When a mysterious new predictive artificial intelligence program appears responsible for assisting someone in the perfect murder, a pair of investigators must hunt down the killer by starting the FBI’s first AI crimes division.
The stories themselves range from historical accounts of protest movements, to tales from the current political climate, to allegories set in the near and distant future.
(Ages 4 years & up/Approx. Retail Price: $124.99/Available: 6/1/2023)
IT’S MORPHIN TIME! From Dino Fury back to the original Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, the Power Rangers have brought teamwork, action, and adventure to generations of fans. The legacy continues with figures, vehicles, collectibles, and roleplay toys from Hasbro, celebrating Ranger teams from nearly 30 years. Imagine all the action of Power Rangers with toys from Hasbro! Inspired by the MIGHTY MORPHIN ALIEN RANGERS, the 5-PACK ALIEN RANGERS 6-inch action figures have premium painted details and design inspired by the classic story arc — the Alien Rangers of Aquitar travel to Earth to protect the planet when the Earth Rangers lose their powers! The Alien Rangers 5-pack includes multiple character-inspired accessories, blast effects, and a second pair of hands. Look for other LIGHTNING COLLECTION figures and roleplay items. Additional products each sold separately. Available for pre-order on Amazon and Hasbro Pulse.
Hellboy: Web of Wyrd is a roguelite action adventure with an original story created in partnership with Dark Horse Comics and creator Mike Mignola.
Global video game publisher Good Shepherd Entertainment has revealed a new partnership to adapt series creator Mike Mignola’s Hellboy franchise, published by Dark Horse Comics. Developed by Upstream Arcade, Hellboy Web of Wyrd is in development for all major gaming consoles and PC. It features an original storyline crafted in collaboration with Mignola, as well as the renowned voice talents of Lance Reddick as Hellboy himself. Mignola has also designed the game’s unique key art.
Welcome to the Butterfly House, a mysterious manor of perverse angles and non-Euclidean geometry built by occultist Pasquale Deneveaux to open a gateway to the Wyrd, a vast, interdimensional web of wondrous and horrifying planes of existence beyond our world. When a B.P.R.D. agent vanishes inside the mansion, it’s up to Hellboy and his team of agents to uncover its forbidden secrets.
Journey into the deepest realms of the Wyrd, each hiding a unique investigation into the unknown. Battle powerful creatures in search of forgotten godforms and magnificent treasures, but beware: ancient evil festers within the Wyrd’s darkest reaches… evil that wants out.
In the game, players will experience gripping storytelling, visuals and atmosphere that evoke the distinct style of the original comics, crafted in collaboration with series creator Mike Mignola. Every moment looks and feels like it was ripped right from the comics. You’ll unravel a sprawling, spine-tingling original adventure true to the spirit of the comics and brought to life with the illustrious voice of Lance Reddick as Hellboy. Explore the secret depths of the Wyrd, discovering wonders and terrors beyond your imagination. Players will need to chain together hard-hitting melee and ranged attacks in challenging combat against a nightmarish menagerie of otherworldly monsters to survive.
Hellboy: Web of Wyrd is coming to steam, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S. It’s being developed by Upstream Arcade and published by Good Shepherd Entertainment.
BOOM! Studios has revealed the first look at the Eisner-nominated blockbuster fantasy Wynd: The Throne in the Sky #5, the final issue of the five-issue chapter in the acclaimed original series by Eisner Award-winning writer James Tynion IV and artist Michael Dialynas, the GLAAD Award-winning creative team behind The Woods, with letterer AndWorld Design, available on December 14, 2022.
The final battle is here as the Faerie army closes in! The kids seemingly have nowhere to escape, with Wynd in dire straits as he takes it upon himself to battle the Faerie General. What will it take to save the children, and more importantly, what role does Wynd’s blood play in all of this?
Wynd: The Throne in the Sky #5 features main and variant cover art by acclaimed series artist Dialynas, as well as variant cover art by acclaimed illustrators Martin Simmonds and Werther Dell’Edera.
Get your copy now! To find a comic shop near you, visit http://www.comicshoplocator.com or call 1-888-comicbook or digitally and online with the links below.
