Britannia

Last year, Britannia --- the prestige murder mystery miniseries set in Ancient Rome, from Peter Milligan and Juan Jose Ryp --- took a lot of people by surprise, but showed that Valiant remains a publisher that'll keep you guessing with the genres and conventions it'll pull out of its hat. Next month, Rome's first and only detective, Antonius Axia, returns for a new mystery and Valiant have provided us a preview of the first issue.

I'm a pretty big fan of learning about history, but one thing that I've learned from reading up on ancient Rome is that most of those stories suffer from a truly alarming lack of monsters with sixteen eyes and a dozen clawed tentacles showing up to make things interesting. But fortunately, as always, comic books are here to improve upon reality, and when Britannia #2 hits shelves in October, it's bringing horrifying monsters with it. As writer Peter Milligan teased in his interview about the series here at CA, he and artist Juan Jose Ryp are ramping up the supernatural horror as the series continues, and you can get a first look right here. Check out the preview below!

In Britannia, Peter Milligan, Juan José Ryp and Jordie Bellaire tell the story of the world's first detective, a Roman centurion with an unusual understanding of psychology. When something that defies his knack for logic causes a murderous kind of trouble in the far reaches of the Empire, he's sent away from his home in the city to a colony far to the north --- and given the title of the series, you can probably guess which one. To find out more about the series, which launches in September from Valiant, ComicsAlliance spoke to Milligan about his approach to introducing a "detectioner" into the ancient world, the challenges of creating a character who combines modern sensibilities with Roman society, and the historical facts that informed his story. We also got an exclusive look at pages from the upcoming issue.