Colonel Sanders Featured In Free Comic Book From Kentucky Fried Chicken

Demonstrating that geek is the new chic, Kentucky Fried Chicken has partnered with DC Comics to promote their restaurant chain at this week's 2015 New York Comic Con event by distributing a special one shot collectible comic book featuring Colonel Sanders.  In "The Colonel of Two Worlds" which is a parody of a classic FLASH story, the Colonel Sanders of our planet faces off against an evil Colonel Sanders from an alternate dimension.  When the evil doppelganger dressed in black attempts to both set up a criminal empire and market inferior fried chicken to KFC's, Colonel Sanders enlists the help of superheroes The Green Lantern and The Flash to help save the day and restore his tarnished image.  It's a comic book face off between a good and evil Colonel Sanders!  Who will prevail?  You'll have to read the comic book to find out!

Kentucky Fried Chicken will be distributing print editions of "The Colonel of Two Worlds" for free to attendees at New York Comic Con from October 8 through the 11th.  Can't make it to New York City?  Beginning October 8th, you can also view a free digital version of the comic book on the KFC website or download it via Comixology.

Yes this comic book is going to be cheesy but you have to give KFC some credit for being original and creative in marketing themselves to fans of the comic book culture.  Take a few moments to not take life too seriously and enjoy the geeky side of life by flipping through the pages of "The Colonel of Two Worlds."  I'm sure it will probably put a smile on your face.  Hmmm....I wonder if this comic book will be finger lickin good?!

A Celebration of the Caped Crusader - BATMAN DAY is Saturday September 26, 2015

Saturday, September 26th is BATMAN DAY where bookstores, comic shops, and other retailers will be celebrating this iconic character with fun promotional giveaways and special deals on Batman products.  Kids and kids-at-heart can also have some fun at home on BATMAN DAY too by enjoying these activity sheets, coloring pages, and mask cutouts from DC Comics:



If you are heading out on Saturday make sure to stop by a  comic shop, book store, or participating retailer to receive a FREE copy of BATMAN ENDGAME SPECIAL EDITION #1 with an 8-page preview of the upcoming BATMAN AND ROBIN ETERNAL.  Comic book stores will all have one cover for this free comic book but other retailers including Barnes & Noble, Best Buy, Books a Million, FYE, Gamestop, Hot Topics and Spencers will be handing out comics with exclusive variant covers.  Digital isn't being left out of the party either with free downloads, also featuring exclusive covers, being available from Apple iTunes, Comixology, Google Play and Nook.

BATMAN DAY partners include Warner Bros. Consumer Products with licensees Bendon, Capstone, Penguin Random House, Scholastic, and DK Publishing, as well as DC Collectibles, WaterTower Music, Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Warner Bros. Home Entertainment. Partners will provide unique retail and digital promotional tie-ins to celebrate the world-renowned Caped Crusader.

Signings and meet-and-greets with top Batman talent from DC Comics will also be taking place on BATMAN DAY including an all star line-up at Baltimore Comic-Con with Scott Snyder, Greg Pak, Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner, Peter Tomasi, Cully Hammer, and Klaus Janson. Additional BATMAN DAY signing events featuring comic book talent will take place around the United States and Canada include acclaimed artist and DC Entertainment Co-Publisher Jim Lee (Los Angeles), Greg Capullo (Guilderland, NY), Tom King (Baltimore), Paul Dini (Los Angeles), Tim Seeley (Chicago), Dan Jurgens (St. Paul), Brenden Fletcher (Toronto, ON), Sean Murphy (Brooklyn) Len Wein (Los Angeles), Chris Burnham (Burbank), Ray Fawkes (Toronto, ON), Pat Gleason (St. Paul), Brian Buccellato (Los Angeles), Kyle Higgins (Los Angeles), Matt Manning (Asheville, NC), Daniel Wallace (Eden Prarie, MN), with  more to be announced.

To help fans get in the spirit for #BATMANDAY the various DC Comics Facebook pages have been updated with themed banners.

