Marvel and Avengers Assemble.

Other teases towards various Marvel books:

• Mark Waid is scripting an issue of Daredevil that features DD in a car chase.
• Uncanny X-Force will focus heavily on Bishop's recent whereabouts and will feature all three versions of Fantomex.
• Sam Humphries is set to introduce the West Coast Ultimates, a team which will include Wonder Man, Tigra, Quake, Black Knight, and The Vision.
• Deadpool #7 is a standalone issue that pits Deadpool against "Demon in a Bottle"-era Tony Stark.

Jesse is a writer for various IGN channels. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on Twitter, or Kicksplode on MyIGN.

Source : ign[dot]com