Yen Press provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site
Award-winning writer Jody Houser returns to pen an anthology of vibrant new stories woven into the larger tapestry of the hit Netflix series Stranger Things in Stranger Things: Tales From Hawkins! Joining Houser on her trip through Hawkins are artist Caio Filipe, Sunando C, Giorgia Gio Esposito colorist Dan Jackson, and letterer Nate Piekos.
On the surface, Hawkins, Indiana seems like the kind of town where nothing too out of the ordinary ever happens, but in the fall of ’83 it is anything but safe. In Issue #1 of Tales from Hawkins, two friends head out into the woods with their rifles and a six-pack. These would-be hunters find themselves the prey of a nightmarish beast who has claimed the wilderness around town and everything inside it, including them.
Stranger Things: Tales From Hawkins #1 (of four) will be in comic shops February 8, 2023. Artists Kyle Lambert, Diego Galindo, and Danny Luckert each contributed a variant cover for issue #1. All four variants are available for pre-order at your local comic shop.
This post contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links and make a purchase, we’ll receive a percentage of the sale. Graphic Policy does purchase items from this site. Making purchases through these links helps support the site
A bio-engineered laborer manufactured with the sole purpose of being worked to death in the seedy city underbelly…
Grab your absurdist lens! Announcing Junction Jones And The Corduroy Conspiracy, the all-new gritty pulp mystery series, written by TC Pescatore, with illustrations and cover by up-and-coming Argentinian artist Luciano Cruzado, and variant Covers by underground artist Patrick Sparrow and Ewan McLaughlin.
In the derelict slums of the multidimensional town of Junction, Mister Nibs and Junction Jones scour the dangerous alleyways in search of illicit organic material to sell off at the local black market chopshops and transmutation garages, until an anonymous tip leads them to the remains of a murdered Earth hobo. The evidence they uncover on the body points to a vast government cover-up, a conspiracy of which they’re now inexplicably at the center. Their first instinct? Run and hide! But a suspicious maintenance team that just so happens to arrive at the same time, looking for the same body, may hamper that. In the ensuing stand-off Jones decides the best option may be a joke; will it fall flat or land?
Fans of Moebius and the Hernandez brothers won’t want to miss this unique dystopian tale. Junction Jones And The Corduroy Conspiracy #1 is from Scout Comics hits shelves Feb. 22, 2023.
(W) Alyssa Wong (A) Martin Coccolo (CA) Martin Coccolo (VCA) Peach Momoko, Todd Nauck Parental Advisory In Shops: Dec 14, 2022 SRP: $3.99
EIGHT ARMS TO KILL YOU! Deadpool has less than 24 hours to kill Doctor Octopus if he wants into the most elite assassin alliance in the world. Can Doc Ock block a cocked glock? Or will he be filleted and slayed by Wade’s blades? And also?uh?what’s that thing hanging out of Wade’s chest?
Jed MacKay’s work on the Doctor Strange mythos has captivated readers over the past year and this March, a thrilling new chapter begins. Spinning out of the character’s terrifying demise in Death of Doctor Strange and Clea’s time as Sorcerer Supreme in Strange comes an all-new ongoing series for Stephen Strange where he’ll resume his duties as Marvel’s Master of the Mystic Arts!
This time around, MacKay will be joined by superstar artist Pasqual Ferry, known for his stylish work on recent titles like Namor: Conquered Shores and Spider-Man: Spider’s Shadow. These two talents have devised a grand plan for Doctor Strange centered around a shocking mystery that strikes at the very heart of Strange’s legacy and purpose. The journey that follows will harken back to the iconic hero’s psychedelic and otherworldly storytelling, taking readers to places only Strange would dare to go and introducing enemies only he could hope to defeat, including a brand-new threat that Strange shares a personal connection with. In honor of this new saga, Doctor Strange will be donning a revamped costume designed by the legendary Alex Ross, who will also be gracing the series with breathtaking covers!
