[Ed. note–some SPOILERS below, although pretty mild unless you’ve really been out of the Cap loop for the last two years.]

Writer Ed Brubaker really knows how to stretch out a story.

His propensity to tell long yarns is evident in comics like Daredevil — where he dangles plots and character beats over the course of several storylines — but it’s on full display in the pages of Captain America.

Cap, under Brubaker’s guiding hand, has essentially consisted of one adventure that’s taken four years to tell. The comic seems like a throwback book in this day of six-part arcs created for the express purpose of later publishing a trade paperback.

For avid readers, Brubaker’s approach is the ultimate form of serialized fiction. He gives an audience the necessary time and space to really know, understand and care about the characters — good guys and bad guys. For casual readers, however, this approach can lead to stories that seem to move too slowly.
But in Brubaker’s defense, Captain America is not “padded” in the least (like the old Bill Jemas days). Each issue serves up significant character moments, contains elements that keep the story going and offers enough nuggets to satisfy dedicated members of the audience.

On top of that, when I read Cap I get the feeling that we’re going somewhere — that we’re not on some endless ride leading to a dead end (so, no crap like a third Summer’s brother or anything like that).

The first sign of forward progression in the pages of Captain America was the reintroduction of Bucky Barnes. That was a BIG deal. The second sign was the murder of Steve Rogers. That was also a BIG deal — made even bigger because the guy has remained a corpse for a few years. The third sign was the introduction of the new Captain America (aka Bucky). Now, judging from some new ads I’ve seen in the pages of Marvel books, it looks like another chapter in this ongoing saga MAY be coming to a close.

And knowing Brubaker, that ending will undoubtedly lead to a new beginning.

Check out our pal Tommy Lee Edwards, who beyond being an amazing AMAZING artist on comics like Marvel: 1985 and more, is also a bigtime illustrator who’s worked for Lucasfilm among a ton of other high-profile clients. Tommy Lee is once more participating in the Ride For Kids program this year, which benefits the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation. We love Tommy Lee and hope you can help, or pass this along to help get the word out. From TL’s e-mail:

“Giving my time as a motorcyclist is my way of showing support for those families battling every day with childhood brain tumors.

Last year, hundreds of North Carolina bikers and I traveled the Triangle area and contributed to a national fundraising total of $4.5 million. With generous donations from friends and family, I was able to personally deliver $9,350. This total earned me the title of “Champion Fundraiser”. Along with that honor, I will be leading this year’s ride as we strive to beat the 2008 total and get even closer to a cure.

The 2009 Ride for Kids is next weekend, May 3rd, and the Pediatric Brain Tumor Foundation needs your help.

DONATE NOW to sponsor my ride
http://www.firstgiving.com/edwardsillustration

Our primary source of donations in 2008 came from teaming up with Lucasfilm. We shipped a limited-edition Star Wars print, illustrated and signed by me, to anyone donating a minimum of $30. I’ve been unable to gather the resources in time to offer the same incentive for donors this year, but have planted seeds for 2010.

For this year, I’ve decided to go for a wild blitz-week of fundraising. We have one week to raise as much as possible. The cut-off is May 1st. So if you can, please donate today.

You can visit my firstgiving website to make a donation. Donating through this site is simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to make a contribution to our fundraising efforts. Large or small, anything helps. And please don’t feel any pressure to donate at all. Many of you may not be in a position to do so, or chose to put your funds toward a separate charity.”

Holy cow, Free Comic Book Day is just a week from Saturday! Jeez-O-Man, and Shelton is firing up his big party machine. Since my last FCBD post, we’ve added Sonic penciller and colorist Matt Herms, as well as amazing Secret Invasion and Astonishing X-Men colorist Laura Martin! (My bad, Cully wrote me to say she’s not going to be able to make it, and I totally forgot. But she’ll be at HeroesCon in June!) Not to mention the ridiculous guest list you can see in the image above.

To review: there’ll be between 20-25 different comics we’ll be giving away while supplies last (we always order a TON, but some things sell out before others). We’ll open our doors at 10am, so come early and stay late. The signing/sketching/kibbutzing jamboree will start around 1pm, and got until 5. Although Brian Stelfreeze is always sketching like an extra hour after everyone else is done. Don’t miss out on this totally FREE event!

