IDW Publishing continues building its new line of all-ages Marvel comics with Marvel Action: Avengers, due out this December.
This new Avengers book will be written by Matthew K. Manning and drawn by Jon Sommariva, the company announced in a press release, which also included the usual effusive quotes from the creators.
“I’m really excited about working on Marvel Action: Avengers – we’re planning big, blockbuster plots, surprising twists, and both returning villains and new threats,” Manning said in the press release. “We’ll be digging into the personalities of these heroes to show all the fans – kids and adults both – exactly what makes them so great.”
“I am absolutely thrilled and inspired to be drawing some of the most iconic characters in the history of comics,” Sommariva said. “I grew up with these characters, so it’s a real joy to bring my high energy to the visual style of Marvel Action: Avengers. I can’t wait to make fun, action-packed comics for fans of all ages!”
Manning has previously worked on Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and Batman/TMNT Adventures for IDW, as well as authored the DK Publishing books Iron Man: The Ultimate Guide to the Armored Super Hero and The Avengers Encyclopedia. Sommariva has illustrated a number of other license properties for IDW, including Star Wars Adventures, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Amazing Adventures, and Batman/TMNT Adventures, on which he also teamed with Manning. The Avengers art included here is from Sommariva.
The forthcoming Avengers comic is the second of three books that make up this IDW-Marvel collaboration. Marvel Action: Avengers will be preceded by Marvel Action: Spider-Man #1 from writer Delilah S. Dawson and artist Fico Ossio in November, and it will be followed by Marvel Action: Black Panther, due in January and so far without an announced creative team.
“We’re incredibly excited to work with Marvel to bring in a new era of all-ages Avengers comics,” Bobby Curnow, Group Editor at IDW Publishing, said in the press release. “Having worked with the creative team in the past, and seeing the material they are cooking up, I’m eager for this book to get in the hands of readers. The enthusiasm and love of comics in this book is absolutely infectious and will be sure to create a new generation of Avengers fans.”
The collaboration is an interesting one, with the companies noting in a joint press release in July that the aim of these books is to “serve as an easily-accessible jumping-on point for younger readers to follow the adventures of their favorite characters.” If that’s what they end up accomplishing here, well, that would be HUGE, essentially seeding a new generation of readers.
In other IDW news today, the publisher announced that the writing team of Elsa Charretier and Pierrick Colinet (The Infinite Loop, Star Wars Adventures, and Superfreaks) would be collaborating with artist Javier Pulido (Human Target, Robin: Year One, She-Hulk) on a new Rocketeer title, Rocketeer Reborn, with the creators subsequently releasing a pair of covers, one of which is included here.
Can’t wait to get these for my daughters. They can then aspire to sit at the back of the group and not have superpowers.
Can we not call these “all-ages?” They’re not really all-ages comics. Those are what Marvel did from the 1960s through the early 1990s. These are comics for kids. Which is great and all but I think it’s important to remember what super-hero comics used to be compared to what they are now and pretending that this stuff is all-ages muddies the waters.
Mike
That’s the world we live in now. Movies, television shows, video games, and comic books. They’re either for children around the age of seven, or for adults 17+. Nothing in between.
It is strange that “all ages” now means “for kids.” I guess the companies don’t want to admit they publish comics for children. Might hurt their “hip” image with the twenty-somethings they’re trying to cultivate.
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