Over the past few years, it's become a sort of guessing game among comics fans whether a new comics miniseries or original graphic novel was really a stealth screenplay its creators were hoping would catch Hollywood's attention.

Amazon Studios, the online retail giant's movie and TV development wing, is erasing any mystery from the equation with its first foray into digital comics, Blackburn Burrow. It's been asking fans directly whether the Ron Marz/Matthew Dow Smith/12 Gauge Comics adaptation of a screenplay by J.H. Levy should be developed for the silver screen. You can judge for yourself by reading the first issue, embedded using the Graphic.ly reader, after the jump.


Amazon Studios' press release announcing the comic explains how the horror-Western project came about: "Community feedback, gathered from Amazon Studios' crowdsourcing model, triggered the idea for the popular project to be adapted into a digital comic that would be shared with audiences for feedback and tested for viability as a major motion picture."

The company hasn't skimped on talent for its first comic project. Writer Ron Marz has long runs on titles including Green Lantern, Silver Surfer and Witchblade on his résumé, and artist Matthew Dow Smith has worked on Hellboy, Doctor Who and several X-books, not to mention his own MonkeyBrain Comics title, October Girl.

Voting in this month's survey to determine whether Blackburn Burrow should become a movie has closed--Amazon hit its limit of 5,000 surveys taken in just over a day, likely because it was offering a $5 gift card for the trouble--but readers will have an opportunity to take another one when issue two hits the Web next month.

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