Wednesday, February 17, 2010

SFX Publisher Future Launches "Comic Heroes" Quarterly Magazine


'Twas just a matter of time, I suppose. Powerhouse UK publisher Future, which produces the 150-page science fiction media magazine SFX, among other titles, is launching a quarterly magazine devoted to comics. Called Comic Heroes, the new magazine will be unveiled in mid-March in the UK; no word yet when it'll show up in the colonies.

The new magazine will be 132 pages and will sell in the UK for £7.99; it will be 132 pages. (A normal issue of SFX costs just £3.99 and retails in the United States for about $9.99, so expect Comic Heroes to be a wallet-killer.)  The move to create a comics-focused magazine comes after a superhero special issue of SFX, which proved to be one of the most successful issues ever, according to The Guardian newspaper.

It's a good move, though I hope they won't be too parochial to superheroes. Of the two parts of its name, it's the "comic" that interests me the most. The Guardian article plays up the superhero aspect quite a lot, and it makes sense that they would focus on popular superhero comics, TV programs, and movies. But, writing as someone who never found superheroes to be all that interesting, I hope they will cover the vast array of other interesting non-superhero comics out there. In fact, it was always the lesser-known comics articles that interested me in (all three iterations of the late, great) Comics Scene magazine. That was the magazine that introduced me to Cerebus the Aardvaark, to mention only one.

(And, because this blog glories in diversionary asides, did you know there's a Cerebus Wiki? Yup.)

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