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2020’s The Old Guard film on Netflix was a surprise hit last year — based on the comic by Greg Rucka and Leandro Fernandez, the story of an immortal band of mercenaries got people talking. With a script by Rucka himself and directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood the movie left everyone waiting for a sequel.

While Rucka and Fernandez have supplied one comics sequel — 2019’s The Old Guard: Force Multiplied — the crew is coming back in even bigger style with The Old Guard: Tales Through Time, a new six-issue anthology that jaunts through the centuries. The series boasts a star-studded lineup of contributors, according to Polygon, which debuted the news.

Contributors include Alejandro Arbona and Kano, Brian Michael Bendis, Michael Avon Oeming and Taki Soma; Robert Mackenzie, David Walker and Justin Greenwood; Matt Fraction; Vita Ayala and Nicola Scott; Kelly Sue DeConnick and Valentine De Landro; Eric Trautmann and Rick Burchett; Andrew Wheeler and Jacopo Camagni; Matthew Clark;  Jason Aaron, Steve Lieber, and Horacio Altuna and of course Rucka and Fernandez. 

You can find quotes from most of the above at Polygon and some spectacular art from Fernandes and co. — but here’s a sampling:

The concept of immortality opens philosophical doors for the writers on Tales Through Time, who pull different meanings from the cast’s endless struggles. “There’s been a lot of coverage calling [The Old Guard] a superhero story, but what is it that they do?” says writer Robert Mackenzie. “They don’t die, until they eventually do. Well, that’s true of all of us. So rather than living or dying, I think of it as a story about aging — and how age turns all of our lives into history, even while we’re still living them.”

Mackenzie’s story with co-writer Dave Walker and artist Justin Greenwood takes readers to a monumental moment at the end of the 1960s: the moon landing. “It’s a period of profound change and conflict,” says Dave Walker. “The Chicago Seven, Stonewall, Vietnam, Woodstock, Manson, and of course, the space race — seem such a great lens for these world-weary characters who have to feel they had seen it all.”

The Old Guard: Tales Through Time hits stand in April from Image Comics.

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