HBO have released the first teaser poster for Game of Thrones: Season 3 and it's... Well, a pretty stark image, if you'll excuse the pun. It's basically just numbers, with the date of the show's return. Well, there are some swords in the first zero!
But look, at this point, we're all just psyched to see more of this show...
A leaked image of a European poster for Grand Theft Auto V indicates the latest in Rockstar's blockbuster saga will be released in Spring 2013.
That news, via fan forum GTA-Five, is hardly unexpected, but this is the first time we've had reasonable confirmation of any sort of release window for the game. There is no indication if this timetable applies to a global release, or if Rockstar intends to stagger its release dates. Grand Theft Auto IV had a simultaneous release in Australia, Europe and North America, with Japan receiving the game some 6 months later.
The leaked poster, courtesy of forum "GTA-Five."
It's also worth pointing out that the only system/publisher logos on the poster are for Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3. It appears as though - for now - there are no plans for Wii U.
More GTA V news is set to arrive in November. Stay tuned to IGN for more in the near future.
Rich is an Executive Editor of IGN.com and the leader of IGN's Nintendo team. He also watches over all things WWE, Resident Evil, Assassin's Creed and much more. Follow him on Twitter, if you dare!
The epic Image Comics series that blends the Peter Pan story with the time period of World War II just hit its next stage of evolution last week with issue #6, so we caught up with writer Kurtis Wiebe to take us on a journey through what's to come for Peter and the Lost Boys.
Check out our review for Peter Panzerfaust #6!
IGN Comics: Peter Panzerfaust presents much more mature, weighty issues than the Disney fairy tale versions of Peter Pan, and, in issue #6, the story adopts a more serious, thoughtful tone compared to even the series' first arc. What made you think to use these characters to tell this particular story, and who is the target audience for the series?
Kurtis Wiebe: Peter Pan has always been the story of holding onto our innocence and youth. Those themes are fascinating because we all have gone through that transition in our lives and we easily relate to them. Take that idea and put it in a context where many children were forced to grow up early, not because of their own choices, but by circumstances put upon them. That’s what happens in war and I think the theme of Peter Pan collides perfectly with the loss of innocence in a real world conflict.
Peter Panzerfaust originally, to me, was a series aimed at young adults, early to late teens. I’ve had so many messages from fans, or been approached by some at conventions, who tell me their 5 year old son loves it, or that they bought the series for their middle aged parents who adore it. It’s a universal story that everyone has grown up with and I think that makes it appropriate for all ages. This upcoming arc might take things down a darker path but there will never be gratuitous language, gore or violence and I think that helps keep it safe for all age groups.
IGN: You mention on your website that you have a general notion that Peter Panzerfaust will run 25 issues. Seeing as the first arc ran 5 issues, did you conceive of the plot as a 5 act drama? Do you find that you feel more comfortable writing series of a definite length or are you also passionate about writing open-ended series as well?
Wiebe: There’s definite structure to this series, and 25 issues is a very precise number and it’s tied into the interviews. Each arc will be narrated by a different member of Peter’s group, so with 5 issues per arc that means 5 of the people who experienced adventures with Peter will get to share their story. Knowing who those characters are and what they bring to the history of the story is very important and there’s a plot happening with those interviews as well. In this case, I’m comfortable with the plan because I know exactly what the narrative beats are and I’m building to a major resolution at an exact point in time.
With long form stories where there’s not a certain ending point, sometimes you can get bogged down with filler or meandering plots. I want this experience to be very concise for readers because that is exactly what I have planned.
Wiebe: They are very important to the overall story and I can’t even begin to tell you how excited I am to finally bring these women into the adventure in a more meaningful way. Tiger Lily has honestly been my favorite character to write in the series so far. She’s taken on such a powerful voice and any scene she’s in she absolutely dominates. It’s rather unexpected, truthfully. I was always a bit worried when I planned ahead in the series that she’d be difficult to distinguish from the huge cast of characters.
