Joe Casey & Mike Huddleston Unsheath ‘Butcher Baker’ at Image

Throughout November Image Comics released every few days a new teaser image for a mysterious and unnamed new series. In a lengthy interview with Comic Book Resources, comics writer Joe Casey (Gødland, Final Crisis Aftermath: Dance) revealed that series is Butcher Baker, The Righteous Maker. Debuting in March 2011 and illustrated by Mike Huddleston (Gen13) the series is a "superexploitation," ultra-violent tale about a retired superhero that Casey promises will give readers "more f*ck for their buck."

Check after the jump for more on Butcher Baker, including the complete set of teasers.

Butcher Baker appears to be a continuation of the over-the-top format-twisting that's become Joe Casey's trademark. As Officer Downe took on the archetype of the unkillable cop and Gødland comments on the cosmic epic, Butcher Baker is a deranged twist on the all-American tough guy.

"He's seen it all and he's got the scars to prove it," said [Casey]. "He drives a powerhouse rig appropriately decorated in the stars and bars called the Liberty Belle. But it's been a while since Butcher was on the front lines of superhero action, [and] as our story opens, he is called into service to tie up a loose end from his glory days. That loose end is the catalyst to a life-altering adventure that will test this guy on every conceivable level."

While it's still too early for Casey to get into the story in a more detailed way, one gets a good sense of what Butcher Baker is about, tonally, from the uncommonly huge number of teaser images, whose text and artwork were taken directly from the completed comics. The endeavor was initiated by Casey and Image Comics publisher Eric Stephenson, both of whom agreed comic book promotion has stagnated creatively.

"Everything's been done, there's a lot of white noise out there, from one-off teasers to Photoshopped scam jobs. And I'm not saying this isn't more white noise - it definitely is - but the idea appealed to me more as an art project than it did as flat-out promotion. Comics are fun, so it stands to reason to try and make every step of the process as fun as possible. We had plenty of finished art at our fingertips, entire issues were in the can so we could cherry pick the most effective images, so we figured, 'Why not?' I've heard that some folks figured out right away what we were teasing, so it wasn't about the 'mystery' of the whole thing. It was a performance piece, more than anything else."