Stephen Strange is back! Reunited with Clea and Wong, it’s back to business as usual for the Sorcerer Supreme. Have your children fallen into a deep nightmarish slumber? Are demonic refugees invading your home? Is your husband possessed by a satanic entity? Then call Doctor Strange! But when someone else begins to issue their own dark justice on Strange’s mightiest foes, Strange embarks on an interdimensional search for answers, only to discover the culprit may be closer to home than he thinks…
Enter a new reality alongside comic books’ greatest magical hero when Doctor Strange #1 hits stands in March!
Haunted ships aren’t exactly a new thing in the horror genre. They are, in essence, floating haunted houses made even more isolated, and perhaps crueler, by virtue of being placed miles away from land, thus making it pretty hard for anyone inside them to escape. It’s mostly the same idea behind stories that take place inside haunted spaceships or monster-infested cargo ships. There’s no escape, no one to really hear you scream, and no one to call for a quick save (all things that make movies like Alien and Event Horizon so utterly terrifying).
A floating prison ship that recruits inmates to work on the highly dangerous task of extracting ectoplasm from the ghosts that are being held in it, though, adds a few wrinkles to that old formula. There just aren’t a lot of these kind of ships in horror. This fact alone opens new doors into terror, and it is precisely what writer Cavan Scott and artist Nick Brokenshire decided bet on for their new IDW Originals series Dead Seas.
Dead Seas follows Gus, an inmate who is being flown into the prison ship Perdition to work on ectoplasmic collection, an entirely new field of work that’s still in its experimental phase. The world, one character explains early on, has been wrestling with a ghost problem for going on ten years, forcing a new status quo and new opportunities to exploit. Water, it’s been found, can hurt ghosts, a discovery that’s led to the capture and holding of spirits at sea to study the ooze they secrete and their potential medical benefits. Of course, it doesn’t take long for technical difficulties and human error to cut the experiment short and put every living soul on the ship on the path towards paranormal activity.
There are a few influences at play in the story, more as flavoring rather than dominating ingredients. Fans of the 2001 Thirteen Ghosts remake, for instance, might appreciate some of the ways in which Scott and Brokenshire present their ghosts and the vessels they’re trapped in. Spirits are found in short supply in Dead Seas #1, but what’s shown hints at an interest in exploring their more monstrous aspects (like those in the film I mentioned). These aren’t transparent outlines of deceased relatives or hazy visions of regular people. They’re nightmarish, things that look and feel dangerous, insidious, and tortured.
Ghosts are only as good as the people they haunt, though, and Dead Seas starts strong in this department. Scott and Brokenshire surround Gus with a cast of inmates and scientists with complex personalities, each carrying their personal histories on their bodies for all to see. Brokenshire’s character design does an excellent job of making each one feel like a unique person, with qualities both seen and unseen making it across in a very nuanced visual style.
Scott’s dialogue and carefully orchestrated exposition segments prioritize character work first. It’s the reason why issue #1 is lighter on ghosts, which isn’t a knock against it. Scott lets conversations play out as needed so that readers can get a good sense of their personas, especially as it pertains to their anxieties and fears. Every prisoner is there for a reason, mostly to get some benefit in exchange for their service as it pertains to their prison sentences. The stakes run high as the promise of freedom is dangled in from of them so they can overlook the risks and do the job.
One thing the first issue could’ve done a bit better with was pacing. Scott and Brokenshire do an admirable job of worldbuilding and character development, but it all happens fast. There’s barely any breathing room to process what we learn about Gus and Perdition’s ghost operation. The story is rich enough that I would appreciate a slower pace to savor the smaller details in it.
This complaint, however, does little to detract from this impressive and refreshing horror series debut. The promise of things to come is more than enough to warrant attention and further reading. It’s hard not to love stories that tinker with traditions and expectations within genre to arrive at something new. Dead Seas falls squarely on that category and I can’t wait to see what horrors await us in Perdition.
Writer: Cavan Scott Art: Nick Brokenshire Letter: Shawn Lee Story: 9.0 Art: 9.0 Overall: 9.0 Recommendation: Read, then research how much damage water can actually inflict on ghosts.
IDW Publishing provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
