Lightning can indeed Strike in the same place more than once, in the case of a small publishing company in Ireland making waves with their published Phantom works.
The team behind Lightning Strike Comics is Eoin McAuley and David Williams, two fans who took a chance with their 80th anniversary celebration Phantom comic Tales of the Ghost Who Walks back in 2016, then followed it up with a standalone book The Phantom: Scarlet Sapphire in 2017.
We reported back in February that they were planning on a new series of Phantom books, and now that The Phantom Strikes series is on the cusp of release we are confident that they will be well received by everyone in the community. The Phantom Strikes is billed as "an exciting new series featuring ongoing stories and anthology issues from some of your favourite Phantom creators."
What is impressive about the Lightning Strike Comics venture with our purple hero is that they appear to have the mix right. They are introducing Phantom readers to local Irish and European talent that many of us are not familiar with, but also employing well known and respected comic names that have credits in the bank.
It takes courage to target an audience and market which is not known or established with the character. It takes even more guts to do it creating your own stories. Our hats are off to Lightning Strike Comics in this brave venture and if they keep producing stories and books like these, they will be creating many a new phan.
A lot of the details of their plans for the series, as well as information about David and Eoin can be found in our X-Band: The Phantom Podcast interview with them in episode #90.
Issue #1 From the Shadow of a Ghost is written by David Williams, art is by phan favourite Alex Saviuk, colours by Ashwin Chacko and the amazing pulp George Wilson style cover (right) is by Oisin Roche, who we can expect to see a lot more of. The ChronicleChamber team has been lucky enough to see an advance PDF copy of the issue, and will be previewing it for you very shortly. (Spoilers: we like it!)
Remarkably, Alex Saviuk is one of the few creators who has seen his work published by no fewer than six Phantom publishers from around the world including Egmont, Frew, Marvel, Moonstone, Hermes Press and now Lightning Strike, ranging from the mid 1980's to 2018. He is currently fitting his Phantom work around penciling and inking the daily The Amazing Spider-Man newspaper strip, as well as penciling the Sunday Spidey.
Issue #2 Masks of The Phantom has been written by Arild Wærness with artwork by Mike Collins, who has previously drawn The Phantom for Moonstone. These talented creators are royalty in European comics.
Arild Wærness lives in Bergen, Norway and moonlights as a DJ and busyboy at BarBarista Pub. He is famous in Norway with the comic festivals he has worked with and the countless comics he has written. This will be his first foray into the Deep Woods.
Mike Collins is very familiar with Arild's work, having previously worked with him on Varg Veum's Christmas Comics, and Seven Mountains.
Mike himself has been creating comics for over 25 years, starting on Spider-Man and Transformers for Marvel UK. He has worked for Moonstone, Marvel, DC, 2000AD and a whole host of other publishers. In that time he’s written or drawn the majority of the major characters for each company.
Writing for #3 will be Ron Marz, legendary comic book author who has been a mainstay of the industry since the mid-1990s when he began writing for Marvel and DC, with credits including Catain America, Silver Surfer, Superman, Batman and Green Lantern. Ron has had a big week, also announced as writing for Dynamite Entertainment's Return of TUROK.
The Lightning Strike Comics team is certainly all in with their involvement in the Phantom universe, with Eoin hosting a discussion panel at the New York Comic Convention this weekend. Many of the creators, including Alex, will form part of the panel.
You can now buy issue #1 for €3.50 plus shipping. We expect Phantom's Vault, possibly Frew, and some Local Comic Stores to have these available in the future, but to ensure you do not miss out or have to wait it could be best to buy directly from Lightning Strike.
(While you're there, you may notice that the Lightning Strike team are now also selling Frew's Kid Phantom and For Those Who Came In Late trade paperback!)
From ChronicleChamber to Lightning Strike: All the very best with your expansion into the Phantom universe - we can't wait to see it!
