Angel: After the Fall

The new Buffy The Vampire series has been one of the biggest hits for the comic book market in the past five years. Bringing many people who might not have otherwise ever visited a comic shop in droves. This week IDW seeks to capitalize on Dark Horse's success with Angel: After the Fall.

It's the same concept that the Buffy book is working with, picking up right where the TV series left off. For legal reasons (which I don't know sadly), this isn't being marketed as Angel season six, and I was thinking that might have left some readers confused, that it's just another spin-off book. But make no mistake, these are the canonical adventures of Angel and crew. And while Whedon's name may not appear in the writing credits, he is involved heavily with the project. Former Spike scribe Brian Lynch will be writing the comic, but Whedon is the one who has laid the groundwork. The two writers talked heavily during the planning stages of the comic, with Whedon laying out where he and the other writers had been planning to take the series. While some of the ideas were scrapped, many that would have never made it into the TV show will be seen in the comic. Why? Because there's no special effects budget in comics.

It's just as easy (relatively), for an artist, in this case Spaniard Franco Urru, to draw Angel riding a giant dragon as it for him to draw a bunch of talking heads. Maybe even easier. And yes, there is a giant dragon, and it is the dragon from the last episode. He too was misled by Wolfram & Hart, so now he's working with Angel. But as far as the rest of Angel's pals, Lynch is remaining silent. I guess we'll just have to read it to find out. If you want to know more, and knowing is half the battle, check out this interview with Lynch over at the Comic Book Resources. Ciao.

-Dan