Legends of the Dark Knight, DC Comics’ long-time Batman anthology series, is returning this April, and when it does, it will be going digital-first.

The series — which will launch digitally on April 2 — will be released in 10-page chapters online. Down the road, two chapters will eventually be compiled into one comic and released physically, with the first issue of the new Legends of the Dark Knight series set to hit shops May 18. In its press release announcing the book, DC noted that it will “serve as a place for both well-known and up-and-coming creative talent to tell new, evergreen stories…”

The first story is definitely of the well-known creator variety, as it will be written and illustrated by Darick Robertson with colors by Diego Rodriguez and letters by Simon Bowland. Spanning six digital chapters and three physical issues, that story is called “Bad Knight, Good Knight,” and it involves someone coming to Gotham to sell deadly chemicals to Batman’s rogues, including Mr. Freeze, the Penguin, and the Joker.

Future stories in the new Legends of the Dark Knight series will be told be a long list of writers, including Stephanie Phillips, Becky Cloonan, Brandon Thomas, Matthew Rosenberg, Brandon Easton, Che Grayson, and comics newcomer Yedoye Travis (Anime in America, Beyond the Bot). Art for the series will come from Cian Tormey, Giannis Milonogiannis, Karl Mostert, Max Dunbar, Dike Ruan, Belén Ortega, and Nina Vakueva.

The digital chapters will go for the usual DC digital-first price of $.99, with the physical comics retailing for the equally-expected usual price of $3.99, plus card-stock variant covers at $4.99. The cover artists for the first physical release of this series are Robertson on the standard cover, with David Marquez providing a card stock variant, Riccardo Federici doing a 1:25 ratio variant, and Francesco Francavilla drawing a teams variant cover available to retailers who order more than 250 copies.

This series while offering a relatively-new distribution format is part of a long DC Comics lineage, with the original Legends of the Dark Knight anthology comic first debuting in 1989. A distinguished list of creators graced the pages of those books, including Denny O’Neil, Grant Morrison, Doug Moench, José Luis Garcia-López, and Klaus Janson. 

This marks a continued growth for DC’s digital-first pathway to shops, joining a growing list of concepts that have been ported over, including Sensation Comics, DCeased spinoff, a continuation of Batman: The Animated Series, and more. You check out the aforementioned cover art below…

 

Legends of the Dark Knight
Darick Robertson cover.
Legends of the Dark Knight
David Marquez cover.
Riccardo Federici cover
Francesco Francavilla cover.

1 COMMENT

  1. I don’t understand the “Digital First” program. I was hoping they would use it as a way of trying out new (and hopefully more experimental and less Batcentric) series and move the successful ones to print. So far it seems more like digital is being used as a preview. Can’t be good for either format, right?

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