There’s less than a month left until Awesome Con DC which takes place April 20 and 21 in Washington, DC and they’re not done with the announcements. Last week the convention announced Buffy‘s Nicholas Brendon will be coming to the first year convention.

Nicholas Brendon is best known to audiences as the sardonic Xander Harris on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a role he played for the seven-year run of the show. He’s currently recurring as FBI technical analyst Kevin Lynch on the hit CBS series Criminal Minds, was recently featured in a four-episode arc on the ABC drama Private Practice, and also starred in the Fox comedy Kitchen Confidential.

This is just one of the recent announcements which also includes The Walking Dead‘s Theodus Crane, Wolverine co-creator Herb Trimpe and 30 Days of Night co-creator Ben Templesmith.

The convention line-up is impressive including Phil LaMarr, Ernie Hudson and comic creators including Larry Hama, John Ostrander, Justin Jordan, S.L. Gallant, Jeff Shultz, Jeremy Whitley and many more.

The nominees for GLAAD‘s 24th GLAAD Media Awards have been announced and a solid list for their comic book category has been announced. The GLAAD Media Awards celebrate outstanding representations of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community and our allies on TV, in film, and in the news.

Astonishing X-Men by Marjorie Liu
Marvel

Batwoman by W. Haden Blackman, J.H. Williams III
DC Comics

Buffy the Vampire Slayer by Andrew Chambliss, Scott Allie, Jane Espenson, Drew Z. Greenberg
Dark Horse

Earth 2 by James Robinson
DC Comics

Kevin Keller by Dan Parent
Archie Comics

Congrats to all of the nominees! The GLAAD Media Awards ceremonies will be held in New York on March 16, 2013 at the New York Marriott Marquis; in Los Angeles on April 20 at the JW Marriott; and in San Francisco on May 11 at the Hilton San Francisco – Union Square.  Special Honorees for each city will be announced in coming weeks.

I’m still recovering from New York Comic Con with a nice case of nerd flu, blaargh. Here’s some news to keep you busy.

Around the Blogs

ICv2 – Disney Slates ‘Ant-Man’ Movie for Nov. 5, 2015 – Counting down starting now!

Bleeding Cool – Grifter, Legion Lost And Blue Beetle Join The DC Cancellations – And we know of one new series so far.

Around the Tubes Reviews

CBR – Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 #14

CBR – Fantastic Four #611

CBR – Ultimate Comics X-Men #17

Dark Horse offers fans and retailers alike the perfect jumping-on point for all of the titles in Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9.

In 2007, Dark Horse made comics history with a revolutionary new concept: Joss Whedon’s best-loved television series continued in comics with Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8. With Joss Whedon himself at the helm, the series launched with much critical acclaim, and sold out of multiple printings.

Following the success of Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 8, Dark Horse launched four separate series for the anticipated Buffy Season 9. Buffy Season 9 and Angel & Faith are direct follow-ups to Season 8, while Spike and Willow are spinoffs from those two ongoing series.

Collected here are all four #1 issues, with all-new cover art by C. L. Bradley!

Coming in at 96 pages, this issue carries the low cover price of only $4.99!

Look for this at your local comic shop on January 23, 2013!

Meta Con has announced that Nicholas Brendon, the actor for Xander Harris in all seven seasons of Buffy the Vampire Slayer, will be appearing at Meta Con 2012 in Minneapolis. Meta Con is a three-day multi-genre comic convention that will bring together over 2,000 fans for a Labor Day weekend, August 31 – September 2, 2012, celebration at the Doubletree by Hilton in Bloomington, Minnesota.

Nicholas Brendon is best known to audiences as Xander on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, a role he played for the seven-year run of the show. His film credits include the cult favorite Psycho Beach Party, My Neighbor’s Secret for Lifetime, A Golden Christmas for Ion, Blood on the Highway, and The Portal.

He recurs on the hit CBS series Criminal Minds, has guest starred on the ABC drama Private Practice, and also starred on the Fox series Kitchen Confidential. In 2010, he launched the weekly webcomic Very Bad Koalas, with Steve Loter. Convention attendees will be able to attend Q&A sessions with Nicholas, and they will have the opportunity to get autographs and pictures with him.

Nicholas Brendon joins other guests including musicians Rumgumption, Possible Oscar, and YTCracker, television stars Nakia Burrise, Michael Copon, Jessica Rey and Jason Faunt, martial artist Samurai Dan, internet video stars LittleKuriboh and Linkara, and anime voice actor Todd Haberkorn. The full guest list can be found at metaconvention.com/guest

It was a gay ole time in comic book news… bad pun?  If you missed it, we had an awesome radio show last night, that’ll be up later today, along with so much more.