Wendy is also going to start to take a more central role later on in this arc and future arcs. She’s been a minor character so far but, rest assured, she’s a major player by the end.
IGN: Hook will be taking center stage soon as well, but I'm sure fans are wondering whether they'll be seeing Tinkerbell any time soon. Any hints?
Wiebe: Tinkerbell has made an appearance. Of sorts. If you go back and read the first volume, Peter talks about our version of her a few times. It’s a more metaphorical interpretation of Tinkerbell and what a mythological creature means in the real world.
IGN: You've previously implied that Peter shows his "magic" by having a knack for escaping tight situations, popping up atop exceptionally high structures, etc., but just how far do you plan to explore the uncanny aspect of the Peter Pan lore in your series?
Wiebe: It’s just beginning. Peter’s "power," for lack of better term, will start to be explained as this arc continues. It’s tied into how Julien is a much more grounded man than Gilbert and his memories, therefore, are a lot more reliable as to the reality of the events.
That’s not to say Peter isn’t extraordinary, he definitely is, probably in a way readers aren’t expecting, though.
IGN: You recently won the Shuster Award for Outstanding Comic Book Writer, primarily for your work on Green Wake. Can you tell us a little about your motivations for writing Green Wake and what it means to be recognized for a work that was so personal in nature?
Wiebe: Green Wake was a concept I came up with while I was going through the early stages of a divorce. In that time I was reflecting a lot; on myself, on the nature of relationships, on the concept of guilt and shame. It was probably the most difficult comic I’ve ever written, and I still have trouble reading the last 10 pages of the first volume. It’s too real to me and the sequence where Morley sees everything that was, is and what could’ve been... yeah. Very difficult.
So, when I won the award for that series it made me realize that this series, despite its early end from lack of sales, had profoundly affected those that read it. It mattered to them. That’s a huge victory to me and made it very worthwhile to struggle through the writing process which was, really, a grieving period in my life.
IGN: Anyone who has ever tried to produce a comic book knows that artistic talent is a limited commodity yet you consistently collaborate with artists who are among the hottest new talent on the market. What is the secret to forging successful collaborations?
Wiebe: It’s funny, but a lot of people don’t realize that most of the artists I work with are friends. I’ve just been lucky to become involved with a group of people that are all interconnected in some way, mostly through ACAD in Calgary, Canada which is an art college. Tyler Jenkins, Riley Rossmo and Scott Kowalchuk all attended that school so I met them all roughly around the same time. I think I just had to prove to them that I was willing to bust my ass to make comics and get them in front of editors.
As for the secret? I’ll give a tip for finding artists, how to secure them totally depends on what they are looking for. A good way to find artists is to go to conventions and scout the artist alley. Many of those artists are looking for something cool to work on and if you can be enthusiastic and promise an equal investment of time and energy in a project as they would have to commit, you’ll do yourself a service.
IGN: You've got a few titles coming out right now, including the romantic comic, Grim Leaper, and the post-apocalyptic adventure story, Debris. Which one of your comic book efforts are you currently most excited about, and which one do you wish more people knew about?
Wiebe: Tough question. I think Grim Leaper really slipped under the comic community radar but the feedback and reviews have been really strong. That series is also based on life experience; it’s inspired by my dating life after my marriage ended and I was heading back into that terrifying world at age 31. If you’ve ever had to navigate the dating world at that age, or, even any age, Grim Leaper will be painfully hilarious.
And, of course, Peter Panzerfaust. I can’t lie. Our sales have fallen since the first arc and I’m trying to get the word out about this series because our fan base is so in love with the series. We need to maintain, or even better, increase our sales to ensure we get our 25 issues. I don’t want to break hearts like I had to with Green Wake. So, readers out there, if you love this series, please, spread the word.
