Anyone who reads comic books is familiar with the name Mark Waid, not only as a writer of one of the best series on the market, Daredevil, but also as a writer of many celebrated series such as Kingdom Come, The Flash, Fantastic Four, and many, many more. He is also an innovator in the world of comics, having worked as Editor-in-Chief of BOOM! Studios for a time before starting his own digital comics platform, Thrillbent.

Thrillbent recently made a change to their business model allowing readers to subscribe to every book Thrillbent releases for $3.99 a month, or readers can continue to buy issues individually. To celebrate this change, Thrillbent is offering new readers a free copy of Waid and penciller Barry Kitson’s series Empire, originally released in 2000. Empire tells the story of Golgoth, a classic megalomaniacal super-villain who has conquered the world before the first issue even starts. The series is an examination of the character and the world he has created for himself.

Thrillbent will also be home to the all-new second volume of Empire, which reunites Waid and Kitson to tell the continuing story of Golgoth and where he goes after the events of volume one. Chapter two of the new series is available now, and the series is just as intriguing and thought-provoking as it was the first time. You can also read the first chapter of Empire Vol. 2 for free right now.

I was able to talk to Waid about not just Empire, but also the future of Thrillbent, as well as what goes into writing Daredevil. You can see what he had to say and also some preview images below.

Summer is upon us! And if you’re like me, you’re no doubt spending time in the great outdoors, enjoying some fun in the sun: picnics, lemonade, playing beach volleyball while listening to Kenny Loggins and giving your shirtless friends elaborate high-fives…

Oh, who are we kidding? I’m inside, next to an air conditioner, waiting for my next trip to the comic book store. And later today when I arrive at my (hopefully air conditioned) destination, here are the top three comic books I plan on purchasing:

That Brian K. Vaughan is a pretty popular guy right now. He’s got one of the most popular comic books on the stands in Saga from Image Comics, and the film version of his Y: The Last Man series seems to be moving forward again. Vaughan launched a new project this week at panelsyndicate.com titled The Private Eye. The series is written by Vaughan with art by Marcos Martin (The Amazing Spider-Man, Daredevil) and colors by Muntsa Vicente. The plan is for the series to run 10 issues and is available digitally. Now here’s the big deal about it: readers can download the issues for any price they want, starting with the 32-page issue #1 available now.

We’ve seen this done before, most notably when the band Radiohead released their 2007 album In Rainbows with the same “pay what you like” model. And there are other comics that have been released digitally outside of the major publishers, perhaps most notably Mark Waid’s Thrillbent webpage. The Private Eye seems to be a unique pairing of digital publishing and a new way to make money off comics.