Geoff Johns and Gary Frank, who have collaborated on projects like Batman: Earth One and Doomsday Clock, are taking their show on the road and jumping ship from DC for Image Comics, where they will launch the creator-owned comic Geiger in April, the publisher announced today. The series will take place on a post-apocalyptic Earth, and seems likely to be one of the projects that Johns was developing through his Killing Zone imprint at DC before a series of layoffs and cutbacks hit the publisher. Interestingly, while the pandemic has been terrible for comics across the board, smaller publishers like Image and IDW seem to have found some success, selling huge numbers of books like Spawn, Snake Eyes: Deadgame, and Savage Dragon that would have been impressive even pre-COVID.
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Spawn and Savage Dragon are among the titles Johns cites as inspirations for the move to Image, where Geiger will bring Doomsday Clock colorist Brad Anderson to the table as well. The series is well-positioned to be one of Image’s biggest launches in some time.
“Gary and I have been secretly working away on Geiger since we finished up Doomsday Clock earlier this year and we couldn’t be more excited to be doing our first creator-owned book for Image,” Johns told Bleeding Cool, who broke the news. “Now that we’re miles ahead of the release schedule, we can finally talk about it. Geiger was inspired by the early days of Image when wonderfully all-new, graphic characters like Todd McFarlane’s Spawn, Erik Larsen’s Savage Dragon and so many more were at the forefront of their publishing line. It was such an exciting time as a reader for us, and we’re hoping to tap into that excitement again with the unexpected and unknown with Geiger. Doomsday Clock‘s Brad Anderson is bringing his beautiful palette to the book.”
“It feels like we’ve been assembling this monster in a hidden tower for an age and waiting for the right storm to pass,” Frank said. “I think we have something full of heart and horror and humanity and, now that we’re close, I’m hugely excited to see it released into the World.”
Here’s the official synopsis for the series:
“Who are the scavengers of a dying earth? Geiger is set in the years since a nuclear war ravaged the planet, desperate outlaws battle for survival in a world of radioactive chaos. Out past the poisoned wasteland lives a man even the Nightcrawlers and Organ People fear. Some name him Joe Glow, others call him The Meltdown Man. But his name…is Geiger.”
Geiger #1 will be in comic shops and available for digital purchase in April.