Whoa, two whole days this week without an update to the HeroesCon 09 Guest List? What gives?! Relax, relax… we’ve been dotting some other I’s and crossing some other T’s–one T in particular that finally got crossed this week was that we are now at last Twittering. So if you want the latest HeroesCon news in little 140-character or less bursts, feel free to begin following us!

A tweet I’ll be twittering in just a moment is today’s Guest List update, including more of our HeroesCon “family” members. This is really turning into one of our best ever Guest Lists, too, with peeps from all over the comics industry. Witness:

CHRIS BRUNNER just gets better every year, especially now that he lives around the corner from our store and we get to see him all the time. YOU may have seen him in the pages of Gotham Central, Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight, The Ride, or one of a billion trading cards. Don’t miss his upcoming book Loose Ends from our buddies at 12 Gauge Comics, created with Jason Latour–that reminds me, I need to get Jason added to this fershlugginer list.

RICHARD CASE is one of our oldest friends, although he’s not all that old. Although he’s a quiet guy, he packs a lot of mojo into his drawing hand, with past work on Grant Morrison‘s now-classic Doom Patrol run, Sandman, and inking over the late great Mike Wieringo on Sensational Spider-Man. These days Rich is a concept artist at Red Storm Entertainment.

JOHN FLOYD has worked with some of the best in the business, including Joe Sinnott, Barry Windsor-Smith and more, on titles including Birds of Prey, Trinity, Silver Surfer, Rune, and more.

CRAIG ROUSSEAU is the co-creator of The Perhapanauts, with fellow buddy and guest Todd Dezago. He’s also worked on Spider-Man Loves Mary Jane Season 2, Marvel Adventures Superheroes, Batman Beyond, Impulse, and many more!

CHRIS SAMNEE is attending his third consecutive HeroesCon, and gets a little more famous each time. These days his dance card is pretty full, and includes art on The Mighty, Area Ten, Dead of Night: Devil Slayer, Daredevil: Blood of the Black Tarantula, Checkmate (*draws breath*), Queen & Country, Capote in Kansas…

RENEE WITTERSTAETTER is also no stranger to HeroesCon, or to comics–she’s worked on titles including Superman, Conan, She-Hulk, and many more. Most recently she’s written The Art of Michael Golden and Tex: The Art of Mark Texeira.

Rounding out today’s update in the cleanup position is KELLY YATES, whose creator-owned Amber Atoms series is still new enough for you to grab up all the issues. Kelly’s also been in Doctor Who: The Forgotten, The Perhapanauts, Fear Agent, and many more.

Every Wednesday we run down the 5 most interesting comics or graphic novels coming out for the week.

5. DETECTIVE COMICS #853
Written by Neil Gaiman; Art by Andy Kubert and Scott Williams; Cover by Andy Kubert; Variant sketch cover by Andy Kubert
DC Comics
$3.99 | 48 pgs

After a bit of a delay we finally get the second and final part of Neil Gaiman’s “Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader” story that began in the last issue of Batman. If you’re coming in late, Batman is dead and they’re having a funeral for him. Except this doesn’t seem to be the Batman (or the Bat-continuity) that we’ve been following recently. It’s more of an amalgam of the kooky elements of Bat-history (very much like what we’ve seen Grant Morrison do in his recent run on the title).

It’s a weird little story very much inspired by Alan Moore’s classic end-of-Superman tale “Whatever Happened to the Man of Tomorrow?” from the mid-80s. Neil Gaiman needs no introduction of course and probably neither does the artist on this book, Andy Kubert so it’s a given that a lot of people will be checking out where this story goes in this issue.

