Matthew Dow Smith

With Should I Be Reading… ?, ComicsAlliance hopes to offer you a guide to some of the best original ongoing comics being published today. This week, we're focusing on fantasy comics as part of a week of articles looking at the very best in the genre. From urban fantasy to high fantasy, from the sword and sorcery of Conan to the magic and madness of Doctor Strange, the fantastical has always offered a rich vein of imaginative worlds to explore, and we're putting the spotlight on some of the very best. Started in 2012, The October Girl is a Monkeybrain Comics series by Matthew Dow Smith that explores the world of reality, fantasy, and everything in between.

I'll admit that I don't know a whole lot about The X-Files. I mean, I know that there's a dude who really wants to believe in aliens, and I know that --- if the screen-shots I see every now and then on Tumblr are to be believed --- there's a lady who's just so done with his nonsense, but that's pretty much it. Despite being around for its original run, I never really watched the show. And I think that might be because we never really got to see their origin stories. I mean, yes, I've heard that the show begins with the two lead characters meeting for the first time, but what if we could go further back? What if we could see them investigating spooky mysteries... as teens?! Now, thanks to the miracle of modern comic books, we can. Next week, IDW is launching X-Files Origins, a new series aimed at young adult readers in which Faith writer Jody Houser and Doctor Who artist Matthew Dow Smith show Mulder and Scully's first investigations, long before they join the FBI.

Now that I've rewatched the entire series as an adult, I have a very hard time picking out my single favorite story arc from Batman '66. When I was a kid, though, there was no question: It had to be the three-part story where Batman and Robin sailed across the Atlantic to far-off Londinium to battle foggy crimes in merry old England. If nothing else, I think that it appealed to my childhood sense that our country's greatest export was costumed crime-fighting. Now, though, it's time for England to repay the favor by sending their own dynamic duo to the fair shores of Gotham City --- and that's exactly what's happening in Batman '66 Meets Steed and Mrs. Peel, the '60s TV crossover that pretty much had to happen. Check out a preview of the book's second chapter!

When it came to 1960s action television, two campy crimefighting series captured the attention of audiences the world over. The first was Batman, the legendary Adam West/Burt Ward series that brought the Day-Glo hijinks of the comics to TV. The other is The Avengers, a long-running spy/science fiction --- or "spy-fi" if you will --- series from Doctor Who co-creator Sydney Newman. The best known seasons of The Avengers paired Patrick McNee's "top professional " John Steed with Diana Rigg as the stylish "talented amateur" Mrs. Emma Peel. Although they've starred in their own comics before under the title Steed & Mrs Peel (to avoid confusion with those other Avengers) --- including comics written by Mark Waid and Grant Morrison --- now the pair cross paths with the Dynamic Duo in Batman '66 Meets Steed & Mrs. Peel, by Ian Edginton, Matthew Dow Smith and Jordie Bellaire. Judging by this first chapter, readers are in for a treat.

Batman ‘66 sure is getting around a lot these days, having recently crossed over with other classic '60s properties like The Green Hornet and The Man From UNCLE. Now, this summer, Gotham’s greatest crimefighters are teaming up with the sharpest spies from across the pond in Batman ‘66 Meets Steed And Mrs. Peel.

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 Bu

Most likely - unless you've skipped the rest of the Internet for the last few days as well as the most recent War Rocket Ajax - you already know about the existence of Monkeybrain Comics, the new digital publisher founded by Chris Roberson and Allison Baker...