But wait! take a closer look! In addition to their being a Batman logo on the banner could there be something else lurking in the shadows?

It's Batman!  They've added an image of the dark knight in the main banner of these nine Facebook pages as Easter eggs for fans to look for in a great caped crusader hunt:  Aquaman, Superman, Wonder Woman,  The Flash, Green Lantern, Justice League, Harley Quinn, Green Arrow, and Vertigo Comics.  Did you find all the hidden Batman images in the artwork?  Some are pretty easy to spot and others are really difficult.

As Robin would say Holy Armadillo Batman there sure is going to be a lot of Batmania going on September 26th!

Care Bears Roar Onto The Comic Scene

After a 25 year lapse, the Care Bears are returning to the pages of a comic book series.  Roar Comics, the young readers imprint of St. Louis-based publisher Lion Forge Comics, has announced it will be bringing the popular characters from the '80s back to life in their own comic book that will be debuting in a digital format this year and in print next year.  Readers will be able to download an app that will feature the new Care Bears series as digital single issues along with interactive educational content.  That will be followed up by a print collection of the digital issues that is scheduled to be available in May 2016.

The Care Bears series is being written by Georgia Ball (My Little Pony, Scooby Doo) with illustrations by Melanie Gillman (As the Crow Flies).  The publisher is promising that this new series will have the same emotion-driven cheerful adventure stories that first made the Care Bears franchise a global phenomenon in the 1980s.  Care Bears started as a line of greeting cards in 1981 and quickly became a smash hit children's entertainment franchise with a series of animated films and television cartoons along with a blockbuster-selling toy line.  The new comics will launch ahead of a new animated series, Care Bears & Cousins, set to debut on Netflix in 2016.

"The best thing about writing Care Bears is that each of the core characters has a distinct personality and a role to play that take them on exciting adventures to new places," writer Georgia Ball relayed to A Geek Daddy blog via email.  "I've worked with American Greetings on comic books before and loved every minute of it; I'm thrilled to be writing with them again on a property that was such a major part of my childhood.  Melanie Gillman's art is just terrific -- cheery and bright, just like Care-A-Lot itself. Kids are going to love it."

Roar Comics plans to provide more information on the new series plus release artwork samples  during the big Comic Con convention in San Diego.  The publisher also announced during the American Library Association's recent annual conference that the company's full catalog of e-book releases will be available via Follett's digital lending platform for access by library patrons across the country.  If you have a library card, you may want to check out what e-books and digital comics you may have access to.  I know that's a service our family doesn't take as much benefit from as we probably could.

"Getting comics into the hands of kids everywhere is crucial to Lion Forge's mission of making comics for everyone," Lion Forge CEO Dave Steward noted before attendees at the American Library Association's Annual Conference.  "We want our books - especially great new series like Care Bears - available to librarians and their patrons on any platform and medium they choose."

Those are words I like to hear!   Keep an eye out for more information about the Care Bears comic books as their app becomes available on digital platforms, the printed books hit retail shelves next year, and hopefully the digital and print versions will be available soon at your local public library.  I'm pretty sure a lot of children (and their parents who were kids in the 80s) are going to be excited by this new comic book series.

New Kids Focused Comic Books Roaring into Retail Stores in June

As a fan of comic books I want to share my interest in them with my kids, but as a parent I also have to be wary of exposing them to a lot of the mature themes and graphic content that are in a majority of today's publications.  There really are  a limited number of titles on the market that are suitable for children. I know because as a dad, I've been keeping an eye out for them.  Understanding that there is an under-served children's market and wanting to cultivate the next generation of comic book aficionados, Lions Forge, a digital first comics publisher, is launching a young readers imprint in June called ROAR.

Of course young readers don't have much money of their own, so Roar is being creative in luring parents to the titles by publishing comic books tied to television shows that us adults enjoyed when we were kids.  Roar is starting off with two titles based off popular sitcoms that any parent who grew up in the 80s and/or 90s would be familiar with, SAVED BY THE BELL and PUNKY BREWSTER.  The goal is that these comic books will feature stories that parents will relate to and feel comfortable with their children reading.