4. DC COMICS CLASSICS LIBRARY: BATMAN — THE ANNUALS
Written by Bill Finger, Edmond Hamilton and others; Art by Lew Sayre Schwartz, Dick Sprang and others; Composite cover by Curt Swan and others
DC
$39.99 | 256 pgs

Speaking of wacky Batman stuff, DC also has this collection of stories from a number of Batman Annuals that came out in the early 60s. This is full of the kind of stuff that used to make Dark Knight fans shudder with embarrassment but thanks to Grant Morrison and Neil Gaiman and the Cartoon Network and a growing ennui with gritty, depressing Batman stories this kind of thing has come back in vogue. Legendary writers and artists like Bill Finger and Dick Sprang bring you crazy tales with shirtless Batman and Robin in the jungle, fighting an octopus and wearing kilts for some reason. And that’s just what you can glean from looking at the cover. If you’re a fan of the new Brave and the Bold series on Cartoon Network than this is where the inspiration from that show came from (this and hallucinatory drugs I’m sure).

3. SCALPED VOL. 4: THE GRAVEL IN YOUR GUTS
Written by Jason Aaron; Art by Davide Furno and R.M. Guera; Cover by Jock
DC Vertigo
$14.99 | 144pgs

Since it’s a generally slow week for new stuff I’ll take this opportunity to quickly point out that Scalped is one of the best ongoing comics out there right now. It’s a dark crime drama set on a decrepit and drug-addled Indian Reservation in South Dakota. Dash Bad Horse is the prodigal son come home after years away from “the Rez” to take a job as a local law enforcer. Which actually means working for shady Casino owner and manipulator of all things on the Reservation, Chief Red Crow. But Dash has more than one agenda in this complicated tale of murder, drugs and dysfunctional family issues.

The latest trade paperback comes out this week and it focuses on Red Crow and the one man he has to answer to: Mr. Brass.

2. I AM LEGION #3 (of 6)
Written by Fabien Nury; art by John Cassady
Devil’s Due
$3.50 | 32 pgs

Attention anyone who bought the DC Humanoids graphic novel I Am Legion back in 2004 and always wondered what happened next: This is what happens next.

DC had reprinted the European comic (originally published by Humanoids) illustrated by Planetary and Astonishing X-men artist John Cassady in a graphic novel format but it only contained the equivalent of the first two issues of the story. Then DC abandoned the poorly selling line and left the handful of American readers of this book hanging.

Now, here in 2009, Devil’s Due has picked up the Humanoids mantle and is releasing this series in comic format. Issue #3 continues where DC’s graphic novel left off so now’s the time for readers of that book to get back into this supernatural thriller about Nazis and a young Romanian girl with the power to tilt the war in their direction.

The artwork, as you might expect from Cassady, is breathtaking.

1. VIKING #1
Written by Ivan Brandon; art by Nic Klein
Image Comics
$2.99 | 24 pgs

The newest crime comic to hit the stands takes place in one of the most brutal periods of crime history: the 9th Century. Ivan Brandon (Cross Bronx) and Nic Klein (who’s done a lot of painted cover work for Marvel) collaborate on this ultra-violent viking tale about two brothers fighting their way to top of the Norse mob.

Though the concept is novel the real attraction here is the unique art by Klein. As you can see from this preview, his work here is a unique mixture of styles that seems part EC Comics, part Neal Adams and part – oh, I don’t know – Genndy Tartakovsky maybe? It’s striking and should make a big splash, appealing to fans of Brian Wood’s Norhtlanders, Ed Brubaker’s Criminal and Jason Aaron’s Scalped.

Today is Friday, and marks the fifth consecutive day this week that we’ve posted a GIANT addition to our HeroesCon 09 Guest List–and we’re going out with a bang this week, with EIGHT new names!

MARK TEXEIRA is no stranger to HeroesCon, and one of our most popular guests. Heck, half the time when we can’t find staff members, they’re in the office listening to “Tex” tell stories while he works on someone’s drawing! And his entrances to our Annual Art Auction, usually with the paint still drying on a piece he’d just finished onstage, are always dramatic! If you’ve never met Tex before, you’ve probably read some of his comics, including Ghost Rider, Moon Knight, Black Panther, and many more.

Also new to the list today is returning guest BRIAN PULIDO, the co-creator of Lady Death and founder of Chaos! Comics. Brian has recently been working in movies, having just written and directed The Graves. He’ll be premiering an exclusive Lady Death HeroesCon variant for you collectors!

And that’s just the start of this addition! G.W. FISHER returns to HeroesCon this year, with recent work on Shadowhawk and Intimidators!

