Grendel

Nice.

My other one is, and I was trying to narrow this down because this is such a deep and extensive saga, but this is one of the true... indie comic darlings, Grendel, Matt Wagner, sort of his magnum opus.

Now, I'm very partial to original flavor, Grendel, Hunter Rose, and then the Christine Spahr story, but this story is still continuing, and it goes thousands of years into the future, but I highly recommend the earlier parts of this saga.

And it's a true success story because this is a series that began with Comico, never really finished out.

And then he had a chance to just sort of redo it all.

So any of that stuff, pick it up.

But, yeah, if you can ever track down just to see what, you know, classic indie comics from the 80s, you know, evil Batman stuff.

Again, a key character in the comics because Comico and Grendel were the very first independent character and publishers to cross over with DC and Batman with that Grendel Batman, the first of those two.

Sure.

There's a new Grendel series from Dark Horse on the market right now.

It is, in fact, part two of a long four-part epic.

So each part of that epic is four issues long.

The second four issues come out this year.

The next four issues next year and the next four issues the year after that.

The collective title of that long epic is called Grendel Devil's Crucible.

And then each part of it has a subtitle.

But I bought them both when they were both being published by Dark Horse, because they originally started with other publishers.

One is Grendel by Matt Wagner, and then eventually John K. Schneider III does some of the art on there.

Grendel is one of those comics where don't fall in love with the characters too much, because...

Matt Wagner's going to flip it on its head completely.

And I didn't get into it until it was in Dark Horse.

Whenever I see Steve Root at a convention, I go up and talk to him about Nexus.

I recently got to interview Matt Wagner and John K. Scherner III.

Of course, a little bit of Grendel talk came into it.

overdone, you know,

when he said, Matt, when you said what you want to do, I thought Grendel, Mage, Batman.

That was the three things I thought you would probably throw at me.

And when you said Dracula, that's why I was surprised even more so because I'm going, it's not your own stuff.

So to be able to work with someone like that was the best thing ever.

And I didn't think I would get this.

I thought I had thought he would say, Hey, I got a Grendel story or I have a Batman thing.

And I was ready for that.

I read Dark Horse Presents.

Was Grendel Dark Horse?

Yeah, Grendel was Dark Horse.

That was, uh, right here.

Yeah, so I haven't read...

Oh, yes.

I'm glad I didn't try Concrete [laughs] when I was 10, 11, 12.

In the '90s when I was reading Sin City and Grendel and Hellboy, this would've been like, "What is happening? I don't like this." So I'm glad I f- I discovered it much, much, much, much, much later.

All right, great.

Yes, and so they can't find the Grendels.

Like, they were in pursuit of X-Teen and Prime, and they've escaped them.

Nice vehicle design.

Yep.

Then there's Grendel by Matt Wagner.

This one is particularly brutal.

It actually had a series order.

Matt Wagner is a big part of the appeal here.

You're getting the creator of Grendel and Mage, drawing Spidey and Wolverine in the early Ultimate Universe.

The whole series will become a rotating artist showcase with Bendis writing and different off-the-beaten-path artists coming on to handle different interpretations of the Marvel characters.

It's not a major key in the traditional sense, but it's one of the first attempts to expand the Ultimate Universe beyond Spidey and the X-Men.