John Constantine has been part of the New 52 from the very beginning with the Justice League: Dark series. However, prior to the DC universe reboot back in September 2011, Constantine had his own solo title under DC's mature comic book line, Vertigo. Well news today reveals that with issue #300 in February, Constantine's Vertigo series will come to an end and a New 52 solo series for the character will begin.
Issue #300 of Hellblazer will be written by Peter Milligan with art from Giuseppe Camuncoli and Stefano Landini. However in the New 52, writer Robert Venditti will launch the tile with Renato Guedes handling the art duties.
Said Venditti,
"He's going to be the same age that he is in Justice League Dark and the same character that people know and recognize - the drinking and smoking, the con man aspect of him - that's going to be very much part of the series.
"He is devious, he is underhanded and he's a very big-picture oriented guy. When you're dealing with things like demons running loose on earth, you need to be that way."
I've read the first 10 issues or so of Justice League: Dark and that was predominantly a Constantine-centric series. He's made cameos in numerous other DC titles and with the looming 'Trinity War' surrounding magic and mythological figures, it seems as if DC is making a conscientious effort to raise his profile.
The news also makes you wonder about the long-term future of Vertigo as a whole.
Here are some industry reactions to the news:
I'm really sad about this. Marvel and DC have had pretty must no titles with a consistent, unbroken run since the sixties. Wolvie, Punisher and Deadpool have all lasted at Marvel and maybe Firestorm at DC, but all have had reboots every one hundred issues or so to boost sales and Hellblazer has been a great success story by somehow coming out every month since 1987 (when I was still at school). It says something about the power of Moore's creations that the legs lasted 25 years. There's been some great runs (Garth's and Jamie's in particular). Very sorry to see it go.Mark Millar
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