Posted in: Comics, Recent Updates | Tagged: april fool, bleeding cool, Comics, comics alliance

FOOL: Arianna Huffington Buys Avatar Press – Comics Alliance And Bleeding Cool To Merge

Published Fri, 01 Apr 2011 05:00:49 -0500

Last updated Tue, 31 Mar 2015 16:00:29 -0500

Apologies for the lack of posting yesterday, but I was involved in meetings all day.

The long and short of it is that William Christensen of Avatar Press has agreed to sell the Illinois comics publisher and all of its subsidiaries such as Boundless Comics, Bleeding Cool, Freak Angels, Whitechapel and the like to Adrianna Huffington's Huffington Post Media Group, now part of AOL. This will have a number of repercussions.

I understand that Lady Death will be cancelled in its current form, and will be relaunched written by Dana Ullman with a new design, new creators and an emphasis on the modern relevance of homeopathy when countering terminal illnesses. Laura Hudson of Comics Alliance will edit.

The upcoming collection of Neonomicon by Alan Moore and Jacen Burrows will be softened slightly to counter certain content concerns and will be subsequently released as a ten page hardcover.

While Arianna Huffington herself has arranged to write the next series of Garth Ennis' Crossed. She told this website "I just love what that Irishman does with the American people. Turning them into rabid, immoral beasts. It reminded me of my last visit to Texas so I thought, I could write that. And now I am!"

Avatar publisher William Christensen said "I must admit I was surprised that a progressive website like the HuffPo would want to invest in a reactionary, provocative and sexist publisher like my own, but after discussing it with my prominent creators, and offering one of my employees as a sacrifice to Glycon, I'm pleased to see that everyone was happy with the changes that will be made.

Warren Ellis told Bleeding Cool, "frankly after writing the Marvel Anime cartoons, I'm open to anything right now. The Huffington Post will be running Freakangels with subtitles for their audience on their front page every week. I reckon that should get me a film option by Tuesday, don't you?"

And the big news, for this website at least, is that Bleeding Cool and Comics Alliance will become the same publishing operation, with Laura Hudson, Brendon Connelly and myself sharing a co-co-co-editor-in-chief position. Very little will change for now, with the two content providers alternating stories through the day and night, but we will join forces on certain stories. Larry Doherty will be banned from the boards however, and probably OM as well. And on CA's side, Chris Sims will be muzzled. Literally, I understand. Look for their site to update to the new look later today.

We'll continue to run a mixture of mock outrage stories desperately trying to find sexist, racist or homophobic themes in comics, gratuitous porn parody coverage, and My Little Pony figurine pictures together. And there will be a weekly Smallville Vs Doctor Who review-off.

A press release will be sent out today claiming that the combined Bleeding Cool Comics Alliance has the biggest audience in the galaxy for anything vaguely comic book related.

And our first joint story, on the Hellboy Vs Conan comic by Mike Hawthorne, and the London MCM European Free Hugs Championship will run later today. Exciting times!