Dynamite signed a deal with CBS Consumer Products to
create a comic book series based on one of the most captivating television
shows of all time, The Twilight Zone, featuring all-new tales of science and
superstition as written by acclaimed author and Babylon 5 creator J. Michael
Straczynski, one of the privileged few celebrated as a Special Guest of San
Diego Comic-Con International 2013.
"One of the most deeply satisfying and creatively
exciting experiences I've had in 25 years of writing for television and film
was my stint on the new Twilight Zone television series," says
Straczynski. "I've been a fan of
the original series since I was tall enough to reach for the TV tuner. So I was profoundly excited when Nick
Barrucci came to me with the possibility of doing the new Twilight Zone comic
to come out from Dynamite."
The Twilight Zone took millions of television viewers on
a weekly journey to another dimension, starting in 1959. The enduring success of The Twilight Zone
spawned three revival series (one of which featured episodes written by J.
Michael Straczynski), a feature film, novels, comics, and other related
merchandise.
Regarding the unique nature of The Twilight Zone series,
Straczynski says, "The immediate creative question to be resolved was: how
do you transplant or adapt the TV anthology format into comic form? Individual stand-alone issues don't give the
issue-to-issue continuity you need to consistently bring in modern readers, and
if it's a year long arc, it's not an anthology.
The solution: three four-issue arcs that are connected by theme,
character, and location... so that in reading one arc you get one side of the
story, with its own supernatural or science-fiction elements, then you turn the
character around to another character in that sequence who has his or her own
story for the next four issues... and then at the end, you connect all of these
individual stories into one overlapping tapestry, so you could literally view
the book as individual stories as initially published, or layer the pages to
create one big story. It's a cool
structure that I'm not sure has been attempted before, so this will be an awful
lot of fun. I'm very excited to be
working with Nick and his team on this book, and hope folks will check out the
books when they come out."
J. Michael Straczynski is the perfect choice to reinvent
a television icon for the comics medium after spending many successful years
straddling both media. In television,
Straczynski has written over 300 produced episodes and six TV movies. In film, Straczynski's credits include five
produced movies in six years: Changeling for director Clint Eastwood, Ninja
Assassin for the Wachowkis, Thor for Kenneth Branagh, Underworld Awakening, and
World War Z for Paramount and Brad Pitt.
He has written nearly 400 published comics for Marvel, DC and Image,
including The Amazing Spider-Man for seven years, followed by Thor, The Fantastic
Four, Before Watchmen, and others.
"It's a thrill, an absolute thrill, to not only
develop new tales for Twilight Zone, but to welcome J. Michael Straczynski as
our honored host," says Nick Barrucci, CEO and Publisher of Dynamite. "We've wanted to work with him for
years, and it's finally materializing with this perfect combination:
Straczynski and Twilight Zone, together again!
The energy and enthusiasm behind the scenes is going to yield some truly
mind-blowing science fiction."