SAVED BY THE BELL is a modern reboot of the NBC teen sitcom written by Joelle Sellner (Teen Titans, Avengers: Earth's Mightiest Heroes) combined with expressive artwork by multiple Eisner Award-nominated Chynna Clugston (Blue Monday, Queen Bee) and Tim Fish (The Graphic Canon, Uncanny X-Men: Nation X).

PUNKY BREWSTER is based on the NBC primetime series about a homeless girl and her foster father making a brand new family that ran from 1984 through 1986.  It is also being scripted by Sellner and will feature artwork by upcoming talent Lesley Vamos.

Both series are currently available to read via purchasing digital issues online and through a partnership with IDW Publishing print editions of the comic books will begin to be available starting this summer.  The first printed issue of SAVED BY THE BELL will be available to pick up in June with the first issue of PUNKY BREWSTER hitting store shelves in July.  Both titles content is being developed through a licensing agreement with Universal Partnerships & Licensing.

"The comics industry has been increasingly supportive of all-ages comics in recent years, but we felt it was time to actually make comics for all young readers age groups," Lion Forge CEO David Steward stated in a press release sent to A Geek Daddy blog.  "We established Roar to reach preschool, middle grade, and young adult readers across sales channels, especially the school and library market, with a dedicated, high-quality effort.  There's just nothing like it right now, and I can't wait to see what everyone thinks of the books."

Transferring nostalgic television shows to comic book series isn't a new concept for Lions Forge, they have already adapted one of my favorite shows as a tween, AIRWOLF, as a comic book series as well as 80's hits KNIGHT RIDER and MIAMI VICE.  The Roar imprint though, headed by Senior Editor Adam Staffaroni, will have more of a kids focus then the rest of Lion Forge's lineup of publications.  In describing Roar, Staffaroni communicated "Every one of our comics is unique, with one thing in common: a highly kinetic style that's just as entertaining as all the TV shows and digital devices competing for kids' attention today."  He added, "They're even more fun, actually, because comics can activate a child's imagination in a way all those other media can't."

Roar plans to expand its comic book series throughout 2015 with digital and print releases of the series CRYSTAL CADETS along with new licensed titles featuring American Greetings Properties CARE BEARS, MADBALLS, and PACKAGES FROM THE PLANET X.

You can find the digital editions of Roar's SAVED BY THE BELL and PUNKY BREWSTER comic books online at Amazon (for Kindle) ComicsPlus, GoogleBooks, Apple iBooks and on the Lion Forge website.  Look for the print versions of Roar comic books to hit brick and mortar stores beginning this summer.

Forever Evil

What would a world dominated by super villains look like?  DC Comics approached this topic in its recent seven issue mini series Forever Evil.  The premise is that a crime syndicate has defeated the Justice League (which is DC Comics way of uniting all of its popular super heroes on one team similar to what the Avengers is to Marvel Comics) and is now working to establish its global rule over the Earth.  The twist to this scenario though is these villains are evil alternate versions of the Justice League from a parallel  dimension known as Earth-3 in the DC multiverse that have now arrived to dominate Earth-Prime.  There is Super Woman (Wonder Woman), Ultraman (Superman), Owlman (Batman), Deathstorm (Firestorm), Grid (Cyborg), Johnny Quick (The Flash), and Power Ring (The Green Lantern) who bring together all the super villains of this universe to join them to create an army they call the Secret Society.  As the story starts no one knows if the members of the Justice League are dead, captured or on the run, the world is just brutally made aware that they are now gone and a new era of Forever Evil has begun.  If you missed picking up the monthly issues of Forever Evil that started their run in September of last year and want to know what happens, don't despair because you can catch up with the whole story collected in one hardcover book that goes on sale this September.