TOM FLEMING is a prolific painter and regular guest of ours, with work in magazines like Heavy Metal and Vampirella Quarterly, and illustrations for World of Warcraft and numberous card sets!

LEO LEIBELMAN is attending his first HeroesCon this year. He’s worked in illustration and art for years, with work in Heavy Metal, Savage Sword of Conan, Turok, and more!

STUART SAYGER is the creator of the Shiver In The Dark graphic novel, as well as a ton of Vs Card System cards, and Lego Bionicle production art!

STEVE SCOTT is attending his second HeroesCon this year–his recent work includes X-Men Forever and She-Hulk, as well as Marvel Adventures Hulk and Marvel Adventures Avengers!

LOUIS SMALL JR is another fixture at HeroesCon. You can catch him in the pages of Vampirella/Lady Death, Sirens of the Cinema, and multiple Marvel and DC trading cards!

Big week next week, as we continue to flesh out our massive list–over 70 new names since April 1st!–and get ready for Free Comic Book Day on May 2nd!

Rolling right along! Just added to the HeroesCon 2009 Guest List is up-and-coming publisher BOOM! Studios, along with three of their biggest creators: Mark Waid (Irredeemable), Roger Langridge (Muppets), and Michael Alan Nelson (28 Days Later). And, since three names just isn’t enough these days, we’re throwing in a couple of first-timers, Detective Comics‘ Dustin Nguyen and Derek Fridolfs!

MARK WAID is an incredibly popular and prolific writer (like I have to tell you), with past work including Kingdom Come, breakout runs on Flash and Fantastic Four, and recent work on Amazing Spider-Man and Supergirl. His new BOOM! title Irredeemable was an instant sell-out, with a second print already on the way.

ROGER LANGRIDGE is not only the creator of the Eisner and Harvey nominated Fred the Clown, but he also is behind the new Muppet Show comic that sold out in about 30 seconds. AND BOOM! is doing a Muppet Show HeroesCon exclusive, with a new cover by Langridge just for us! Did you hear that, Rusty?

MICHAEL ALAN NELSON is the writer of numerous books for BOOM!, including Hexed, Fall of Cthulhu, and 28 Days Later. He’s making his very first trip to HeroesCon, so we hope you’ll be extra sweet to him!

ALSO making his first trip is Detective Comics penciller DUSTIN NGUYEN! I love this guy’s art almost as much as his first name–check out the cover to the upcoming Batman: Streets of Gotham at left… sweet! Besides that and his current gig on Detective Comics, Dustin’s also worked on Wildcats 3.0, Authority, and more.

He’s joined by his occasional collaborator and inker, DEREK FRIDOLFS, who is inking Detective and Streets of Gotham, and in the past has worked on Green Lantern Corps, JLA, Immortal Iron Fist, and a ton of other!

I think it was Billy Idol who once said, “…with a rebel yell, MORE! MORE! MORE!” One can only presume that he was gazing into the future at the HeroesCon 09 Guest List, which is growing by leaps and bounds with each passing day!

Today we’ve added a whopping NINE new names, hailing from the worlds of all-ages comics, newspaper strip comics, and in a few cases, both!

JIM AMASH is an old buddy of ours and an inker par excellence–besides inking a ton of different Archie comics like Sonic Universe, Jughead, and Veronica, he also works on the Spider-man newspaper strip’s Sunday edition, and is one of the editors at Alter Ego Magazine!

JUNE BRIGMAN is currently drawing the Brenda Starr newspaper strip, and has also worked on Supergirl, Alpha Flight, Star Wars, and more!

TERESA DAVIDSON is an inker working primarily for Archie Comics, on Sonic Universe, Veronica, Sabrina, and many more. She’s also worked for Disney, Marvel, DC, and Dark Horse!

IAN FLYNN is not just the writer of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic Universe, but one of our most regular customers in the store! AND you can meet him on Free Comic Book Day, coming up on May 2!

STEPHANIE GLADDEN has drawn for pretty much everybody, and including books like Powerpuff Girls, Flintstones, Sweatshop, Simpsons Comics, and more!

DAVE MCDONALD has worked in comics and television for years, most recently as the creator of Hamster Sam Comics!

