Last night, Savage Dragon creator Erik Larsen tweeted that it looked like Savage Dragon #250, which hit the stands last week, had sold out at the distributor level. The comic, which shipped with a number of variant covers, was largely absent from store shelves this week, but Larsen and Image had been instructing readers and retailers that Diamond still had it in stock. Now, the first print is completely exhxausted, and Image is headed back to press with a second printing. Larsen, who said on Facebook that he didn not want the series’ longtime fans to feel obligated to buy the second printing, will not draw a new one. Instead, Larsen’s standard cover to the first print will be used, with slightly different coloring.
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Savage Dragon unfolds in real time, and has been in print for 28 years at Image. The current star, Malcolm Dragon, is the son of the original Dragon, who died in #225. Larsen, though, has been working on versions of Dragon since he was young, including Paul Dragon, a proto version of the “final” Dragon that first appeared in the ’80s in Graphic Fantasy, a zine Larsen published with friends.
Larsen participates in a regular feature at ComicBook.com, where he provides insight and context for each issue of Savage Dragon in a “director’s commentary”-style conversation. You can see the interview in support of #250 here (spoilers).
“There are a bunch of things that I can point to and go, ‘Hey, look at that. There’s Mark and Peter Johnson as superheroes in Graphic Fantasy #2, which I just reprinted in Savage Dragon #250, and we didn’t see those two characters in costume until #248,’” Larsen recently told ComicBook.com. “So there’s some planning for you. We’re eventually going to get to those guys being superheroes, and here’s where they first appeared that way.”
The end of #250’s lead story sets up a surprising new status quo, which blends some of Larsen’s oldest published work from Graphic Fantasy with “The Merging of Multiple Earths,” the story in which Dragon died just a few years ago.
In a blurb sent out by Image, The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman described Savage Dragon as “the greatest superhero epic ever published,” and said, “If you enjoy comics and you haven’t read Dragon, you screwed up… but it’s never too late!”
Savage Dragon #250, second printing (Diamond Code JUN208611) will be available at comic book shops on Wednesday, August 19.