Wiebe: I quite honestly buy mostly Image titles, and outside of Image it’s always creator owned. I’m reading Saga, Mind MGMT, Punk Rock Jesus, Mind the Gap and Harvest. Those are just a few off the top of my head, there’s more of course. I think we’re already seeing Justin Jordan exploding, he’ll be a top writer in the next few years. Which is great because he’s an awesome guy. Riley Rossmo is finally going to get the eyes on his work he’s always deserved with Nick Spencer’s Bedlam. I’ve seen the pages, and they are his best work yet (yes, even better than Debris). Joe Keatinge is also bursting onto the scene, writing a stack of Image titles and getting work at Marvel in a very short time so I bet we’ll be seeing him a lot more as the years go by.
IGN: In a world of Kickstarter, Image, and work-for-hire, what would your recommendations to aspiring creators be?
Wiebe: Creator owned. All the way. Own your worlds, your characters and your stories. Yeah, the money isn’t always great, and, let’s be honest, it can be downright terrible, but at the end of the day you are in full control of your story and nothing is worth more than that. We are hearing more all the time about dissatisfied creators walking away from the big two. There’s a reason for that, and it comes down to being able to tell a story without a thousand restrictions.
I love creative freedom.
Poet is a freelance writer, mid-core gamer, and frequent IGN contributor. Follow Poet on Twitter, or post a message on his IGN profile.
Last year, Image Comics launched a great new series called Witch Doctor, which we adored here at IGN Comics. Now, Witch Doctor scribe Brandon Seifert is prepping the second volume of the series alongside tackling the comic book adventures of some iconic genre franchises: Clive Barker's Hellraiser and Doctor Who. We caught up with him to see what he's unleashing on us this fall.
IGN Comics: First, congrats on all the new work. We’ll talk about this again closer to release, but what’s the status of the next volume of Witch Doctor?
Brandon Seifert: Witch Doctor: Mal Practice #1 (of 6) goes on sale November 28! I’m excited to finally be back — it’s been a little while since we did Vol. 1, but we wanted to make sure to “come correct” on this. So the whole mini-series is already written, and issues #1-3 were all drawn before we even announced the release date!
IGN: That's great to hear. Now, how did the Hellraiser and Doctor Who gigs come about?
Seifert: If we’re going to be perfectly honest, they came about because of Allison Baker — the co-publisher of MonkeyBrain Comics, and wife of writer Chris Roberson. Allison and Chris have always been super supportive of me and my work. Chris has written for both BOOM! and IDW, and Allison put in a good word for me at both of those companies. In the case of BOOM!, it led to them offering me a writing gig on the Hellraiser Annual that came out in April. In IDW’s case, I got in touch with them about something unrelated — and found out that Editor-in-Chief Chris Ryall had read Witch Doctor and thought my handling of that eccentric doctor character and his weird sci-fi adventures would translate well into me doing something on Doctor Who. And it so happened that I’d already pitched some ideas to Who editor Denton Tipton a few months before, because Doctor Who is one of my favorite things ever!
So — Allison, thanks again!
Seifert: I feel like the Hellraiser comics are very different from the movies. The movies are very self-contained, like horror movies tend to be — they have to be, if they’re going to give you any real sense of peril for the characters. When you’ve got a horror franchise that’s based on a hero rather than a villain, like Scream or something, that’s different because you’ve got a protagonist who you can reasonably expect is going to survive the movie — because they’re survived the past ones. The Hellraiser films aren’t like that.
But the comic series is about both the villain — Pinhead — and about the heroine — Kirsty Cotton. Kirsty’s been the heroine throughout the comic series — which kind of makes it less of a straight-up horror story, and more of a multi-genre piece. The Hellraiser comics have horror, but they’ve also got action and drama — same as Witch Doctor. So when I sit down and write a Hellraiser comic set in this universe, I’d argue it’s honestly more like Witch Doctor than like a Hellraiser film — although without the sci-fi element, and with way less humor.
As a writer, I like exploring the ramifications of things. In Witch Doctor, that shows up as we examine classic monsters you feel like you know, but then reveal there’s lots more going on with them than you expect, and it’s all tied into the darkest corners of real-world biology. In Hellraiser: The Road Below, I’m doing the same kind of exploration, but it’s with Kirsty Cotton, the choices she’s made and the power she now has.