ROY RICHARDSON has worked for pretty much every major publisher, on books including Captain America, Iron Man, Flash, and Tomorrow Knights, which he co-created. These days he works with June (his wife) on the Brenda Starr newspaper strip!

JIM SCANCARELLI is another one of our best local buddies, and a Charlotte treasure. He’s the cartoonist behind Gasoline Alley, the longest running newspaper strip ever!

Last but not least is DON SHERWOOD, whose credits go all the way back to the 1960’s, on books and strips including Dan Flagg, Sgt Preston of the Yukon, The Partridge Family, and his recent graphic novel, I Love A Mystery!

Instead of just reviewing one comic book this week, I wanted to take some time to recommend a few different titles:

Dark Reign: Hawkeye No. 1 — A few reviews ago, I talked about how I liked my comic book villains “bad” — not misunderstood monsters or anti-heroes. Well, I guess writer Andy Diggle and I are on the same page because his Dark Reign: Hawkeye limited series chronicles the adventures of the gleefully villainous Bullseye (who’s currently dressed as Hawkeye). Diggle pulls out the stops to show Bullseye committing a bunch of atrocities on innocent and not-so-innocent bystanders — the results are both heinous and hilarious.

Superman: World of New Krypton No. 2 — I’m fairly engrossed with Superman: World of New Krypton. The latest and second issue, written by Greg Rucka and James Robinson with art by Pete Woods, is a little thick on the subject of Kryptonian culture, but there are enough mysteries percolating about the storyline to keep my interested. And I must admit, I appreciate the hole Rucka and Robinson are digging for Clark; if the creative team keeps going on this path, I’ll more than likely stick around to see how everything gets resolved.

Batman: Battle for the Cowl No. 2 — The only reason I’m reading this limited series is to find out who becomes the new Batman. Based on the way things are rolling — and from reading Previews and a few comic news websites — I think I have it figured out. So, basically, I want to see if I’m right. Is the story or art in this comic any good? The art has its good and bad moments, and the writing, by Tony Daniel, is good enough to make me stick around to the last issue of this three-part series.

Destroyer No. 1 — I’ve already said how much I love Robert Kirkman’s writing in this space and his work in this Marvel/Max limited series doesn’t disappoint. The art, by Cory Walker, is on-point as well. Both the drawing and the writing is crafted with such economy — Kirkman using the least number of words and Walker using the least number of lines — that everything comes across effortlessly.

Every Wednesday we count down the 5 most interesting and noteworthy comics or graphic novels coming out for the week.

5. 100%
By Paul Pope
DC Vertigo
$39.99 | 256 pgs

Following up on their hardcover treatment of Heavy Liquid a few months back, Vertigo continues their repackaging of their Paul Pope library with 100%, arguably his most popular and acclaimed book. If you’ve never read any of Pope’s stuff, this is a good place to start. It’s a sexy and stylish cyberpunk drama set in 2038 following the lives of six interconnected New Yorkers. Pope’s style is a fusion of Japanese and European styles and has made him not only popular with us comics people but with commercial advertising and NY fashionistas as well (check out the work he’s done for Diesel if you haven’t already).

There’s some sketches and some new material included in this new printing.

4. THE DYLAN DOG CASE FILES
Written by Tiziano Sclavi; art by various
Dark Horse
$24.95 | 680 pgs

Though most American comics readers have probably never heard of Dylan Dog, this Italian comic, first published in 1986, has been a huge success in Europe and is soon to be made into a motion picture called Dead of Night starring Brandon (Superman) Routh. Dark Horse is releasing the first English version of this series in a decade by dropping a 680 page brick on us complete with a new Mike Mignola cover.

Dylan Dog is an ex-cop and paranormal investigator living and working in London. He is accompanied by his partner, Groucho, looks exactly like Groucho Marx and his former boss, Inspector Bloch, who acts in the skeptical Skully role of the non-believer in all things supernatural. What makes Dylan Dog interesting is his numerous hangups. After losing
his wife he wears the same outfit all the time, he’s afraid of bats and heights and is claustrophobic and he seems to have an Oedipus complex in that he is constantly falling in love with women that resemble his dead mother.

