Posted in: Comics | Tagged: bad idea, david lapham, diamond previews, first supper, mark waid

Bad Idea Publish Mark Waid & David Lapham's Comic in Diamond Previews

Published Fri, 19 Aug 2022 09:25:11 -0500

The June edition of Diamond Comic Distributors' monthly Previews catalogue arrives in comic shops and digitally on August 24th and features comic books, graphic novels, toys, and other pop culture merchandise scheduled to go on sale beginning November 2022. But next week's catalogue will feature a new Bad Idea comic book, The First Supper, by Mark Waid and David Lapham, as an eight-page comic book in the catalogue itself, from page 485.

Might this be Bad Idea Part Two? Publishing comic books to comic stores, not actually distributed to them through Diamond but actually inside the Previews catalogue itself? Because there is no Bad Idea listing in the catalogue itself. And, given the announcement now, might next week's Previews be as collectable as any other Bad Idea comic? Especially as it includes Mark Waid's first work for the publisher? Or might, for Bad Idea Part Two, they decide to let Diamond distribute them to all stores rather than just the chosen few? Or maybe let diamond run the Destination Store programme for Bad Idea?

It does smack a little of how Jim Shooter launched Warriors of Plasm with #0 bound inside Diamond Previews, when he launched Defiant almost thirty years ago. Dinesh Shamdasani, who revived the Valiant Entertainment publisher that Shooter founded, may have had inspiration there, and a chance to celebrate its thirtieth anniversary as well.

Bad Idea is a new comics publisher from Dinesh Shamdasani, Atom Freeman, Joshua Johns, Karl Bollers, and Anthony Militano. A direct-to-retailer publisher, eschewing digital and trade paperbacks in favour of one-cover one-per-person comic book sales from big comic book names. Last year Bad Idea announced that they were ceasing publishing operations. The last official word from Bad Idea was, "Bad Idea is over, as we know it." We knew that was a lie.

They have not announced, solicited or launched a new comic series since December of last year. But they did create new comics to be given away with doughnuts, or invisible slabbed comics, or if you found Matt Kindt and San Diego Comic-Con and tackled him to the ground. But at their Bad Idea First Customer Pin Tiki Party at San Diego Comic-Con, they were showing off a lot of art for… something, from Lewis LaRosa, Ramon Villalobos, Alberto Ponticelli, David Lapham and more.

Now they are returning this November with what they promise is "a mammoth two-part slate of comic books to rival any that have come before." It seems they "may have been over, but certainly weren't idle" They are almost promising the type of comic "you can only make if you're solely focused on creating them and not distracted by the printing or selling or marketing." What that means remains to be seen because Bad Idea has given us no details on the upcoming comic books yet.

That's right, there will be seven titles in part one and they are offering a blind pre-order from now until September 7th before you know what they are. The first ten people to pre-order all seven titles at each participating destination store will get a sticker. That's right, a sticker. The one up there. And yes, that is the new list of Bad Idea stores, we have the scoop on that too.

1 – BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE is made up of seven titles (15 issues) on-sale between November and February.
2 – Connect with any BAD IDEA Destination Store ONLY on Wednesday, September 7th (in-person or by any other means accepted by the store).
3 – Pre-order all seven of the BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE titles with your store. You are pre-ordering blind. No titles. No story details. No creative teams. Only the cover price and number of issues will be released by September 7th. Consult your store for their pre-order requirements.
4 – If you're one of the first 10 people to pre-order all seven titles at your store, you will be awarded a swanky BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE redemption sticker.
5 – The sticker can be used to redeem, from BAD IDEA, an extra, alternate, and exclusive story choice for one of the soon-to-be-revealed books in the BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE line-up. WTF is a story choice? Oh boy, just you wait.
Miss the BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE PRE-ORDER DAY and you'll miss the BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE redemption sticker, along with the extra, alternate, and exclusive story choice it redeems. But, rest easy, you'll still be able to pre-order any or all of the BAD IDEA TWO: PART ONE line-up until each book's order deadline. Probably, I mean unless we're forced to lock orders after the pre-order. But that wouldn't happen, would it?

A sticker that can be redeemed to get different endings to the comics you buy. Perhaps a choose your own adventure title in the mix?

We'll know for sure the day after the pre-order deadline when all the stories, titles and creators are being revealed. In any case, they seem very proud of the upcoming books even saying they are "without a doubt the best assemblage of stories any of us at BAD IDEA have ever been a part of." Bad Idea also seems to have added some new stores. They'll be announcing all the returning and new stores for Bad Idea Two tomorrow.

Bleeding Cool has also learned that all pre-orders are "guaranteed first printing fulfillment regardless of any allocations." Perhaps to try and avoid a repeat of the heavy allocations that occurred on their final release, Odinn's Eye. Also of note, Bad Idea says "we have plans for you haters". Something we understand involves New York Comic-Con. But as for Diamond Previews?: We wait to discover more.

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