Forever Evil was a huge cross-over event for DC Comics that was a primary focus for the publisher between Sept 2013 to May 2014 which was kick started with "Villain Month" last September featuring  the first issue of the Forever Evil mini-series plus numerous villain themed one-shot comic books (where the story is self-contained within that one issue and doesn't continue on into future issues) that had special 3D lenticular motion covers on the front of the title.  Plus there were Forever Evil story arcs contained within several of the DC Comics normal monthly publications including Justice League #24 - 29, Justice League of America #8-13 and Suicide Squad #24-29.  Following the release of the principal Forever Evil mini-series three other tie-in six issue mini-series were introduced titled: A.R.G.U.S., ROGUES REBELLION and ARKHAM WAR.  Note though only the seven issues of the initial Forever Evil mini-series are being reprinted in the hard cover publication being released on September 9, 2014.  CLICK HERE for more information.

Forever Evil does an exceptional job of playing out plots full of twists and pivots featuring the Criminal Syndicate members from the alternate dimension.  Lex Luther's role as planetary savior shows how villains are best when portrayed in shades of grey.  He starts off the series acting despicable and devious threatening to destroy someone who doesn't bend to his will and ends the series actually of all things saving Superman's life.  In between we witness Lex create a Bizaro Superman, kill the original Robin aka Dick Grayson aka Night Wing, and fight in a battle against of all people ... himself.  Forever Evil also leaves us with a cliff hanger as it concludes with Lex Luther gaining a little tidbit of information that could have big implications for future stories down the road...he learns that Batman is Bruce Wayne.  Lex really is the core character in this story and that aspect is one of the most enjoyable parts of reading it.  It is interesting how Luther really uses intellect and financial advantages to overpower people that have super powers.

This comic isn't for children as characters in it die, real deaths too not the ones where people are reincarnated a few issues later (aka Johnny Storm - The Human Torch, Peter Parker - The Amazing Spiderman, or Clark Kent - Superman).  These are graphic and brutal deaths too.  Power Ring has his arm chopped off and than is torched to a crisp.  Johnny Quick is frozen and shattered into pieces.  Another character has his heart heart pulled out of his chest.  One of my favorite scenes though is Lex Luther squashing one bad guy with his boot like a bug.  I'll admit enjoyed seeing evil villains getting taken down in the same vein as enjoying a horror flick but these absolutely aren't images I want my 5 year old twins flipping through.

While I was happy that one of my favorite villains Black Manta had a lot of involvement in the series, I was disappointed that most of the super villains gathered for the Secret Society really were treated as an after thought and not referred back to after the first issue.  It seemed DC Comics really dropped the ball on that aspect of the series.  I collected all of the Villain Month one-shot issues too and have to say that while the 3D covers were very impressive the stories on the inside were all pretty bad.  The focus of this min-series is on the alternate Justice League or as they call themselves the Criminal Syndicate, Lex Luther tackling this threat, and how the heroes of Justice League reappear.  Unfortunately, I have to say that the return of the Justice League is very anti-climatic.  Everyone reading this book obviously knows they are going to bring them back at some point but essentially the story wraps up and suddenly they just reappear.  After reading through this story I would have liked a little more meat and detail to that plot point.  To give DC some credit the super villains are much more focused on in the stories contained in the cross-over publications that I mentioned earlier that aren't being reprinted within this hardcover book though it would have been nice to have seen a greater role for them in the principal mini-series itself.

While I was critical of a few points, the story angles for the Crime Syndicate, Lex Luther ... oh and did I mention Batman and Catwoman happen to play a big part in this story too that help make things interesting but you'll have to read it to find out how...make for a good read.  If you didn't happen to read the original monthly issues of Forever Evil when they were on store comic book stands I'd recommend picking up a copy of the hard cover compilation to peruse.  It is an entertaining romp of a comic book adventure.

You can pickup the Forever Evil hardcover edition on Amazon.com , Barnes & Noble or by visiting your local comic book store. 

DISCLAIMER:  I received temporary access to a digital edition of this product to review.  I was not compensated for this post and my opinions and views are my own. DC Comics maintains the copyright of any picture used in this post which were used for the marketing of their product in this blog and they should not be reused without their expressed permission.