Earlier this year, Boom! Studios announced a new partnership with Stan Lee's POW! Entertainment to launch a new line of heroes for Boom!. The identities of these new characters are now revealed in one of the first announcements out of SDCC 2010. While Stan is credited with generating the concepts for these heroes, each title will be handed off to a different creative team. And their names ought to sound familiar.
Here's a look at the lineup that Stan introduced in San Diego:
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Here's the rundown from Boom! Studios:
SOLDIER ZERO, written by DOCTOR WHO and ACTION COMICS scribe Paul Cornell with art by SUPERMAN artist Javier Pina, tells the story of a wheelchair-bound astronomy teacher who finds himself in a freak accident that bonds him with an alien weapon of war.
THE TRAVELER, written by Eisner Award-nominee and BOOM! Studios Chief Creative Officer Mark Waid with art by AMAZING SPIDER-MAN artist Chad Hardin, features a mysterious new superhero with time-traveling powers battling the Split-Second Men, super-powered assassins from the future.
STARBORN, written by iZOMBIE's Chris Roberson with art by THE X-MEN's Khary Randolph, tells the story of a regular guy who discovers he's the heir to an intergalactic empire, putting him the center of a war between five alien races.
Each of these sound like potential hits, if only because of the writers involved. Perhaps most exciting is the prospect of new original series from Paul Cornell. Stan's name is up top, but theseought to operate like creator-owned series for all the teams involved. If writers like Cornell, Roberson, and Waid can innovate within the confines of big two continuity, imagine what they can do with these characters. Are these the next Invincible and Irredeemable? Definitely worth a look.
Soldier Zero debuts in October, with The Traveler and Starborn following in November and December respectively.
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"these ought to operate like creator-owned series"
why make this assumption?
That Paul Cornell one sounds awesome. Picking that one up for sure.
Didn’t Paul Cornell sign exclusively with DC?
Starborn and Soldier Zero. Done.
Soldier Zero sounds like the best one to me. The Traveler might be ok too…
Out of the three, only Cornell one sounds interesting. I’m talking about trade wait though.
I feel bad though because I haven’t heard of any of these artists. Even when they state
where they’ve worked on before.
While I like the writers involved here, I’m much not sure I want to shell out $4 an issue on unknown artists. Boom! seems to cut corners when it comes to the art chores. I dropped Incorruptible because the artwork was simply not worth the cover price. Even at discount. I might pick up the first trades though.
@nickmaynard – They’re new characters that exist in their own continuity. Stan came up with the concepts or parts of them, and it would seem that the creative teams get to run with them from there. I’m not talking about legal nonsense, just the freedom from continuity and the ability to establish new worlds and characters. It’s not a huge leap to look at it that way.
@paul – i see what you mean and yeah, it’s not a huge leap, i agree. but i wonder how much they’ll be allowed to "run with them" though. stan / boom may be providing plots or the writers might have to get stan’s approval before doing future arcs, etc.
but man, i can’t believe stan is STILL pumping out material. what an inspiration, seriously.
Soldier Zero actually looks pretty cool.
New Stan Lee characters? I’m in. Hopefully they’re all good. MAybe not actually, cuz now I have even more comics for my pull list when I can barely afford the ones I have now.
hmmm this likely means that by year’s end Boom will be nearly half of my pull list all three titles sound really promising and I tend to like everything I’ve read (or seen in the case of Paul Cornell) from each of the writers. I haven’t yet added Paul’s DC work to my pull lists, mostly because I haven’t gotten much into either of the big 2’s continuities… but I admit to being tempted simply because of his involvement.
Great move by Boom! Though I’m a bit puzzled, I thought Paul Cornell was "exclusive" to DC?
This was the only carve out in Paul’s exclusive. He told them he had a chance to work with Stan and DC said okay.
Rycaut – Half your pull list? Man, can we clone you?
Best,
Chip
BOOM!
btw, on the art teams…. well, if you don’t know Javier Pina, Chad Hardin and Khary Randolph today, theirs will be household names very shortly.
Surf these pages and weep:
Pina – http://gallery.me.com/davmacho#100077&bgcolor=black&view=mosaic&sel=0
Hardin – http://hardinartstudios.blogspot.com/
Randolph – http://www.kharupt.com/images/art/comics/MU2099001002.jpg
Chip
BOOM!