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You’ve seen the news and art, but a brief report from the actual Valiant Summit. This was a briskly run and produced event; given that it was in a comedy theater at 2 in the afternoon there was a decent turnout who applauded enthusiastically. EIC Warren Simons and publisher Dinesh Shamdasani spoke about the general direction of the line, and then authors Jody Houser, Fred van Lente, Matt Kindt and Rafer Roberts came out to talk about their projects.

This was the second Valiant Summit to announce new books — the first was at Twitter HQ last year. As I’ve mentioned before these kind of big event events are more and more the rule for comics companies to get a pop for their announcements. How much pop did #valiantsummit get? Enough twitter trending that the girls in bikinis or less tweets that follow trending topics popped up in my feed. Signs of Success c.2016.

Faith remains the breakout hit at Valiant, and Kindt’s Divinity, about a black cosmonaut who gets powers, is an underrated book. For me personally, Peter Milligan and Juan Jose Ryp’s Britannia sounds like the best read; it sounds right up Milligan’s ally, and that can be a very entertaining alley to be lost in.

At any rate, Valiant is expending its line with known creators and concepts that are jumping on points. In a year when many companies are cutting back on titles, they staying the course with slow increases. It’s the kind of stability that may find a ready audience among retailers in an increasingly turbulent market.