Oct.13-19 - More Returns and Changes

Englehart in your future -- via the past

I was pleased to find in today's email a note Steve Englehart had sent out to those who'd been in contact with him along the way. In it he wrote a little about projects he's been working on which are coming out this year, so I thought I'd pass some of the info along.

Steve's asked not to be quoted directly, as it wasn't a press release, but has said I can talk about any of it in my own words. I don't know that I'm up to rewriting something from Steve Englehart, but I'll take a stab at some of it.

The focus of the note, and something I hadn't heard about before, is Black Rider. (I'm including a couple of 1950s-era covers in the mix for reference and color. Click on them for larger views.)

This is scheduled as a one-shot, and is part of some Western-theme that Marvel's going to be running in June. Steve mentions solicitations in the next few weeks, but since comics shops are placing orders now for items due to ship in March, I believe -- certainly no later than April -- the next few weeks would be fairly early for Marvel to begin pushing a June title. Regardless, though, this title and that theme are coming later this year.

Steve will be working once more with Marshal Rogers, and all things considered this seems due to their working together on last year's Dark Detective creative reunion (not to mention another Batman miniseries of the same name coming later this year) and the view that Black Rider also dresses in black, fights crime and is a mysterious guy.

Steve refers to a Jack Kirby origin sequence, but the credits for 1950s work on Marvel titles are sketchy. Whoever was responsible, indications are that Steve's reached back to those stories for background to have some fun with. Elements in the character's origin (above and beyond a former outlaw who's reformed and become a doctor, then deciding to dress up in a costume and battle crime, of course) make it possible that he might not be entirely sane. While some have suggested as much for Batman, here the creative team is left to handle the character as they see fit, a character who in his origin tale not only trained his horse (Satan, aka Ichabod, based on the covers I've seen) to have a secret identity, but did so before coming up with one for himself! To the extent that I've looked into the character, though, he seems reasonably well-formed as older comics character go, including - buried in his past - time as a youthful outlaw, the Cactus Kid. Here's some quick background on the character.

For additional fun, he's bringing Black Rider to New York City on a case in 1881. B.R. is on the trail of a Chinese prostitution ring, and I'm presuming finds himself there to track down those in charge... though I'll be interested to see why a Chinese ring in the late 1800s especially would be operating out of the East Coast. Maybe the guy in charge is doing all that he can to physically distance himself from the operation..? I'm sure Steve'll lay it all out for us. Either that or we'll discover that it's Steve himself, not Batman who's been insane all these years... Either way, I'm happy to see the selection of locale. Had he opted to play this as a staright Western my interest in it would have been halved.

Also mentioned is a potentially fun guest star in the one-shot: the man who will one day (though I did think he was supposed to be significantly older than this, having been born in the 1430s as is noted in the Official Marvel Universe Book of the Dead in 2004, where they drew on information developed for the Y.A.O. project) become The Ancient One. By 1881 he was pretty damn ancient by any human standards, but we'll see how this irons out.

If any of this sounds like fun, be sure to order a copy/let your retailer know you're interested -- however that works for your situtation -- as Steve's expressed an interest in telling more tales of the Rider, Young(er) Ancient One and their associates in a later miniseries or ongoing series, but that'll only happen if the one-shot sells well.

Between the creative team and the time & setting combination I'm looking forward to it.