Around the Blogs:

ABC 6 – NY suit over ‘Spider-Man’ musical airs in court – Will this get as much coverage as all of the accidents?

Arts Beat – Lawyers in ‘Spider-Man’ Battle Spin Their Early Arguments – The answer is yes.

Bleeding Cool – And Finally… Okay, So This Must Be The First Mainstream Gay Kiss In Comics… – A nice chunk of history.

Bleeding Cool – So What Was The First Mainstream Gay Kiss In Comics Anyway? – This too.

The Mary Sue – Things We Saw Today: DC’s Newly Gay Character Looks Like Someone We’ve Met Before – Hmmm…

The Beat – Robert Downey Jr wanted Bill Murray to be in Iron Man – I wonder what for?

Bleeding Cool – Gay Comics Boom In Taiwan – This is the new marketing thing… like Obama was…

Around the Tubes Reviews:

CBR – Angel & Faith #10

CBR – Animal Man Annual #1

Comicsgirl – Avatar: The Last Airbender: The Promise Part 2

Sik Chic – The Battle Of Saragarhi: The Last Stand Of The 36th Sikh Regiment

Geeks 0f Doom – Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Season 8: Library Edition Volume 1 HC

IGN – Spider-Men #1

The Beat – Spider-Men #1

So did folks head to the comic shop yesterday?  What’d everyone get?

Around the Blogs:

Huffington Post – Paul Cornell Talks About His New Political Comic Book, Saucer Country – A great series, a definite buy!

Around the Tubes Reviews:

CBR – Buffy The Vampire Slayer: Season Nine #7

CBR – Glory #24

The Mary Sue – Womanthology: Heroic

The weekend is almost here… so soon!?  Here’s the latest news you might have missed.

Around the Blogs:

Kotaku – Real Life Gotham City Impostors Looks More Entertaining Than the Game – Wish I could of seen this in DC.

Around the Tubes Reviews:

CBR – Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 #6

Ely Standard – Modesty Blaise: Live Bait

The Fandom Post - One Model Nation

CBR – Severed #7

Complex – Review: “Severed”, One Of The Best Horror Comics In Years, Ends In Grisly Fashion

Official Press Release

BUFFY SEASON 9 GETS COLLECTED!

VOLUME 1 TO BE RELEASED IN AUGUST 2012!

December 2, MILWAUKIE, OR—Series creator Joss Whedon has teamed up with Andrew Chambliss (Dollhouse, ABC’s Once Upon a Time) and Season 8 artist Georges Jeanty for the life-affirming, world-changing Season 9 of the smash hit Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Dark Horse Comics is proud to announce the first collection of the season with Buffy the Vampire Slayer Season 9 Volume 1: Freefall!

Season 8 ended with a bang that cut the world off from magic—culminating in another set of world-ending problems. Buffy has left her best friend, Willow, powerless, and brought an end to a millennia-long tradition of superpowered girls. By day, Buffy is a twenty-something waitress with no real direction, and even though magic is gone, she’s still a vampire Slayer by night. Bigger problem? Vampires are becoming an epidemic . . . of zompires!

Written by series creator Joss Whedon and Andrew Chambliss of the CW’s The Vampire Diaries, Freefall collects Buffy Season 9 #1–#5! On sale August 1, 2012.

About Dark Horse Comics

Since 1986, Dark Horse Comics has proven to be a solid example of how integrity and innovation can help broaden a unique storytelling medium and establish a small, homegrown company as an industry giant. The company is known for the progressive and creator-friendly atmosphere it provides for writers and artists.  In addition to publishing comics from top talent like Frank Miller, Mike Mignola, Neil Gaiman, Gerard Way, Will Eisner, and best-selling prose author Janet Evanovich, Dark Horse has developed such successful characters as the Mask, Timecop, and the Occultist. Additionally, its highly successful line of comics and products based on popular properties includes Star Wars, Avatar: The Last Airbender, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Aliens, Conan the Barbarian, Mass Effect, Serenity, and Domo. Today, Dark Horse Comics is the largest independent comic-book publisher in the United States and is recognized as both an innovator in the cause of creator rights and the comics industry’s leading publisher of licensed material.

About Twentieth Century Fox Consumer Products

A recognized industry leader, Twentieth Century Fox Consumer Products licenses and markets properties worldwide on behalf of Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation, Twentieth Television and Fox Broadcasting Company, as well as third-party lines. The division is aligned with Twentieth Century Fox Television, one of the top suppliers of primetime entertainment programming to the broadcast networks.