Breaking: Pat Mills and Kevin O’Neill Sign-Up Marshal Law to DC Comics
Breaking news from Twitter, as Pat Mills just tweeted the following:
Kevin O’Neill and I just signed up Marshal Law with DC Comics. http://twitpic.com/45qao5
He had more about the news on his Facebook page:
Kevin O’Neill and I just signed up Marshal Law with DC Comics.
So they will be reprinting the existing material - in formats and on a schedule to be determined.
It’s great to see Law being published by DC. It means our character is finally going to be seen by an entirely new generation of readers. A character who was the original and… remains the strongest of all the critiques of super heroes. i think this is l because I really mean it - that is to say, I share Law’s perspective and his angry desire to find a hero in a world that is supposedly littered with them. And of course that’s doubly true for Kevin; so we encourage each other in our various visual and story excesses . DC’s enthusiasm for such a hard core and uncompromising character who really lifts the lid on the world of costumed heroes is an encouraging sign of the changing publishing times we live in.
Whether Law ever gets a chance to later “interact” with the heroes of the DC Universe remains to be seen, but I can always dream.
This is surprising news, because Mills and O’Neill previously had a deal with Top Shelf to publish an omnibus version of the much-loved series. However, Top Shelf were set to publish the omnibus in late 2010, and the release never transpired.
This led to one fan on the Jinxworld boards asking if the release was still coming, to which Brett from Top Shelf replied:
” Hi folks, Brett here from Top Shelf. The delay on the book has essentially been rooted in the search for the highest quality films for this mammoth project. I am a total nutjob for production values. The good news it that we have finally located the films - which were old enough that ultra care would be needed in digitizing them - done some scans and test prints, and we’re good to go.
That said, it will take a year to put this together, promote and print. Top Shelf is a 4-person company, unlike Marvel, DC, or even “smaller” houses like Dark Horse (staff of at least 100).”
I asked Pat to comment on the publisher change, and he told me that:
It didn’t work out with Top Shelf. But we’ve parted on good terms and they’ve wished us well. I’m curious to see how DC will do it. They have excellent productions standards like Top Shelf so it should look cool.
I suspect that, like indicated above, it was just too big a project for Top Shelf to take on. That’s pretty sad because I think Top Shelf put out some fantastic collections, but DC Marshal Law is better than no Marshal Law at all.
Also, we could get some new Marshal Law out of this, with DC crossovers. Imagine the possibilities!
Related posts:
- Pat Mills’ Requiem Vampire Knight Receives an English Translation by Panini UK, and Mills Signs at Forbidden Planet on September 19th
- Action Comics #1 Sells for a Record Breaking $1,000,000 USD
- 2000 AD Confirms Pat Mills’ appearance at San Diego Comic Con 2010
- Breaking News: Transmetropolitan Set to Return in 2011!
- Pat Mills and Garth Ennis Amongst Speakers at the Comics & Conflicts Conference in August
Hope the rights can be arranged with Clive Barker and his current comics publishers (Boom, I think?) to include the Marshal Law vs Pinhead crossover in an omnibus. Beautiful stuff, O’Neill having real fun creating cenobites.
That would be sweet! I think Barker owns the rights to the characters himself though, as he has a new sequel novel to the original Hellbound Heart novel coming out in the next couple of years.