The Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman and the AMC shows’ chief content officer Scott Gimple have announced a surprise new comic book series which hit stores this week.
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Kirkman a letter to retailers by plastering it onto the back of posters which were shipped out earlier this week, announcing their new series which is titled DIE!DIE!DIE!. “Strictly for mature readers, this action packed comic lives up to its title – blood will flow, bullets will fly and the mayhem will never end,” the book’s synopsis reads.
“Hey look! It’s another letter printed on the back of a poster! This is old hat by now, right?” Kirkman wrote to comic shop owners. “Has DC done this yet? Should I stop pointing this out? Okay!
“To get this out of the way from the jump, I love comics and I really love comic stores. It would be an understatement to say that the direct market changed my life. Your support of The Walking Dead from its earliest of days, as well as my other successes in comics (thanks for getting behind Oblivion Song!), have made it possible for me to do cool things like what we’re doing today.
“Maybe you’ve already seen it… maybe this is the first thing you pulled out of the box. But you should have gotten a shipment of a brand new series today, a book called DIE!DIE!DIE! (it’s awesome) by myself, Scott M. Gimple and Chris Burnham! We matched your orders to the recent Oblivion Song launch, so that’s how we determined what to send you.
“We’ll be doing a targeted media blast today, getting the word out that this book is in stores this week! Hopefully the excitement of a surprise launch like this will bring people into your stores, and we all celebrate another successful series launch together.
“The reason for all this insanity? Well…
“There’s something magical about going into a comic shop. For me, the heyday of this magic was in the early ’90s when I was around years old. Back then… you didn’t know what was coming out months in advance. There were ads in comics, sure… but when you walked into a comic shop and looked at the new comic rack, it was full of something that I think modern comics is very much lacking… SURPRISE.
“I remember walking across the story, seeing the new rack from afar… scanning the covers, trying to figure out what they could be as I got closer and closer. Back then you could arrive at a store and say, ‘What the heck is Sleepwalker?’ and it was just there, on the shelf waiting for you to find out. I remember when I first saw the cover for Infinity Gauntlet… what the heck could that be? All the Marvel heroes in one comic? That’s special–it’s not like they did that twice a year back then! As time went on and the internet started feeding us more and more information than we could ever want about every little thing in existence… those surprises pretty much faded away.
“I want to bring that excitement back. I want the comic shop, the place you’re probably standing in, to be a place of discovery again! I want it to a place where a customer can come in and find out about something new and exciting!
“Huge thanks to the teams at Image and Skybound for working tirelessly to figure out a way to make this happen. But most of all to you, dear comic book retailer, for working in the trenches to keep bringing us this art form we love to enjoy week in and week out!
“Thank you for your time, and once again-always, in fact!-thank you for your support.
“-Robert Kirkman.”
DIE!DIE!DIE! is available at your local comic book store now.
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Image Credit: Marvel Comics
