Vertigo teases new “Sandman” and “Invisibles” at Comic-Con

PanARMENIAN.Net - A year out from its 25th anniversary, DC Entertainment's Vertigo imprint has teased an anniversary celebration that draws from the past to look toward the future, The Hollywood Reporter said.

At the imprint's panel at San Diego Comic-Con Friday afternoon, July 21, newly installed executive editor Mark Doyle introduced a sizzle reel for the company's acclaimed mature readers imprint that appeared to offer a hint of things to come. "I hope that sharp-eyed viewers would see that there was some new art in there I can't talk about," he told the crowd, before showing a video that appeared to include new Invisibles artwork by Jeff Lemire, new Sandman artwork by Jae Lee and a Death image by Jim Lee, alongside previously publishing images from series including Preacher, Swamp Thing, Y: The Last Man and American Vampire.

The video ends with a new Vertigo 25 logo, and the date announcement 08.08.18. Quite what that date refers to remains, for now, hidden.

Scott Snyder, co-creator of American Vampire, appeared at the panel, dropping hints at a new beginning for the series he works on with Rafael Albuquerque. "We're bringing it back in a big way, and it's a series that will never go away," he said about the long-running series that tracks the birth and development of a new species of vampire that's specific to America. But just as the vampires are evolving within the series, the series itself is about to undergo a transformation itself. "It's going to evolve itself into something very different," he said.

John Ridley, the Academy Award-winning screenwriter behind 12 Years A Slave, was also present, talking about his new series The American Way: Those Above and Those Below. Set a decade after his original American Way series, he said that he's using the 1972 era of the new six-issue series — which launched earlier this month — to draw parallels to contemporary politics.

"The 1960s, as they did, began with optimism — the belief that Kennedy would talk about, the new frontier. But that was also the beginning of the civil rights era, the Vietnam war," he explained. "Coming in the '70s, we are in a space of cynicism. What do we believe, who do we believe, do we believe in who is supposed to lead us. So many people ask me, am I commenting on things as they are now? I'm not trying to comment on them, but I am pointing out that we repeat in cycles."