Tuesday, January 24, 2012

Mars Attacks Coming From IDW

Classic trading card property (and personal favorite) Mars Attacks is coming back to comics thanks to Topps and IDW.

Newsarama reports that writer John Layman and artist John McCrea will be launching a new ongoing Mars Attacks series as part of the original card series' 50th anniversary.

Long time readers will know that I am a big fan of the Mars Attacks cards and was even serializing it here for a while.  (I should pick that back up...).  As a kid, I was a big fan of Dinosaurs Attack!, and only when I was older did I learn the connection to Mars Attacks and get into those as well.  Besides the ongoing series, IDW evidently will also be collecting some older material, including the 1994 miniseries which I ate up back in the day.  That series was unique in that it presented two stories (with a flipbook format): one dealing with a modern day invasion of Earth, and the other set in the 1960's.  Also interesting is that while Keith Giffen wrote the modern story (with art by Charlie Adlard), he drew the nostalgia story (with Len Brown handling the writing chores).  For some reason a story about Martians invading the planet and causing violent mayhem seems a good fit for Keith Giffen.

One strange note is that the first issue will have 55 covers, one for each of the original cards.  Huh, I wonder if I will be able to pick which one I want?  There's a ton of choices but Watching From Mars has always made me laugh!

I only know John Layman from one title, but it's one which fills me with good feelings: Godzilla: Gangsters and Goliaths, also from IDW (and the subject of my latest episode of Earth Destruction Directive).  If he handles Mars Attacks with the same sort of gusto and panache which he brought to that miniseries, we should be in for a treat.  Artist John McCrea has a huge body of work, but I don't know if I have ever seen much of his stuff.  That having been said the preview image from the article looks pretty darn amazing, so there you go.

No date has been announced for the series, but I am sure IDW will hype the heck out of it (as is their custom) when it is solicited.  

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