One of the great comics from the Plane of Limbo, The Fabulous Killjoys is finally coming out this June, with a Free Comic Book Day preview. You may recall this collaboration between My Chemical Romance’s Gerard Way, writer Shaun Simon and artist Becky Cloonan is the print component of MCR’s 2010 SF concept album, Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys. Video’s for the album told the story of a bunch of heroic outlaws battling an evil Grant Morrison. Long delayed by Way’s hectic schedule, the book is finally coming out!
UPDATE: Comics Alliance has an interview with Way and editor Scott Allie about Killjoys and the next outing of the Umbrella Academy saga, Hotel Oblivion (Above)
GW: Yeah, that’s the greatest benefit of the break, which another thing about that break is important to point out is that we were recording an album. So it was weird because I guess the extracurricular activities I would do or the other stuff I was doing meant it really wasn’t a break at all. So that was difficult.
SA: And originally Killjoys was just a comic and then it was an album and a comic, but the album had to get done first. And now the comic is a completely different comic than it was going to be. The reason is that the Killjoys that he originally conceived is so different from the Killjoys that’s about to come out, because the album did a certain amount of what the original intent was. So there’s different characters and a whole different arc. The hiatus made it better, but it also transformed it into a whole different thing.
PR from publisher Dark Horse:
In 2009, when Dark Horse first announced a new project from Grammy-nominated frontman turned Eisner-winning comics writer Gerard Way (The Umbrella Academy), the response from music and comics fans alike was overwhelming. Now, Dark Horse is thrilled to announce that Gerard Way, Shaun Simon, and Becky Cloonan’s highly anticipated sci-fi epic will finally see publication in 2013!
Welcome to Battery City, where the disease is the cure!
In My Chemical Romance’s critically acclaimed album Danger Days: The True Lives of the Fabulous Killjoys, the Killjoys fought against the tyrannical megacorporation Better Living Industries. It cost them their lives, save for one—the mysterious Girl. Today, the followers of the original Killjoys languish in the desert while BLI systematically strips citizens of their individuality. As the fight for freedom fades, it’s left to the Girl to take up the mantle and bring down the fearsome BLI or else join the mindless ranks of Bat City!
“The original idea for the comic informed the record,” said Gerard Way. “The record helped refine the idea, and then Becky had done a drawing of the Girl for the single ‘The Only Hope for Me Is You’ and I saw it and thought, this is the comic. It’s basically the last video, it’s the last part of the Killjoys story, while at the same time being totally its own thing.”
“I think we have created a broad range of characters here,” said cowriter Shaun Simon. “A lonely teenage girl hiding from her past in the desert. A couple of android call girls wanting nothing more than to be together. An aging assassin with a secret that could destroy his life . . . Even though these characters are living in a bizarre sci-fi world, their struggles are the same we face in our own.”
“The world of the Killjoys is full of visual opposites—from sprawling deserts to urban junkyards—and a cast of characters to match,” said artist Becky Cloonan. “It’s been a challenge to encompass all of this in my art, but woven into the world building is a human spark that lights this story on fire and gives me so much to draw from.”
As announced at New York Comic Con, an early look into this world will be published as part of Free Comic Book Day 2013, with the first issue hitting stands the following month on June 6!
Dang… I forgot Cloonan was doing the art. Saw her at a con not that long ago and did not think to ask her about it. As if yhe comic didn’t sound great already.
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