Batman/Superman Returns as Ongoing From Planet Hulk Writer Greg Pak

DC Comics announced today that Batman/Superman will return as a new, ongoing series in the New 52 [...]

DC Comics announced today that Batman/Superman will return as a new, ongoing series in the New 52 under the guidance of longtime Incredible Hulk writer Greg Pak. Jae Lee will reportedly provide the art, with the series set in the earliest days of the superheroes' careers, before even the launch of Justice League. "We've been given the incredible opportunity to show these two icons meeting for the first time at this very early and raw stage in their careers," Pak said. "Neither one of them has ever heard of the other guy." The last incarnation of the book, titled Superman/Batman, launched in 2003 under current Nova creative team Jeph Loeb and Ed McGuinness. It ran for eight years and saw, among other things, the reintroduction of Silver Age staples like the Kryptonian Supergirl and multicolored Kryptonite in its pages. Superman and Batman's historical team-up title, World's Finest, is currently in use (although modified to the Multiverse-friendly Worlds' Finest) by Power Girl and The Huntress. "Working in comics, almost every project you do for DC or Marvel deals with these amazing characters that are so much fun to work with but, wow, Superman and Batman? That kind of lifts your hat and spins it around in the air a bit," Pak told USA Today. "It is a real thrill, and it's particularly a thrill because we're being given some real leeway to do some really important storytelling with these characters. It really defines some great things and to depict some really key moments for them."

Pak, who is concluding his run on X-Treme X-Men, is arguably best known for his Planet Hulk and World War Hulk stories, which are rumored to be the basis for new movies from Marvel Studios. He's also been dabbling in multimedia recently, with revolutionary works like The Vision Machine (we spoke with him about it here) and an as-yet-unannounced project with singer-songwriter Jonathan Coulton. Lee is coming off a critically-acclaimed and controversial run on the Before Watchmen titles. Many regarded it as the best work of Lee's career, but given remarks made by the series writer and former editor Len Wein, perhaps this will be a Marvel-like approach to the title, with Lee trading off arcs with another creator (which is, incidentally, similar to what George Perez and Kevin Maguire do on Worlds' Finest). "I will probably be white-haired by the end of this project because of Jae and his deadlines. He makes them—he makes them squeak, but he makes them," Wein said of Lee when we spoke to him at Comic Con. "The work itself is breathtaking. I have never seen anybody put more effort into what he's doing. I dialogue from pencils. It got to the point where I was dialoging from layouts. He would do finished pencils that were extraordinary—then the inks would come in and I would realize that he'd redrawn half of what he'd drawn from the pencils."

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