Alex Maleev teaming up with Kolstad and Venditti on WARBIRD

Bad Idea Comics has announced Warbird, an espionage thriller written by Derek Kolstad and Robert Venditti, with art by Alex Maleev. Due out this summer, the book revolves around Cole Norton, a “repo man” who’ll steal yachts, private planes and more from the wealthy, for a price. The comic will follow him on his greatest job yet, which will be to seize an advanced jet created by the Russians.

The synopsis elaborates, “The Russians have stolen aeronautical military secrets from China, France, Germany, the UK, and the US to Frankenstein together the ultimate bleeding edge, next-gen fighter jet: the Spearhead. There are only three of them in existence. They are an absolute force of nature dominating every global hotspot from Syria to Ukraine. Cole’s been hired to steal one… and destroy the other two. And at a price of $500 million each, his fee is a cool $50 million. But this isn’t a repo. This is outright theft. And failure doesn’t mean jail time and fines — it means a bullet to the back of the head.”

The book marks Maleev’s first interior work since reteaming with Daredevil writer Brian Michael Bendis on Masterpiece in 2023. He previously collaborated with Venditti at Bad Idea, providing covers for 2025’s Ordained. Kolstad worked with Venditti on Planet Death, and is writing a film version of Ordained.

Issue #1 will be released on July 22, with covers by Maleev, Frank Quitely, Michael Cho, Rod Reis, J.G. Jones. Further variants will include glow-in-the-dark, decoder text, and metal covers (the last of which is made from an actual jet), and an 8-bit PC game, housed in a jewel case limited to 1-in-250 copies. They are available to preorder now from Lunar Distribution.

In the meantime, you can read Bad Idea’s newsletter for a look at Maleev’s artwork and process, and their July solicits for more on what will be on offer from the publicity stunt-loving publisher.