Starting in Nightwing 22, Kyle Higgins said that Nightwing (newly relocated to Chicago) will continue to hunt out his parents’ murderer Tony Zucco while finding out the mystery behind the dead superheroes in Chicago and fighting former Superman foe Prankster. Swamp Thing 22 begins the “Whiskey Tree” storyline by Charles Soule and Kano in which Swamp Thing travels to a small town in Scotland that has become rich because of a tree which has scotch whiskey in its roots. John Constantine will guest star in this two part story arc.
Chicagoans Art Baltazar and Franco introduced their new series The Green Team complete with a Batmobile on the first cover. Deathstroke will appear in issue three, and Baltazar described the teen trillionaires as being the “Justice League in twenty years”.Artist Freddie Williams II gave information about The Movement by Gail Simone and said that it would be dark, but fun and contain all new characters with rich back stories. There was also some more information from editor Jim Chadwick about Jeff Parker and Jonathan Case’s Batman ’66, the first comic book set in the 1960s Batman TV show continuity. The first arc will have Riddler and Catwoman as villains, and Chadwick hinted at King Tut and Killer Croc showing up in later issues. Brian Azzarello also teased his new 100 Bullets miniseries called Brother Lono which was inspired by his and Eduardo Risso’s trip to Spain when Spain won the World Cup. A final announcement from DC was the DC Entertainment Essential Graphic Novels, a magazine that will have the “correct” reading orders for their different characters and will be given out free at comic book stores everywhere.
Q&A Highlights:
– Bob Wayne, Brian Azzarello and others referred fans to Wonder Woman 25 for any questions regarding Damian Wayne’s death and possible resurrection, the return of the Young Justice TV show and Wonder Woman and Superman’s relationship status.
-Kyle Higgins (Nightwing) felt challenged by a burn victim who bravely asked why most characters in comics who are victims of burns or scarring (Firefly, Lex Luthor) are predominantly villains.
-A man who had Len Wein’s signature on a tattoo of Swamp Thing on his back asked the panel if there would be a sequel to 1989 box office bomb Return of Swamp Thing and the short lived Swamp Thing animated series.
-When asked if Constantine would be a softer take on Hellblazer, Bob Wayne joked that there would be new “Hellblazer underoos” put out by DC. He also compared Constantine, Animal Man, Swamp Thing, and Justice League Dark favorably with the similar Vertigo books of the early 1990s.
-Charles Soule (Swamp Thing) said that the “plant approval process at DC is rigorous”.