Several comics caught my eye the other day while looking over both Marvel’s and DC’s June solicitations available at Newsarama and CBR. The one got me excited is Fogtown, a story about a private eye who’s a repressed homosexual living in the 1950s. At Comic Con a couple years ago I stopped at artist Brad Rader’s table and he was working on drawing a page right then. Rader talked about the project in broad terms and showed a couple different pages to me. The project seemed pretty daring so knowing it’ll be available in a few months makes me happy.
Happy is not how I feel reading artist Mike S. Miller, controversial for his orthodox Christian view on homosexuality, attached to The Authority.
Most surprising is info about a second Rawhide Kid mini. Returning writer Ron Zimmerman is paired with Howard Chaykin. At least Johnny will be drawn as a hot redhead. What are the chances that Zimmerman has read up on homosexuality in American West cowboy culture? And $3.99 for a 32 paged comic? With a parental advisory warning? Really?
FOGTOWN HC
On sale AUGUST 4 • 176 pg, B&W, 5.5” x 8”, $19.99 US • MATURE READERS
Written by ANDERSEN GABRYCH • Art by BRAD RADER • Cover by LEE BERMEJO
New from Vertigo Crime! Frank Grissel is a hard-knuckled private eye – and a deeply closeted homosexual – set in the very real world of 1953 San Francisco. Aided by his long-suffering secretary (and sometime live-in lover) Loretta, Grissel’s search for a runaway girl winds up with his becoming a suspect in a string of gruesome murders. The case takes twists and turns through the Golden Gate’s greasy underbelly: the beguiling arms of a Chinese shipping heiress (and smuggler); an unexpected reunion with the daughter he abandoned long ago; the loss of Loretta to the sadistic clutches of the high-powered “Colonel”; and finally to the horrifying, gender-bending truth.
THE AUTHORITY #23
On sale JUNE 2 • 32 pg, FC, $2.99 US
Written by TOM TAYLOR • Art by MIKE S. MILLER • Cover by PHILIP TAN
With the onboard rebellions subdued and attacks from the stowaways repelled, The Authority can once again focus on the nature of their voyage. Is the Carrier leading them to its home – or does it have some other, more sinister agenda? While passing through a vast graveyard of discarded spacecraft, the latest Century Baby detects a faint sign of life. The High goes off on a rescue mission, but what he brings back on board eclipses any danger they’ve faced so far.
THE RAWHIDE KID #1 (of 4)
Written by RON ZIMMERMAN • Penciled by HOWARD CHAYKIN • Cover by JOHN CASSADAY
32 pg Parental Advisory $3.99
“TOMBSTONE BLUES”
The best-dressed gunslinger the Wild West ever knew is back in the saddle again — and this time, he’s riding with a posse! That’s right, pardners, it’s a brand new rip-roaring adventure of the Rawhide Kid! When Wyatt and Morgan Earp are taken hostage by Cristo Pike and his pack of pistoleros, Rawhide has no choice but to put together a posse of the greatest western heroes in the Marvel Universe — to rescue the Earp brothers and bring Pike to justice. Enter: Kid Colt, Doc Holliday, Annie Oakley, Billy the Kid, Red Wolf and the most overrated gun in the West: The Two-Gun Kid! We guarantee the Wild West can’t get any wilder.