IGN: What’s the general plot of Hellraiser: The Road Below?
Seifert: In the last couple years of the Hellraiser ongoing comic, Kirsty Cotton has gone from being the “final girl” of the first two movies, to being a Cenobite-hunter — and now, to being a Cenobite herself! Pinhead stepped down — and convinced her to become his replacement, so she could “change the system from the inside.” But when Kirsty became the new Pinhead, she realized that if Hell is evil, it’s a necessary evil.
Hellraiser: The Road Below is a sort of “year one” story, picking up really early in Kirsty’s time as the new Pinhead. This is Kirsty still really committed to carrying out Hell’s work, catching the people who deserve to be punished and bringing them back to Hell. She’s really convinced she’s doing something good for the universe... but there’s ramifications for her actions she’s not expecting. And when she’s summoned by a frightened mother who wanted to make a deal with a devil to save her child from a blood feud that’s almost wiped out their family, Kirsty’s going to learn just how true that whole thing about Hell and good intentions is!
IGN: While I’m not one of them, Hellraiser has a very passionate fanbase. How do you balance bringing your own vision to the story while staying true to what the fans want/expect from a Hellraiser story?
Seifert: That’s honestly hard, because I can’t really guess what Hellraiser fans “want,” and it’s easy to second-guess myself if I start doing that. At the end of the day, with Hellraiser or anything else, the only thing I can do is make sure I’m telling a story that I want to tell, and a story that I, as a reader and fan, want to read. And I’m doing stuff in The Road Below that I’ve wanted to read since I first got into Clive Barker back in high school — so I think that part is going well!
IGN: How involved is Clive Barker in the ongoing work of the Hellraiser comics?
Seifert: Hellraiser is definitely still Clive’s baby, and even in Hellraiser books like The Road Below that he’s not actually co-writing, he’s still there behind the scenes reading and vetting everything, and bringing things back onto the track he wants them on if they wander off it. And the ongoing Hellraiser title — that’s Clive. He’s co-writing it, and the other people he brings on are there to help implement his vision for the world and the characters.
IGN: Which Hellraiser movie is your favorite and why?
Seifert: I think the first one is still pretty unmatched — but I’ve got a lot of affinity for Hellbound: Hellraiser 2. This is the one where you got to see Hell, where you got to see people turned into Cenobites and where you got to see the Cenobites’ god, Leviathan. That’s my jam, right there. One of my favorite things about Clive’s work, the thing I found more inspiring when I got super-into his writing when I was in high school and my brain was all squishy and influence-able, was his worldbuilding and the scope of his vision.
The original Hellraiser is great, and it’s definitely the scariest movie in the series — but it doesn’t have the scope or the depth of Hellbound. Hellbound actually gets into the world of the Cenobites, who they are, where they come from and what they do — and that’s the sort of thing that interests me, as a fan and a writer.
Head over to Page 2 for some Doctor Who and Witch Doctor goodness!
According to sources close to IGN, Wayne Rooney will not appear on the cover of FIFA 13.
It's the first FIFA game in seven years not to carry the image of the Manchester United and England striker. Over the years, he's appeared alongside other footballers from the Premier League and other European leagues, including Frank Lampard and Kaka.
The world's best player Lionel Messi will appear front and centre on the FIFA 13 box (EA signed him up last November), flanked by two players, both presumably from the Premier League.
You can watch EA announce who's on the box at 6pm this evening via the YouTube livestream below:
Daniel is IGN's UK Staff Writer. You can be part of the world's worst cult by following him on IGN and Twitter.
Horror fans and '80s cult cinema lovers can rejoice! Image Entertainment will resurrect director Stuart Gordon's beloved cult horror classic, Re-Animator, on Blu-ray September 4, 2012. The film will also come to DVD the same day.
