In this day of reboots and refreshes, “New” and “First” issues and universes, it’s nice to know that beyond the comic book publishing industry’s elementary drive for sales alone, there’s still an art to the art form of comic books and sequential storytelling.
You can make the argument both ways: that we used to see the comic book art form pushed further a decade or to ago and that we see if pushed further than ever now. Still, it’s always noteworthy when one of the two big publishers, Marvel Comics and DC Comics, do something out of the ordinary – something that celebrates the medium we all love.
And that’s what we get today with the Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1.
Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1
Written by: Various
Illustrated by: Various
Published by: Vertigo Comics
Leave it to Vertigo Comics, the more mature and sophisticated imprint of DC Comics, to push at the sequential storytelling medium again. Especially given the recent decline of the imprint’s importance to its parent publisher.
Vertigo, God bless it, is still kicking.
Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1 is the first of four extra-sixed anthology-story issues that follow a theme: CMYK.
For those of you working in the graphic design industry, you’ll what those four letters mean: Cyan, Magenta, Yellow and Black – the four colours that form the foundation of comic book colouring. Those four colours, mixed in varying degrees, make every other colour that you see in the pages of your favourite superhero, horror, sci-fi, dramatic or action periodical. And, like all the best Vertigo Comics offerings, we’re told that Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1 and it’s three subsequent issues, Quarterly: Magenta #1, Quarterly: Yellow #1, Quarterly: Black #1, released each season this year, will push the boundaries and conventions of traditional comic book storytelling.
In the Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1, some of the medium’s greatest storytellers tell their tales, with the colour cyan suggesting a particular mood. Here you’ll find Jock, Fabio Moon, James Tynion IV, Amy Chu, Joe Keatinge, Robert Rodi, Shaun Simon, Cris Peter, Tony Akins and many more.
With 80 brilliant, multi-genre pages, make the run to your local comic book shop today and pick up Vertigo Quarterly: Cyan #1. Here, colour and the art form runs deep!
Every Wednesday, JP makes the after-work run to his local downtown comic book shop. Comics arrive on Wednesdays you see and JP, fearful that the latest issue will sell out, rushes out to purchase his copy. This regular, weekly column will highlight a particularly interesting release, written in short order, of course, because JP has to get his – before someone else does!
