The Robert Kirkman/Rob Liefeld collaboration The Infinite apparently isn't going to live up to its name. Responding to a fan asking about upcoming issues of the series on Twitter, Liefeld said quite simply, "Infinite is over."The Infinite launched with some fanfare last summer, as it teamed the Image partner and popular writer Kirkman (Walking Dead, Invinicible) with Image founder and popular artist Liefeld, uniting top talents from two generations of Image creators on a single book. The high-concept premise was that a grizzled, middle-aged soldier fighting a losing war in the future who travels 20 years back in time to team-up with "the only ally he knows he can trust," himself.

Four issues of the series were produced and published, but the fifth issue, scheduled for an October release, was rescheduled for next month. Image had solicited the book through April's eighth issue. The ever-optimistic Liefeld didn't seem too terribly broken up about the book's demise, noting that instead of 11 books, he'll only be producing 10.

Liefeld added further that "creative differences have sunk" the book, and that he "tried a new inker over 14 pages" of the series' unreleased fifth issue, and "loved 'em- but split decision w/Skybound." Skybound is Kirkman's imprint at Image Comics, through which The Infinite was being produced.

The Infinite also wasn't the pair's first work as a creative team on a book that didn't quite work out. They had previously collaborated on a Killraven miniseries for Marvel Comics that was announced in 2007 but never materialized, and Kirkman wrote the troubled 2009 miniseries Image United, for which Liefeld and five other Image founders were illustrating their own characters in jam-style art pages. Only three of the planned six issues have shipped to date.

Liefeld is currently in the midst of something of a career renaissance. He drew the first few issues of DC's "New 52" relaunch of Hawk and Dove, the very characters he was working on when he first came to fandom's attention in the late-eighties and was announced as taking over the writing duties as well... before DC decided to axe the title. That announcement was shortly followed by another stating that Liefeld would take over writing and art duties on DC's Deathstroke, and would be plotting two other titles, Savage Hawkman and Grifter.

Meanwhile, Image Comics has been relaunching Liefeld-created Extreme Studios characters and concepts by new creators, to the acclaim of many fans and critics (including our own, in the case of Glory and Prophet). Kirkman has plenty to keep him busy as well, including his comics Invinicible, Walking Dead and Super Dinosaur.

Perhaps for their next collaboration they should choose a less open-ended title than The Infinite. Maybe Here's Hoping...

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