COMIC-CON INTERNATIONAL: VERTIGO PANEL

By Ernie Estrella

SAN DIEGO -- The massive Vertigo Panel had a fleet of creators and announcements Friday afternoon at Comic-Con International.

In attendance were Karen Berger (Vertigo Senior Editor), Shelly Bond (Group Editor), Jonathan Vankin (Editor), Will Dennis (Editor), Jason Aaron (Writer, Scalped), Tony Akins (Artist, Jack of Fables) Brian Azzarello (Writer, 100 Bullets) Mark Buckingham (Artist, Fables) Mike Carey (Writer, Faker), Josh Dysart (Unknown Soldier) David Lapham (Silverfish), Simon Oliver (Writer, Exterminators), Matt Wagner (Writer, Madame Xanadu), Steven T. Seagle (Writer, American Virgin), Matt Sturges (Writer, Jack of Fables), G. Willow Wilson (Writer, Cairo), Bill Willingham (Writer, Fables), Brian Wood (Writer, DMZ)

Following are highlights:

* The Unknown Soldier is a new monthly in the works and will be written by Josh Dysart (Violent Messiahs, Swamp Thing). Dysart explains the latest take, one that is powerful and raises awareness of the situation in East Africa.

"It will take place in 2002 when the Ugandan government is fighting the Lord's Resistance Army. That conflict is now 20 years old and remains the least-reported humanitarian conflict by the global media. It's time to update the Unknown Soldier and what better place than Central East Africa which is the biggest unknown place to us in the west. 1.9 million displaced human beings and 25,000 kidnapped children, it's time they got one soldier."

"It starts with a man accepting an award for being a pacifist and activist for peace and winds up killing a man at the end, and that's how we start the unknown soldier."

Dysart actually travelled to Uganda to conduct research for the book.

*Brian Wood's latest ongoing series, Northlanders hits stands this December. Berger jokingly described the book as a story about "Hipster Vikings."

Wood shares, "It seems like a departure for me and Vertigo but it's right in line even though it's 1000 years in the past. Each story arc will last for eight issues and then a new penciler is rotated in. Davide Gianfelice will illustrate the first arc. This seems like a departure for me and Vertigo but this is my type of book!"

* As John Constantine closes in on his 20th anniversary in 2008, the original graphic novel Hellblazer: Pandemonium finds John in Iraq looking for a supernatural presence that no one can trap and it turns out that it's an old demon friend of John's. Jamie Delano is writing the book with art by Jock (Losers, Faker). Berger said, "It's politically powerful story and a wonderful piece of work. Look for that next November."

* Madame Xanadu which was first announced in the Matt Wagner panel when he signed on to write the series with Amy Radley (Tokyo Pop Fool's Gold) that will come out in March.

"It's a very unusual project because it was suggested to me," said Wagner "I've always generated my own work so my brother-in-arms, Vertigo editor, Bob Schreck tried to hook me up with Amy for quite some time. It's a century-spanning gothic romance.

Berger said, "We come to find out why she's named Madame Xanadu!"

This fall the Vinyl Underground lifts the rug up for readers to see into the British sub-culture as we meet a group of Cult Detectives, living in the underground, and listening to a bunch of music. Si Spencer will write the book, newcomer Simon Gane and Cameron Stewart will provide the art.

*The Un-Men is written by John Whalen and drawn by Mike Hawthorne. Tomer Hanuka will provide covers.

Whalen described the characters as "synthetic men that are partially undead, partially stiched together from living parts."

"The version I'm going for is like the American Freak mini-series of the 1990's. They were granted reservation of land in desert on the former site of a nuclear testing ground. Flash forward to fifteen years and it's become something like Las Vegas, Disneyland, and Mutant central becoming a huge touring attraction."

Berger said it is starts as a romance story between an Albino detective named Kilcrop and an un-woman, Nico who is winged and has only has one arm.

Berger added, "It's very much like Freak Noir. I fell in love with a novel that I required each Vertigo editor and writer to read and that's Geek Love by Katherine Dunn, and the Un-Men is Vertigo's version of Geek Love.

*The House of Mystery is a new monthly book written by Bill Willingham and Matt Sturges (Jack of Fables). Art is provided by Luca Rossi.

Willingham explained the premise of the story. "There's this house that's owned by Cain of Cain and Abel fame. One day walking home from his brother's house, he finds out that someone has kidnapped his house and becomes a bar and restarurant. The exchange of stories are the medium of exchange for paying for one's bar tabs."

It's not an anthology title.

* David Lapham talked about his recently released hardcover, Silverfish. "It's my Hitchcock-ian killer starring a girl who hates her step-mom and digs into her past. My favorite part was to build suspense. for 110 pages and 45 pages of finale where all the blood comes out.

* One of the more anticipated graphic novels is a memoir written by Percy Carey and Ron Wimberly called Sentences.

Sentences is the true life of indy rapper M.F. Grimm, on how he began as a child actor on Sesame Street, got shot and paralyzed, dealt drugs, got thrown in jail and how he turned his life around.

Berger said that this is his life story. It's very visceral and raw. The hardcover will be on sale in September.

* Cairo is the original graphic novel by G. Willow Wilson and M.K. Perker Wilson said that five different characters in the same city are drawn together by a genie. It's structured a lot like 1001 Arabian Knights and it's a storytelling method that has not been seen very much. The hardcover will be on sale in November.

*The Alcoholic is an original graphic novel by Jonathan Ames with art by Dean Haspiel (American Splendor)

* Incognegro is an original graphic novel by novelist, Mat Johnson that is sure to be provocative as noir based true tales of undercover race spying in the Jim Crow South.

* Vertigo is re-releasing the Stardust hardcover.

* Absolute Sandman Volume Two with the same deluxe treatment hits the streets this November.

* Horror novelist Peter Straub is writing a thrilling, horrific serial killer tale called the Green Woman painted by John Bolton.

* Vertigo is working to tell the story of Neil Young's Greendale in comic form. Josh Dysart is writing that project. It takes place in 2003 in Greendale, CA and is about a woman who finds her place as an activist. It's a blend of surrealistic Vertigo, my aesthetic and Neil Young.

Other answers to questions asked to the panel:

* Lapham there will be more Stray Bullets but life takes you places. There's one more issue out in the current story but there's a lot of back story to tell but he is busy with Vertigo work.

* Garth Ennis is working closely with the HBO team who is bring Preacher to TV.

* Death is on the rise again with Neil Gaiman writing a script.

* DMZ will end but a number has not been determined.

* Matt Wagner said that the Grendel movie was originally going to be about Christine Spar but the the box office failure of superheroines leaned the studios towards focusing on Hunter Rose's story instead.