Bullets: KOBK Reprints and Screen Print, Velvet Volume 3, and Deluxe Details for The Fade Out!

We're summarizing highlights from a few sources:  the back matter of the latest issue of Kill Or Be Killed ("The Secret Ingredient"), the Twitter feeds of Brubaker and Phillips, Sean Phillips' official blog, and Ed Brubaker's email newsletter: we mentioned the 9/6 installment in our previous post, and another newsletter has already been sent out since then, on 9/14. 

If you're not keeping an eye on these sources yourself, you're missing out on things like additional art previews, updates on Sean's Big Cartel store, and Brubaker's recommendations on books and TV shows.

• Kill Or Be Killed, Going Back to Print Again.  Image Comics has the official announcement, that the first two issues of KOBK will see additional printings as the "body count rises."

These additional printings will be available alongside the latest issue, all on October 12th.

• KOBK #1, Third Printing
• KOBK #2, Second Printing
• KOBK #3

The announcement includes cover art for the printings, which are color variations of earlier printings.

• Kill Or Be Killed Screen Print.  With help from Ben Dodge, Sean Phillips has created a limited-edition screen print for Kill Or Be Killed. The five-color, hand-pulled art measures just over 20-by-27 inches, and a variant was created exclusively for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival in Kendal, England, on October 14-16. 

Very limited quantities of both versions are now available for pre-order in Sean's online store, and just yesterday Sean lowered the price for the artwork.

• Velvet Volume 3, In Stores Now.   Today sees the release of the third trade paperback collection for the retro spy comic by Ed Brubaker, Steve Epting, and Bettie Breitweiser.  In his 9/6 newsletter, Brubaker describes the three arcs as "one long novel, really, and while it's a complicated mystery with a lot of tangents, the answers are there for anyone looking, I promise."

Brubaker suggests, "please buy a copy for your dad, who likes spy stories and doesn't understand why you read comics."

(And he also mentions that the story was almost sold to television before it became a comic book, and he treats readers to a TV Guide mock-up that was part of the pitch presentation.  We'll let readers see the image at the archived newsletter.)

• Details on The Fade Out Deluxe Edition.  Finally, in the back of KOBK #2, Brubaker gives us quite a few details on the forthcoming deluxe edition of The Fade Out.

The Deluxe Edition collects the entire serialized graphic novel in one beautiful edition.  I even went through the book and made some minor tweaks here and there, so I'm considering this the definitive version of the story.  And on the bonus content side, this is probably our biggest one yet.  We've got over 50 pages of extra content -- covers, articles, process stuff about the art and research.  We've been doing these hardbacks a while now, and we put out some of the nicest ones on the market, but I think Sean outdid himself with the design and extra content this time.  So, be sure to tell your retailer if you want one.

We're even more eagerly looking forward to this release, due on the same day as the three KOBK printings, October 12th.

Kill Or Be Killed #2 Preview Online, In Stores Tomorrow with #1 2nd Printing and Criminal Volume 7!

As we mentioned in our last post, there are quite a few books due this week from Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips:

• Kill Or Be Killed #1, 2nd printing
• Kill Or Be Killed #2
• Criminal Volume 7 TPB: "Wrong Time, Wrong Place"

London's Mega City Comics asks the right question on Twitter, "With this much Brubaker & Phillips out tomorrow, how will we afford anything else!?"  We're perhaps the most excited for the new issue of KOBK, as we hope to see how it expands on the series' unexpected premise.

A five-page preview is now available at Image Comics' website -- and in higher quality in Brubaker's just-published newsletter (about which, more soon) -- and it looks like we're in for more moody scenes of NYC in winter.

And there's more rambling dialogue from our potentially unreliable narrator.

Kill Or Be Killed #2 detail, From the Desk of Ed Brubaker

All three books are in stores tomorrow.

Bullets: UNDERTOW PODCAST #4, Brubaker Essay, Solicts, and More!

It's September already!  Let's kick things off with a few brief items.

• UNDERTOW PODCAST, New Episode Now Online.  Our latest episode of The Undertow Podcast is now available on iTunes and Podbean.  Robert and I have a very interesting discussion following the debut of Kill Or Be Killed, talking about its unexpected premise and where the new series may be going next.

We hope our readers here enjoy listening as much as we enjoyed recording it.

• Ed Brubaker in This Week's Image+.  We've been digging the inexpensive magazine Image+ since its May debut.  The second issue featured a cover story on Kill or Be Killed, and there was a pleasant surprise in the latest issue.  Out yesterday with a November cover date, issue #5 features a two-page "Industry Perspectives" essay by Ed Brubaker.  On Matt Fraction's suggestion, Brubaker penned an open letter to a younger version of himself, at the beginning of his career.

The entire thing is worth reading for its perspective on the last couple decades on comics, and it touches on creator-rights issues that Brubaker has been covering in his email newsletter, but there's also the more general word of wisdom that became the article's pull quote:  "Sorry, but your career doesn't go the way you thought it would (turns out almost no one's does)."

Ed adds, "you're happier, if it's any consolation."

• Kill Or Be Killed Keeps Rolling in November.  Image Comics' November solicitations came out early last week, Newsarama has the complete listing online, and Sean Phillips reposted the details for KOBK #4 -- "The shocking end to the first arc, as Dylan's secret collides with his home life."

The 40-page issue is scheduled for a November 16th release.

• More Details on Upcoming books.  We're eagerly anticipating October's deluxe edition of The Fade Out, and Ed Brubaker has shared some details on Twitter as the book went to print last week.

Brubaker describes the book as "the nicest hardback we've ever done."  We had guessed at least 30 pages of extra content, but the 400-page book contains more than 50 pages of bonus content, including research, production essays by Phillips and Breitweiser, and two of the bonus articles from the monthly issues.  Readers "keep asking" about these articles, but it's long been the creators' practice to reward those who support their projects by specifically buying the monthly issues.

Also on Twitter, Brubaker does mention that "you never know" about an eventual return of Incognito:  the film rights were sold to Fox in 2010, and a film adaptation is apparently still in development.

And on the subject of films, Sean Phillips recently highlighted a high-resolution version of the cover artwork for The Hired Hand, a 1971 western directed by Peter Fonda, out on Blu-ray and DVD this November from Arrow Films.  The dual-format release includes a "Reversible sleeve featuring original and newly commissioned artwork by Sean Phillips."

A little closer on the horizon, Phillips' Twitter feed confirms a few arrivals for next week:

• Kill Or Be Killed #1, 2nd printing
• Kill Or Be Killed #2
• Criminal Volume 7 TPB: "Wrong Time, Wrong Place"

(A photo of his comp copies, reprinted above, confirms the title's comma, which was missing from the solicited cover art.)

We haven't seen any extended previews of KOBK #2 online yet, but this week, on his blog, Sean Phillips posted a single panel in-progress, evidently from page 8.

He writes, "This is probably my favourite panel from this issue, Bettie did such a beautiful colour job here..."

We can't wait to see more!