May 16, 2018- CURSE WORDS #14, DAREDEVIL #602, POE DAMERON #27, POE DAMERON VOL. 4 TPB

Quite a week! Four big releases – obviously the latest installment of Curse Words, issue #14, hovers above all, casting its magically benevolent gaze down upon us, but I had some other great stuff out too: Daredevil #602, continuing the “Mayor Murdock” story, Poe Dameron #27 and the fourth collected edition of that series, “Legend Found.” Let’s chat about them, shall we?

WE SHALL.

First up, obviously, is Curse Words #14. Written by me, art by the undeniable Ryan Browne, colors by Addison Duke, letters by Crank! Cover A by Ryan, and Cover B by Daniel Warren Johnson, who’s pretty undeniable in his own right.

The issue here is part four of “The Hole Damned World,” the third arc of the series, and serves as the penultimate installment before the arc finale in #15 next month. Not the series finale, mind you – still plenty yet to come for Wizord and his pals.

By this point in the arc, I hope you’ve seen that the story we’re telling here is the paired search of parents for their children: Wizord and Ruby Stitch for Margaret in our world, and Jacques Zacques for his missing sons over in the Hole World. My primary challenge in this book is balancing the intense ludicrosity (pretty sure I made that word up, but I’m not going to look it up – I need to finish this post!) with emotional beats that feel true and earned. For me, the emotions parents feel for their children and vice versa are some of the strongest around, so it seemed like a natural.

Curse Words is a book about family, although it doesn’t reveal itself to be that until well into it. As I always say, “hook ‘em with the sorcerer battles, keep ‘em coming back with the family drama.” We actually have a bunch of fun announcements to make about this series – the fourth arc and other things we have cooking, but I’ll save them for a full-on “Latest News” post later.

Yes, I realize that I have been slacking a bit on that front, but honestly, The Oracle Year’s release has been pretty all-consuming. That said, all the PR and so on seems to have been paying off – the book has remained a strong seller since its release in early April, and great reviews keep pouring in. I’m actually off to Arizona on Wednesday for a huge author event at The Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale, and then Phoenix Comicon from Thursday-Sunday, which will include an appearance on Arizona PBS TV to talk about the book. So much going on – and I still have to write all the other books and so on in between! Busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy busy.

You can always keep up to date on where I’ll be for appearances, etc. here on the site on the Appearances page.

Now, let’s talk about Daredevil #602, part 2 of “Mayor Murdock.” Art by Mike S. Henderson, colors by Matt Milla, letters by Clayton Cowles.

This issue includes a number of scenes dealing with one of the great friendships in comics – Matt Murdock and Foggy Nelson. As I’m not the first person to point out, Matt’s not an ideal best friend for Foggy. He rarely seems to learn anything, and just has to go out and burn himself up while working to save New York City (and, occasionally, the world.) It drives Foggy nuts, because he loves Matt and doesn’t want to see him hurt – but at the same time I think he’s a bit in awe of him and the choices he makes. The secret to writing them, though, is to remember that Matt is not just a jerk who takes advantage. He’s just… extremely focused. A little blind, even – but he loves Foggy too. The thing is, all the energy Matt puts into saving the world, Foggy tries to put into saving Matt. It’s a neat relationship, and when you layer in Mayoral politics and ninjas and all sorts of other crazy stuff, it’s just a blast. I just did the letters pass on #604 today, which features the return of a character from earlier in my run. Can’t wait for you to see it – there’s great stuff on the way in Daredevil.

Poe Dameron #27, part two of “The Awakening,” continues the story of the Resistance set during both The Force Awakens and after The Last Jedi. It’s drawn by Angel Unzueta, colored by Arif Prianto and Rachelle Rosenberg, and lettered by Joe Caramagna, with a cover by Phil Noto.

If you’ve been reading this arc, you know that the framing device for the story is set on the Millennium Falcon after the conclusion of The Last Jedi, with Poe Dameron catching up with Finn, and getting to know Rey a little better. During their conversation, he’s telling them things they didn’t see or know about the story of The Force Awakens. For me, it was a chance to have my cake and eat it too – I was very worried that just re-telling the Episode VII stuff would be boring (after all, the movie was out years ago), but I think this framing device suddenly gives everything a new urgency, because it’s happening in a time when we really don’t know what will happen next.

The issue starts with one of my favorite moments in the whole series, a little beat between Chewbacca and Nien Nunb. I love finding unexpected connections in Star Wars – relationships you know must exist but weren’t given any screen time. Of course Chewie and Nien would know each other. They were both Heroes of the Rebellion, and they’ve got a very important ship in common. You didn’t see it in Episode VII or VIII, but you saw it in this comic, and that’s why they’re awesome to write.

The fourth collection of the series was out on May 16 as well – the “Legend Found” arc, which collects issues 19-25 as well as an Annual. They used the Annual for the cover, which is a lovely image, but I will say it’s a mild bummer that they didn’t use one of Phil Noto’s amazing images, just for consistency’s sake.

There was a point when “Legend Found” was supposed to conclude the series, and I think in some ways it reads like a great ending – but we got to move into the next arc thanks to the support of readers everywhere (the series continues to do very well and seems to have enormous support in trade readership and digital).

Next week (well, this week, as this goes up…) I HAVE NO BOOKS OUT. I can’t believe it. It’s been a long time since I had a null week. I’ll take it, though – with a bookstore appearance and a four-day con, any little reprieve I can get is nice. However, the Hunt for Wolverine continues, with the debut of the fourth mini in the hunt, the X-Men focused story Mystery in Madripoor, written by Jim Zub with art from Thony Silas. It’s super fun, sort of a sexy spy thing starring a number of women with various connections to Logan, romantic and otherwise. This week also saw Claws of A Killer begin, the horror story with a cast of Wolverine’s greatest villains trying to kill him before he comes back to life. It’s written by Mariko Tamaki and drawn by Butch Guice, and it’s super fun. With Mystery in Madripoor, you’ll have the first installment of all four minis out, so you can see the shape of the story beginning to come together. I hope you’re enjoying it – tons more to come, including a huge announcement that I just did some interviews for over at Marvel HQ earlier today. See you in a few weeks! (Or in Arizona, whichever’s first.)