Luigi Anderson

Of all the comics that could indulge in one of my beloved Holiday Specials, Flash Gordon seems like a pretty unlikely candidate. I mean, now that I think of it, if comics can give us that story where Superboy gets caught up in the Christmas Spirit and decides to get the Legion of Super-Heroes to hunt down the star that the Magi followed to the manger and ends up rescuing a race of alien bird-people from a flood in what can only very charitably be called a miracle, I guess you can wring a little holiday cheer out of just about anything. Still, the adventures of three humans trapped in an alien empire full of tree monsters and beast-men doesn't quite seem like it would easily lend itself to the spirit of the season. And yet, that's exactly what the folks at Dynamite have done with the new Flash Gordon Holiday Special one-shot, and while I could not possibly be more in the target audience for this thing -- my interest in space adventure is only outstripped by my love of Christmas -- it's well worth picking up.

Today at San Diego Comic-Con, Oni Press announced its latest ongoing creator-owned book, The Auteur, which is slated to make Hollywood start feeling a burning sensation in the spring of 2014. So what's it all about? Having had the opportunity to check out an advance copy of the first issue by Rick Spears (Black Metal), artist James Callahan (Barf Comics) and colorist Luigi Anderson, I can say that