One Month To Live

No, not me (I hope). Rather it’s a Marvel weekly mini-series, coming in September, and I’m writing issue two, featuring Spider-Man. So, I get to write Spider-Man. Did I mention I get to write Spider-Man?

Spider-Man.

That’s one of Mike Fyles’ killer covers for the series. And Koi Turnbull (Fathom) is drawing #2.

Anyway, this has been a really interesting process for me. Four writers – Rick Remender, Stuart Moore, John Ostrander and myself – are all writing individual issues (Rick’s bookending it with #1 and #5), and, starting with a conference call off the back of Rick’s script for #1, we’ve acted as a kind of email ‘writer’s room’ throughout the plotting. Everyone’s contributed ideas and notes, everyone has been very cool, supportive and respectful of each other and it seems to have worked out really well. I’ve never been involved in something this collaborative with the writing before and it’s been really enjoyable and quite inspiring. Put us on a tour bus together for a year and we’d no doubt end up with major substance abuse issues, fatal light airplane crashes, cousin marrying, divorces and jail time, but this has really worked. And generated a story that could be something quite powerful (we hope).

ONE MONTH TO LIVE tells the tale of Dennis Sykes, an ordinary guy in New York who, in true Marvel tradition, suffers an accident that gives him superpowers. The catch is that the accident also leaves him with one month to live. So, the question is, what does he do with the time left to him?

Also solicited for September is GHOST RIDER: SHADOWLAND by myself and Clayton Crain. I’ve discussed this previously, but here’s the cover and the solicit.

SHADOWLAND TIE-IN! When the Spirit Of Vengeance is summoned to the front lines of the battle for the soul of New York, Ghost Rider finds himself a pawn in a larger game, and if he wants his freedom back he’s going have to head for Japan and take on the might of The Hand where its power is strongest – in its home base. But in the far east, he’ll find everyone’s afraid of something… even the Ghost Rider.

Also solicited in September is the brilliant Laurence Campbell’s new series DEADPOOL PULP. I’ve seen a lot of the pages for this and it looks gorgeous. Well worth picking up.

And, while I’m plugging friends’ stuff, Paul Cornell’s ACTION COMICS run starts at the end of June. That’s a dream job and perfect for Paul, I think. I’ll be buying.