Much of today has been devoted to wrapping up WORLD OF NEW KRYPTON #8, which is a pretty crazy issue. James Robinson, Greg Rucka and Pete Woods are introducing the Thanagarians to the series, and where the Thanagarians go, can bloody skirmishes be far to follow? One thing that’s complicated matters on this issue is Pete’s shoulder injury (I know, I know, I’m not supposed to give the opposing team info on our players’ injuries!). Happily, the always-joyous Ron Randall has swung in to save the day, with some beautiful, dynamic pages that’ll leave you saying “Pete who?” Since Ron is still working on his pages while I’m writing this, I’ll just have to leave you to be wowed later, and share a Pete/Nei Ruffino-produced peek instead.
Since one eye (of my three) is always looking ahead, that means steadily working on ACTION #882, which gets sent to the printer next week. #881 just came out a couple days ago, launching the four-part “Hunt for Reactron” crossover with SUPERGIRL #45 and #46, and I think it turned out pretty darn stellar. Usually when you tell a multi-part story, the buildup is almost inevitably more fun than the payoff, but not in this case (-whew!-). Sterling Gates and Greg have really done some amazing work here together, and between them and Pére Perez (ACTION) and Jamal “Shorts” Igle (SUPERGIRL), this arc is something I’m really proud of. ACTION #882 is pretty intense in places, but the finale in SG #46 is nothing short of majestic. Can you tell I’m pumped? Here, I’ve even included a sneak peak or two!
I end up having to pull away from ACTION to deal with two important developments. First, my manservant, Wil Moss has noticed that our main Thanagarian player in WONK #8 has a costume inconsistency. Nothing, and I mean nothing gets by this guy! Happily, he’s since contacted Pete, Ron and Nei, and a solution has been agreed upon. Then James comes through with a large portion of WONK #9, a story that stars a very peeved Jemm, Son of Saturn (remember him?). Man, this is good stuff.
At last, I return to proofing the lettering for ACTION, even as a question comes in from Fernando Dagnino, our fabulous penciller of SUPERMAN #693. Seems Fernando needs clarification for one scene involving the Parasite, and where he should be positioned on the page. Easily answered (and believe me, few things in this job are!). Sorry, ACTION. I’ll pay attention to you now.
Bing! Editor Liz “Don’t Give Me A Nickname, I Don’t Do Nicknames” Gehrlein has just sent over Geoff Johns’ latest script, for ADVENTURE #3. Hmmm. It looks thick. I’ll save this for the train, so I don’t repeat last night’s mistake, where I tried to balloon pages of Geoff and Gary Frank’s third issue of SUPERMAN: SECRET ORIGIN. Here, I’ll let you judge for yourself:
Pretty messy, huh? Stupid train. Well, at least the art’s gorgeous. Anyway, by this point I’ve gotten through the proofing for the lead story, but I have to put off going over the Captain Atom co-feature (part 4, for those of you keeping score) for our weekly Superman writers’ conference call. Poor ACTION…
Without going into any details, today’s call focuses on the happenings in the books come next summer, and how best to get there in the books that come out in the spring. Yesterday, we resolved a major point of concern that Dan DiDio had, and man, the ideas have really been flowing freely today as a result. Sometimes it really is fun knowing things before everyone else does.
Finally, after more work on WONK, some back and forth with the amazingly talented LaDronn (who’s doing the variant cover for WONK #12 as a bookend of sorts to his variant on the first issue), and a typically bizarre conversation with James about a special book that’s coming out in January, I turn to see that the sun has gone down. Guess I’ll be reading Capt. Atom over the weekend… but to end on a cheerful note, here’s a page from the story, by the ridiculously gifted team of CAFU and Bit. Have a nice weekend!
