It’s a new week and we’ve got lots coming at you. So strap in and get ready! We’re kicking off the week with some news and reviews from around the web in our morning roundup.
DC has announced new releases coming to store shelves in June.DC Pride is an 80-page anthology comic featuring LGBTQIA+ characters from across the DC Universe. Crush & Lobo is a new eight-issue miniseries written by Mariko Tamaki with art by Amancay Nahuelpan. Crush & Lobo will launch on June 1 and DC Pride will publish on June 8. DC will also publish a series of nine Pride-themed variant covers in June, showcasing DC’s top characters as realized by the comic book industry’s leading artists.
DC Pride #1 will feature LGBTQIA+ characters from all corners of DC’s ever-expanding Universe, including cameos by fan favorites Batwoman, Renee Montoya, Alan Scott, Midnighter, Apollo, Extraño, Poison Ivy, Harley Quinn, Constantine, and more. The DCPride creative teams, and the characters they’re developing stories for, are:
Batwoman (Kate Kane) by James Tynion IV & Trung Le Nguyen
Flash of Earth-11 (Jess Chambers) by Danny Lore & Lisa Sterle
Green Lantern (Alan Scott) & Obsidian by Sam Johns & Klaus Janson
Aqualad (Jackson Hyde) by Andrew Wheeler & Luciano Vecchio
Dreamer by Nicole Maines & Rachel Stott
Renee Montoya by Vita Ayala and Skylar Patridge
Pied Piper by Sina Grace, Ro Stein & Ted Brandt
Additionally, DC Pride #1 will include full-page profiles of DCTV’s LGBTQIA+ characters and the actors who play them, and fans of The CW’s Supergirl will be thrilled to see the first comic book appearance of Dreamer, a trans woman superhero, in a story written by actor Nicole Maines, who plays Nia Nal/Dreamer on Supergirl.
Rounding out the DC Pride anthology is a forward by Marc Andreyko (Love is Love), single-page pin-ups by artists Kris Anka, Sophie Campbell, Mildred Louis, Travis Moore, Nick Robles, and Kevin Wada, with more surprises to come! The DC Pride #1 cover is by Jim Lee, Scott Williams, and Tamra Bonvillain.
DC will also release a series of Pride themed variant covers showcasing DC’s leading characters through the month of June, giving fans the opportunity to purchase comics featuring covers with Batman, Harley, Ivy, Superman, Wonder Woman, and more, all by cutting-edge comic book artists!
Batman #109 Pride variant cover by Jen Bartel
Crush & Lobo #1 Pride variant cover by Yoshi Yoshitani
DC Pride #1 Pride variant cover by Jen Bartel
Harley Quinn #4 Pride variant cover by Kris Anka
Nightwing #81 Pride variant cover by Travis G. Moore
Superman #32 Pride variant cover by David Talaski
Teen Titans Academy #4 Pride variant cover by Stephen Byrne
Wonder Girl #2 Pride variant cover by Kevin Wada
Wonder Woman #774 Pride variant cover by Paulina Ganucheau
Crush & Lobo spins out of the pages of Teen Titans Academy, and will debut with a cover by Kris Anka, a Pride variant cover by Yoshi Yoshitani, a 1:25 ratio variant by Christian Ward, plus an exclusive Dan Hipp team variant for participating retailers. In this new eight-issue miniseries publishing between June 2021 and January 2022, Crush, daughter of the Czarnian bounty hunter Lobo, is in full-on self-destruct mode! After rage-quitting the Teen Titans and blowing up her relationship with her girlfriend Katie, Crush decides it’s time to finally confront her father in space jail and get her baggage sorted before she wrecks everything. Like father, like daughter?
DC will also publish GLAAD Media Award-nominated Suicide Squad: Bad Blood by Tom Taylor and Bruno Redondoon April 27, DC’s gothic LGBTQIA+ romance Poison Ivy: Thornsby Kody Keplinger and Sara Kipin on June 1, and Mariko Tamaki and Yoshi Yoshitani’s highly anticipated YA graphic novel,I Am Not Starfire, will publish on July 27 as part of the publisher’s overall Pride plans in 2021.Lois Lane by Greg Rucka and Mike Perkins, Far Sectorby N.K. Jemisin and Jamal Campbell andYou Brought Me The Ocean by Alex Sánchez and Julie Maroh have also been nominated for GLAAD Media Awards in 2021!
Just in time for Pride Month, DC has tapped acclaimed author Kody Keplinger and artist Sara Kipin to reimagine Poison Ivy—one of DC’s most popular antiheroes—in Poison Ivy: Thorns, a new teen romance with a gothic-horror twist.
There’s something unusual about Pamela Isley––the girl who hides behind her bright red hair. The girl who won’t let anyone inside to see what’s lurking behind the curtains. The girl who goes to extreme lengths to care for a few plants. Pamela Isley doesn’t trust other people, especially men. They always want something from her. Something she’s not willing to give.
When cute goth girl Alice Oh comes into Pamela’s life after an accident at the local park, she makes Pamela feel like pulling back the curtains and letting the sunshine in. But there are dark secrets deep within the Isley house. Secrets Pamela’s father has warned must remain hidden. Secrets that could turn deadly and destroy the one person who ever cared about Pamela, or as her mom preferred to call her…Ivy.
Will Pamela open herself up to the possibilities of love, or will she forever be transformed by the thorny vines of revenge?
Poison Ivy: Thorns marks both Keplinger and Kipin’s first graphic novel and first work with DC. It features colors by Jeremy Lawson and lettering by Steve Wands. The book is available to preorder now and hits stores everywhere books are sold on June 1, 2021.
