Giffen and DeMatteis Reunite on Larfleeze For the New 52

In an interview with Keith Giffen yesterday, the veteran writer/artist, who was just announced as leaving Legion of Super-Heroes to write a new Larfleeze ongoing for DC Comics as part of the family-wide Green Lantern shakeup in June, revealed that he'll be plotting and doing breakdown art for the series, which will be pencilled by Scott Kolins as previously announced. Oh, and dialogued by Phantom Stranger co-writer and longtime Giffen collaborator J.M. DeMatteis. The pair have worked together on dozens of projects over the years, including a long and memorable run on Justice League/Justice League International/Justice League Europe, which reinvented the superhero team as a DC Universe workplace drama set against the backdrop of a superhero team with a U.N. sanction. Ever since, they've been revisiting those characters from time to time in a series of increasingly comic stories with titles like Formerly Known as the Justice League and I Can't Believe It's Not the Justice League. Their final story with that group of characters was also the final Justice League story before the launch of the New 52; you can read our interview with DeMatteis about it here. Because of their reputation as "funny guys," fans of the Green Lantern-based Larfleeze might be divided; after all, the character has so far been played fairly straight, but at the same time he (along with the Red Lantern cat Dex-Starr) is just begging to be played for laughs. And while Giffen says that the series will revolve around Larfleeze and his "beset-upon butler," DeMatteis reassures fans that they're taking the character seriously. "Larfleeze isn't a comedy book," DeMatteis told Newsarama. "It's a cosmic adventure with ample helpings of humor." Look for more on this as the series draws closer.