Criminal Macabre: Final Night #1
The 30 Days of Night Crossover
Written by Steve Niles
Art by Christopher Mitten
Cover by Justin Erickson
Dark Horse Comics
Release date: December 12, 2012
Cover price: $3.99

To say that Steve Niles has created the best of both worlds when it comes to horror and crime-pulp-noir with his two most well known properties, Criminal Macabre and 30 Days of Night, is an understatement. Any fan of horror, crime comics, or novels of the like would absolutely love these stories and the revolving cast of characters.

Criminal Macabre is about Cal McDonald, a former cop turned supernatural detective, who with the aid of his ghoul sidekick Mo’lock battle the forces of evil and get just as wasted doing so. 30 Days of Night is the story of vampires attacking a small Alaskan town named Barrow, where the sun goes down for a month and vampires are free to roam. Steve Niles has written several mini-series and novels based on the characters from both properties. 30 Days of Night was adapted as a major motion picture as well as the second story in the series, Dark Days, which was a direct-to-DVD movie. Needless to say, both titles have a lot of history behind them and this story has been building for a long time.

Creator-Owned Heroes #5
Written by Steve Niles, Jay Russell, Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray
Art by Andrew Ritchie, Jerry Lando
Covers by Dave Johnson, Andrew Ritchie
Image Comics
Release Date: October 10, 2012
Cover Price: $3.99

Creator-Owned Heroes helps fill the huge void in my monthly comic experience left by the demise of Wizard magazine. This comic/magazine features two serialized comics and articles focused on independent creators. This is my go-to source each month to hear comic creative types talk shop and shower us with tidbits of advice.

The previous issue concluded the stories of American Muscle and Trigger Girl 6. Creator-Owned Heroes #5 kicks off two new stories and, as always, includes fantastic articles to guide wannabe creators on the path to riches and fame.

Criminal Macabre: The Iron Spirit
Story by Steve Niles
Art and Lettering by Scott Morse
Edited by Scott Allie and Daniel Chabon
Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: September 12, 2012
Cover Price: $19.99

Writer Steve Niles may have had greater success with works like 30 Days of Night, but it’s the embittered hunter of the supernatural demons, Cal McDonald, that is his iconic character and the one Niles has continually returned to for 22 years. And, after all this time, it seems as though Cal is having a bit of an existential crisis with his current predicament.

Criminal Macabre: The Iron Spirit takes a little excursion from the main narrative of the series – the war between man and seemingly every supernatural monster ever dreamed – to do a one-shot detective story. When the book opens, Cal is trying to come to grips with his recent… undeath. The bad is that he can’t sleep, he has no blood, and his hands are kind of cold and clammy; the good is he can still drink and smoke (and do both without the adverse health effects, I assume, so: bonus?) and has picked up the ability to sense other members of the undead. I’m sure Niles will explore it further, but whatever rules he has for the undead, the message seems to be that there is no relief from life in undeath. Or, as Cal put it: “I seemed pretty much like myself, just dead and tooling around like before.” The mechanics of being undead are perhaps the most interesting thing about this comic, and I don’t mean that as a backhanded insult. It’s the kind of thing that keeps Cal compelling beyond the mysteries he’s trying to solve.

Creator-Owned Heroes #2
Written by Steve Niles, Jimmy Palmiotti, Justin Gray
Art by Phil Noto, Kevin Mellon
Letters by Bill Tortolini
Image Comics
Release Date: July 4, 2012
Cover Price: $3.99

Creator-Owned Heroes is Image’s new monthly series that highlights the original content of established comic book talent. More than “just a comic,” it’s a feature-packed magazine that celebrates creative independence. How appropriate that the second issue was released on the 4th of July. You definitely get your money’s worth; this book is loaded with content with two ongoing comic series, interviews, editorials, and how-to features.

The comic book portion, which makes up about two-thirds of the book, continues the Triggergirl and American Muscle series that kicked off last month. American Muscle is a post-apocalyptic, zombie-ish story where human immune systems have completely stopped functioning. The comic follows a small group of survivors and their search for a safe, permanent place to start a new life. In the last issue, they made their way to Los Angeles only to discover that it has become a zombie-riddled wasteland that’s falling into the Pacific Ocean.

Each and every week “Firework Fred” MK2Fac3 and “Firecracker Frank” Henchman21 read a lot of comics. Seriously you guys, a lot of comics. Maybe too many comics. I mean, it is possible”¦ theoretically. They look forward to some more than others, I mean, who doesn’t? So, let’s take a look into the depths of their pull lists, grab some comics, and we’ll let YOU know what the top books to look forward to are for the week of July 4, 2012. Single issues and trades, they’re all here.

Um, yeah, sorry about the delay, folks! We were just sitting over here drinking non-alcoholic beverages in celebration of freedom and such, so we got a little too distracted by the holiday to get this up in time. You forgive us, right? Sure you do. I mean, I’m sure that you might have gotten distracted by all the booms and crackering of fireworks too and missed picking up new comics, right? That’s what I thought. Well, there’s a decent amount of stuff that came out this week, but a lot of it is more new issues than new comics, you know what I mean? Not a lot of fresh pickings. Nonetheless, you should read on because there are new comics to love and behold. Which ones? Like I said, you’ll need to read on for The GoD List.