Check out a preview here.

3. ADVENTURES IN CARTOONING: HOW TO TURN YOUR DOODLES INTO COMICS
By James Sturm, Andrew Arnold and Alexis Frederick-Frost
First Second
$12.95 | 112 pgs

There’s a lot of how-to books out there for aspiring comic creators but none quite like this. Aimed at a much younger audience than theory books like Scott McCloud’s Understanding Comics, this new book teaches kids cartooning skills within the context of a story in which a princess tries to make a cartoon but doesn’t think she’s good enough to do it. The cartoons are light and kid-friendly but the information it passes on is useful for artists of any age. It’s written by James Sturm (Golem’s Mighty Swing) who is the founder of the Center for Cartoon Studies. With this book he collaborates with two newcomers and former students of his, Andrew Arnold and Alexis Frederick-Frost.

Read a little preview here.

2. RAMPAGING WOLVERINE #1
Written by Joshua Fialkov, Christopher Yost, Robin Furth, Ted McKeever; art by Paco Diaz Luque and Ted McKeever
Marvel
$3.99

Back in the ’70’s Marvel put out an black and white magazine called Rampaging Hulk that I actually have fond memories of (though if I were to re-read it now I’m sure it wouldn’t seem as great as it did then). It featured out-of-continuity Hulk stories that were slightly more mature in hopes of pulling in the audience of the popular TV show of the time. I guess with the new Wolverine movie coming out you could say that might be the thinking behind this new magazine-sized comic that borrows everything from that Hulk book including the adjective.

There are three stories included in this first issue and the creative teams are a bit unusual for a Wolverine comic. Joshua Fialkov is the writer of the acclaimed series Elk’s Run and Ted McKeever is known for his creator-owned sci-fi books like Metropol. I think Wolverine battles pirates in one of these stories which seems topical right now though I think they are of the South Pacific rather than the Somali variety.

If you’re love for Wolvie is so strong that a magazine-sized black and white comic just won’t be enough of a fix for you than this is your week. This is not the only Wolverine comic hitting the stands by any stretch of the imagination. You’ve also got Wolverine Noir #1 in which Wolverine is re-imagined as a hard-boilded detective in 1930s New York. Wolverine: Logan written by Lost and Y: The Last Man writer Bryan K. Vaughan with art by 100 Bullets artist Eduardo Risso and of course the latest issues of Wolverine proper and Uncanny X-men.

1. 100 BULLETS #100
Written by Brian Azzarello; Art by Eduardo Risso; Cover by Dave Johnson
DC Vertigo
$2.99 | 32 pgs

This is it, the final issue of the excellent crime/conspiracy thriller 100 Bullets. They always said it would aptly end at the hundredth issue and here it is. Myself, I’ve been holding off on reading the last few story arcs until this whole thing came to an end so that I can go back and start re-reading the whole epic tale from the beginning to try to sort through all the twists and turns. If you haven’t read any of it yet than take this new release as a sign that it’s time to start at the beginning. In fact, I’d expect some nice hardcover collections to start hitting pretty soon, so maybe hold off a little bit longer.

A book that started off pretty unassumingly about a mysterious man who shows up offering various people a briefcase containing everything they need to get revenge on the person that ruined their life slowly built into a complicated web of a story about assassins, secret organizations and Manchurian Candidate-style hypnotic suggestion. Brian Azzarello writes with the tough guy flair of crime writers like Elmore Leonard and James Ellroy. Eduardo Risso illustrates it all with drenching, black shadows and expressionistic gestures. Dave Johnson captures the essence of each chapter succinctly in an intriguing cover image. They were an amazing team and you know what? None of them ever missed an issue.

STILL, THERE ARE ALSO THESE…

ALEX TOTH GOES HOLLYWOOD
This might be a little hard to find but it collects works adapted from Hollywood and television properties by the great master, Alex Toth. Stuff like Roy Rogers
HERBIE ARCHIVES VOL 3
The third and final volume of these golden age reprints
ESSENTIAL DAZZLER
Reasons this is essential: Paul Chadwick is credited as one of the creators in this volume. Reasons this may NOT be essential: Every story has Dazzler in it.