Look to the skies—it’s the “Alien Invasion” issue! Beings making planetfall include Starro the Conqueror, Aliens, Predator, Alien Legion, D.R. and Quinch, and more oddities sure to please. Featuring the work of David Michelinie, Gerry Conway, Bart Sears, Mark Verheiden, Mark A. Nelson, Chris Warner, Randy Stradley, Carl Potts, Frank Cirocco, Larry Stroman, Chuck Dixon, Alan Davis, and others. Starro the Conqueror cover by Brian Bolland! Edited by Roger Ash.

Keith Giffen Tribute Issue! A star-studded celebration of the work of the prolific writer/artist of Legion of Super-Heroes, Rocket Raccoon, Guardians of the Galaxy, Justice League, Lobo, Blue Beetle, and many more hits from the Bronze Age and beyond! Featuring Cary Bates, Tom Bierbaum, J. M. DeMatteis, Dan DiDio, Robert Loren Fleming, Cully Hamner, Scott Koblish, Paul Levitz, Kevin Maguire, Bart Sears, Mark Waid, and more! Re-presenting the cover of Son of Ambush Bug #6 by Giffen and Bob Oksner. Edited by Michael Eury and Roger Ash.

Steve Englehart is spotlighted in CBC #37 in a comprehensive, career-spanning interview, with emphasis on his glorious ’70s work as top comics writer. Plus, with the help of former DC Comics' romance editor Barbara Friedlander, we redeem the once sullied name of her mentor, the late, great DC editor Jack Miller, whose career was bought to an ignominious end by company management while he suffered a fatal malady. Also, Dan Didio shares about his entry as DC exec to become the company’s co-publisher in the second portion of Greg Biga's interview with the writer extraordinaire. We also conclude our 100th birthday celebration for Arnold Drake with the final portion of an amazing conversation with the brilliant late scribe, examining his creation of The Doom Patrol and work on The X-Men! We also finally present our long-promised look at the 1970s underground comix oddity, The Funny Pages, with help from the comic tabloid's editor, Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs creator Ron Barrett! Also included, natch, are our regular departments such as Hembeck's latest Dateline strip.

Alter Ego #188 is a special double-size (160-page) issue with twin (flip) covers—one for Marvel, one for DC—celebrating 25 years of Alter Ego at TwoMorrows! The Marvel side includes David Armstrong’s Comic-Con mini-interviews with John Buscema, Marie Severin, Jim Mooney, and George Tuska—plus “Stan Lee’s Dinner with Alain Resnais,” as annotated by Sean Howe! On the DC side: Armstrong’s short talks with Carmine Infantino, John Broome, Julius Schwartz, Joe Kubert, & Murphy Anderson—plus a special photo-feature on Gardner Fox, featuring his extended family! All this, plus FCA, Mr. Monster's Comic Crypt, and more!

IN THE NEWS! From the Boys' Brotherhood Republic newsletter of his childhood, to rare newspaper interviews with Jack and articles about his career, we're clipping anything and everything about Kirby that has to do with newsprint! There's a never-published 1973 San Diego Con panel with Jack discussing DC's coloring with Neal Adams, newly discovered strips that Jack ghosted for other syndicated artists (including Frank Giacoia on Johnny Reb & Billy Yank), unused newspaper strip concepts, collages, a never-reprinted Simon & Kirby Headline Comics tale, a Jimmy Olsen and the Newsboy Legion pencil art gallery, our regular columnists, Mark Evanier’s 2024 Kirby Tribute Panel from Comic-Con International, and more! With an unused Jimmy Olsen cover inked by syndicated cartoonist David Reddick.

“This time no one gets out alive, for I, your very own Cryptologist, have unleashed the walking dead for the sixth issue of my putrescent tome! It’s a gathering of zombies, journeying back to the films White Zombie and I Walked With A Zombie, before venturing on into the zombie apocalypse of George Romero and Lucio Fulci’s foul imagining. We also stagger through zombies that ran amok in the comic books of the pre-Code years, Bernie Wrightson’s cadaverous creations, and the decomposing abominations that overwhelmed the horror comics of Brazil. The contribution made by the black stars of classic horror cinema is consummately explored, digging out a few more of this atrophied brethren. But I can see you want more—so we have The Plague of Zombies in our Hammertime section, Fantaco’s macabre interpretation of Night of the Living Dead and the chilling Revenant from France. This decrepitude will have you frothing at the mouth, and it’s available especially for retro horror fans, by Tim Leese, Mark Voger, Steve & Michael Kronenberg, and editor Peter Normanton!”

"Heh-heh-heh, it’s me again—the Cryptologist—and my ghastly little band have cooked up a few more grisly morsels to terrorize you with! Amongst them is Roger Hill’s conversation with diabolical horror (and superhero) comics artist Don Heck! For something even more gruesome, Steven Kronenberg slices up his favorite severed hand films! Barry Forshaw brings back the otherworldly horrors of Hammer’s Quatermass, while Tim Leese spends more Hammer Time on that studio’s output. Then, editor Peter Normanton prepares a viewing of horror-inspired covers from the Shadow’s own 1940s comic book! We’ll cover another Killer “B” movie classic, Conrad Veidt and “The Man Who Laughs!,” along with more pre-Code comic books, and Pete Von Sholly offers his twisted take on cartoon horror. So peer into the dark side with TwoMorrows Publishing’s latest terror—scribed just for retro horror fans!"

Feel the G-Force of Eighties sci-fi toon Battle of the Planets! Plus: The Girl from U.N.C.L.E.’s Stefanie Powers, athlete-turned-actor Chuck Connors, The Oddball World of SCTV, Rankin/Bass’ stop-motion Santa Claus Is Coming to Town, Kiss My Grits—Television’s Greatest Catchphrases, one-season TV shows, and more! Featuring columns by Andy Mangels, Will Murray, Scott Saavedra, Scott Shaw, and Mark Voger. Edited by Michael Eury.