Ender’s Shadow: Battle School will be Marvel’s follow-up adaptation of Orson Scott Card’s Ender’s Game series of books, debuting December 3. The first issue will have variant covers by Timothy Green III and Jim Cheung.

Written by Mike Carey (X-Men: Legacy) with art from newcomer Sebastian Fiumara, readers will be introduced to Bean, the only one student at Battle School smarter than the famous Ender Wiggin.  Born in an illegal genetic engineering laboratory, Bean grew up an orphan living off the brutal streets of Rotterdam.  Now, he’s been recruited to Battle School, where he’ll make new friends, new enemies, and embark on the adventure of a lifetime—saving the Earth.

Ender’s Game began as a short story in the August 1977 issue of Analog, expanded to a 1985 novel, which found an audience and spawned a series that has included Ender’s Game, A War of Gifts: An Ender Story, Ender’s Shadow, Shadow of the Hegemon, Shadow Puppets, Shadow of the Giant, Speaker for the Dead, Xenocide, and Children of the Mind.

Card has seen his series be embraced around the world and in 1991 he made modifications to the first novel in order to reflect changes in the real world.  The book has been recategorized as young adult fiction.

Check out the preview pages after the jump. (more…)

Coming November 5 will be the first issue of a three issue miniseries, Weapon X: First Class, which will explore the Weapon X program and how it turned Logan into Wolverine.  Writing this fresh take on the story will be Marc Sumerak, former assistant editor and currently one of Marvel’s fresh new voices.

CMix: Hey, Marc, nice to catch up with you.  Just how did you manage to transition from staff to fulltime freelance?

Marc Sumerak: I spent four exciting years on Marvel’s editorial team as Tom Brevoort’s Assistant Editor, working on some of my all-time favorite titles (including Avengers, Fantastic Four, Iron Man, Thor and more). But, as they say, all good things must come to an end… and for a number of reasons, I found myself leaving NYC and heading back to my hometown of Cleveland, OH.

At that point, I figured my career in the comic biz was pretty much over… but not long after the move, I was contacted by Marvel and asked to pitch a few ideas that I had been starting to develop right before I left staff. One of those ideas became my first series at Marvel: Guardians. That came out in July, 2004…and somehow I’ve managed to continue working in comics steadily ever since! Only now, I’m not the one enforcing the deadlines…I’m scrambling to meet them instead!

CMix: You seem to have concentrated on the lighter, brighter sections of the Marvel Universe such as the Power Pack miniseries.  What’s the appeal?

MS: I think it’s important to have a wide variety of titles available that appeal to different segments of our readership. My editors have seemed to think that I have a good grasp on "all-ages" material, so that’s been the overall focus of my body of work to date… and I definitely can’t complain about that. Working on Power Pack, Franklin Richards and the Marvel Adventures line has been a blast!

Like many of our readers, I discovered the joy of comics at a young age… and if something I’m writing brings that same feeling of wonder and excitement to one of today’s young readers, then it’s one of the greatest rewards I can imagine.

Without new readers coming in the door, the industry will eventually cease to be. So being able to provide material that a new generation can enjoy — and that parents can feel comfortable about giving their children — is an essential step towards strengthening our industry’s future. I couldn’t be more proud to be a part of that effort. 
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By now, many of you have picked up the new Incredible Hulk DVD or Blu-Ray and witnessed the newest take on the character in cinematic form.  Of course, there has also been the occasional video game tie-in, and this hero is no exception.  Let’s once again take a look back at the Jade Giant’s anthology of gaming…as green as it may be.

Questprobe 1: The Incredible Hulk – 1984, Commodore 64

The Hulk’s first foray into the video game world was…a text adventure.   Needless to say, it’s not very exciting or note worthy.  What IS noteworthy is the fact that this was supposed to be the second Hulk game; the first for the Atari 2600 was cancelled before release.  The next proper game wouldn’t be for another 10 years.

The Incredible Hulk – 1994 (Super NES, Sega Genesis, Sega Game Gear)

Dr. Banner’s next appearance in video games did little to strengthen the character’s status with fans, as we were treated with a bare bones brawler that made little to no sense for the comic’s history or tone.  Here, there was no “Hulk Smash” to be found…just Hulk Punch…everything.  Bad guy? Punch.  Wall?  Punch.  Controller?  PUNCH.  The game made big green move like he was walking through molasses dipped in tar, and for some bizarre reason, after a few hits, he’d turn into Banner and DIE.  Apparently, there is something stronger than the Hulk, and its name is shoddy game development. (more…)

I’m a chronic re-reader/re-player/re-watcher. Combine having a lousy memory with a love of the familiar, and you’ll find someone who loves re-reading old comics, re-playing his old collection of Super NES games, and re-watching TV shows of years past. This carries just as much with webcomics: I’ll discover a comic, read all the archives, keep up with it regularly, and periodically go back and read the archives again. It’s like a chunk of my comic collection that I can use to procrastinate at work.

Webcomic archives mean that there’s never a continuity lockout: You’re always able to go back and learn what came before. If DC doesn’t reprint a Martian Manhunter story from 1992 and I wasn’t reading comics at the time, then I’m totally lost when it gets referenced in Infinite Crisis. If Fred Gallagher wants to reference a previous storyline in Megatokyo, he can just put a link to it in that day’s news post and rest easy.

As an aside, a few comics make the most recent strip freely accessible, but make the archives pay-to-view. This model is okay for low-continuity gag-a-day or newspaper-type strips, but effectively locks out much of the new audience if you’re very storyline-focused. But then, if there’s no storyline, you don’t have the same desire to go back and read older strips. Garfield liking lasagna and hating Mondays gets old fast(err) if you read 200 of them in a day.

And oftentimes, even when the comic is finished, the archives will stay. Often, the author has another project in the works, so it contributes to his online presence and, as the occasional new reader discovers it or an old reader like me re-reads it, it might even bring in a little ad revenue or a few new book sales. The old comic, typically completed intentionally, rather than having faded out, is archived like a classic novel, available in its entirety. (Expect a few of these to show up in my Webcomics You Should Be Reading columns.) (more…)