Here's a synopsis of the picture direct from Image, "Adapted by Dennis Paoli, William J. Norris and Stuart Gordon from the H.P. Lovecraft short story, Re-Animator tells the strange tale of medical student Dan Cain (Bruce Abbot) and his girlfriend Megan Halsey (Barbara Crampton), both of them drawn to odd new student Herbert West (Jeffrey Combs) who’s conducting secret experiments involving the re-animation of dead tissue. When one of the instructors, Dr. Carl Hill (David Gale), stumbles upon their activities, West murders him -- but is brought back to life, now thirsting for revenge as well as lusting after Megan. The final denouement features the re-animated Dr. Hill squaring off against Herbert and Dan in a battle royale within the school’s morgue, complete with resurrected “henchmen” and undoubtedly one of the greatest visual double entendres in all horror cinema!"
Re-Animator will be presented in 1.85:1, with a brand-new 1080p HD transfer approved by producer Brian Yuzna, featuring 5.1 DTS-HD Master Audio. Extras will include the following:
Suggested retail for the Blu-ray is $17.97. Amazon has the disc available for pre-order for $14.99.
As always, be sure to check back for more news regarding this title. And be sure to look for a review of Re-Animator on Blu-ray this fall.
R.L. Shaffer has seen things you people wouldn't believe. Attack ships on fire off the shoulder of Orion. He's watched C-beams glitter in the dark near the Tannhauser gate. And now you can follow his Twitter, Facebook and MyIGN for quotes, rants, reviews, news and more!
Point-and-shoot cameras offer pocket-friendly convenience, but the image quality rarely holds a candle to digital SLRs. Today, Canon is introducing a digital camera that could offer the best of both worlds without breaking the bank.
Canon U.S.A. Inc. announced on Monday the new EOS M Digital Camera, available this October for $799.99 SRP when bundled with the new EF-M 22mm f/2 STM kit lens. While a black model will be available everywhere cameras are sold, Canon will also be offering a white version exclusively on its online store.
The Canon EOS M isn't a full-fledged digital SLR, but the mirrorless 18-megapixel shooter offers an APS-C-sized CMOS image sensor inspired by the company's more expensive EOS technology, targeting both photographers and videographers alike.
"The EOS M includes a unique feature set making it an ideal movie-making tool, while also offering incredible still image quality on its APS-C-sized CMOS sensor," said Yuichi Ishizuka, executive vice president and general manager, Imaging Technologies & Communications Group, Canon U.S.A. "The camera's size, image quality, advanced video capabilities and the versatility of Canon's full lineup of lenses make the EOS M another great option to help our customers record and capture their creative vision."
Canon is also debuting a pair of M-series lenses with the EOS M. The EF-M 22mm f/2 STM kit lens is aimed at general shooting of video or still images with a fixed focal length lens with an aperture of f/2, while the EF-M 18-55mm f/3.5-5.6 IS STM ($299.99 SRP) offers variable zoom range for both video or still imagery. A $149.99 SRP Speedlite 90EX flash unit will also debut in October.
EOS M owners won't be limited strictly to M-series lenses, however. An optional Mount Adapter EF-EOS M ($199.99 SRP) allows the use of any Canon EF or EF-S lens, making it quite a versatile little addition to the Canon lineup.
A couple of months back, we brought you an enlightening chat with our good friend and Image Comics writer Kurtis Wiebe about his new series Debris, which re-teams him with his Green Wake cohort Riley Rossmo to deliver a fantasy epic inspired by the likes of Final Fantasy.
The story centers on Maya, the last hope of humanity, as she's forced to battle the spirits of Earth that take the form of gigantic monsters made of junk. And yeah, it's as cool as it sounds. Courtesy of Image Comics, take a look at the first issue, which hits stands next week.
Final Fantasy Inspires New Comic
Joey is IGN's Comics Editor and a comic book creator himself. Follow Joey on Twitter, or find him on IGN. He will love Star Wars until the end of his days.
