Preview of Fatale #21, Out Today with an Early Review! - UPDATE: Catwoman Vol 3 Out Today.

The latest issue of Fatale is in stores today:  late last week, Comicosity and Comic Book Resources both posted a six-page preview, and it looks like an already uncanny comic is heading to even stranger waters.

The MacGuffin has an advance review, giving the issue a 9.5 out of 10 and saying that the "fantastic" series is losing no steam as it approaches its inevitable conclusion.

For those who don't keep up with Twitter, there have also been a few announcements worth repeating here.

• Sean Phillips has added a few hardcovers to his Amazon store, each copy coming with a gorgeous, hand-drawn sketch -- but the books are so heavy they're only shipping within the UK.
• The UK's Forbidden Planet is selling the first deluxe hardcover for Fatale with an exclusive mini-print signed by both Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips, which is available for pre-order online.
• Sean Phillips announced that, after twenty years, his Hellblazer collaboration with Paul Jenkins is being collected:  Comics Beat reports that John Constantine Hellblazer Volume 9 is due on October 21st, and Volume 10 is due on February 17, 2015.
• Steve Epting has provided the cover image to Velvet #6; part one of "The Secret Lives of Dead Men" is due on June 25th.
• Finally -- and most importantly -- Sean Phillips shares his controversial opinion, that Michael Jackson's Off The Wall is a "much better" album than Thriller.

We agree with Sean:  great minds and all.

UPDATE, 1:30 pm:  I completely forgot about this until I visited my local shop, but today also marks the release of Catwoman Volume 3: Under Pressure.  As we first reported in November, the book completes Ed Brubaker's run on the series, and it features art by Sean Phillips in issue #32.

It's a very good week for Brubaker-Phillips fans.

Fatale Deluxe Vol 1 and Velvet #4 Out Tomorrow.

Along with posting wicked artwork for Jess Nevins' essay on cults in the next issue, Sean Phillips retweeted a reminder from UK's OK Comics that Fatale's first deluxe hardcover is in stores tomorrow.

Selling for a retail price of $39.99, the book complements the deluxe editions of Criminal, Incognito, Sleeper, and Scene of the Crime; it collects the first ten issues of what will be a 24-issue run, and we reported last month that the book will be at least 312 pages.

Brubaker fans have another reason to visit their local retailers tomorrow:  Velvet #4, by Brubaker and Epting.  Comicosity and Comic Book Resources released the same 6-page preview late last week, and today Fanboy Comics released a very positive advance review.

(And, we missed it earlier, but Publishers Weekly notes that the first trade paperback collection of Velvet is planned for April.  Since the first arc's "shattering conclusion" is contained in Issue #5, due April 2nd, we assume that this first trade collects the first five issues.)