Conan and the People Of the Black Circle is a new Conan comic series set to release this fall from Dark Horse comics. It will be a 4-issue miniseries, taking place 10-years after the current on-going Conan comic series written by Brian Wood. But what makes this miniseries so noteworthy? Why the epic creative team involved, of course! Dark Horse announced today that two of the hottest names in comics, writer Fred Van Lente and artist Ariel Olivetti, will reunite to be the creative force behind Conan and the People Of the Black Circle. Olivetti’s epic painting style has already proven itself a stunning force on pages with a similarly muscular and legendary brute by the name of Thor. Meanwhile, you can see Van Lente’s great talent for writing Conan-esque archetypes in the pages of both Marvel’s Thor and Hercules comics. Combined on the pages of Conan, this duo should make for a rather epic story.

“I’m thrilled to be working from one of the best Conan stories Howard ever wrote, with the most interesting female lead and one of the Cimmerian’s most compelling adversaries,” stated Van Lente. “But what I’m most excited about is seeing what Ariel Olivetti does with my scripts—he was born to draw Conan, and his painted artwork should attract anyone who doesn’t know anything about Conan or Robert E. Howard but just loves things that are awesome.”

As pointed out by Van Lente, Conan and the People of the Black Circle focuses on Robert E. Howard’s 1934 story of the same name, wherein Conan kidnaps a regal princess of Vendhya and hopes to foil a nefarious plot of world domination by the Black Seers of Yimsha. Assassins, dark magic, and a beautiful noblewoman mean trouble for the Cimmerian barbarian unlike he’s ever seen in this full-tilt escapade through the mountains of Afghulistan. Conan and the People of the Black Circle #1 is on sale October 16th, around the same time The Legend of Conan should be filming with Schwarzenegger in New Zealand. Make sure you swing by your local comic shop to pick it up!

So what exactly will Marvel’s Agents of SHIELD be about? According to ABC:
Joss Whedon (MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS, Buffy the Vampire Slayer) shows us not all heroes are super with MARVEL’S AGENTS OF S.H.I.E.L.D.
Fresh from his role in the summer’s box office smash, MARVEL’S THE AVENGERS, Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) returns to the worldwide law enforcement organization S.H.I.E.L.D.  He puts together a small, highly trained, team of Agents to tackle the cases that haven’t been classified yet, the new, the strange and the unknown.  That team consists of straight arrow Agent Grant Ward (Brett Dalton), an expert in combat and espionage; pilot and martial artist Agent Melinda May (Ming-Na Wen); and brilliant if socially awkward scientists Agent Leo Fitz (Iain De Caestecker) and Agent Jemma Simmons (Elizabeth Henstridge). They’ll be joined by civilian new recruit and computer hacker Skye (Chloe Bennet). Prepare for an epic adventure that showcases the hope and wonder of the human spirit. This is a world of Super Heroes, aliens and the unusual – of action, spectacle and world spanning stories. The show will speak to the human condition through the lens of our very human, non-powered S.H.I.E.L.D agents – that together we are greater than we are apart, and that we can make a difference in the world.

Game

Price: $15

Players: 2-10

Time: 10-30 minutes

Age: 15+

In April Cryptozoic came out with The Walking Dead Card Game. The game is based on the game 6 Nimmt! if you are familiar with that but was easy enough to learn without ever knowing about that game too.

There are 104 walker cards and 6 hero cards included in the game. Each point value has a picture depicting a number of zombies on them. The single point cards only having one zombie and the seven point card having a swarm. The six hero cards are Maggie, Daryl, Rick, Andrea, Glenn and T-dog. Each have an action shot from the show.

There are two different modes or ways to play the game.

Hero Mode

In hero mode each player will get to choose one of the hero cards to start in their hand. Each hero card works the same way so there is they can be handed out at random if wanted. The goal of hero mode is to kill more walkers than the rest of the players by collecting more points worth of walker cards. The points are shown on each card based on the number of bullets printed on each card. Game play is simple enough to learn and to teach to new people. Each player starts with 15 walker cards dealt to them plus their hero card. Then four more cards are lined up in a column. Each player will choose one or two cards from their hand and place them face down in front of them. When everyone has set down their cards you flip them over and follow the rules for placing the cards into rows. Starting from the lowest card, each card is placed next to the closest number that is lower than the card played. So if you played 51 and the cards out are 10, 20, 53 and 100, your card would go next to the 20, as that card is lower than your 51 and closer than 10. If the card is lower than all the cards at the end of the rows, then you place it after the highest card. Once all the cards are placed, you start the next round. When the card is forced to be played on a stack with five cards, your card being the sixth one, you collect the five cards on the table and leave your card as the new starting card. If a player wants, they can place their hero card as the second card when placing two cards down. When this happens, your walker card is placed before any other card regardless of its number, giving you the chance to collect a stack of zombies without it being stolen away by another player. When all the cards are played by each player, the game is over and the bullets are counted up. You can play one time or keep track of your score and play a set number of matches, three being recommended by the instructions.

Survival Mode

Survival Mode plays out almost the opposite of hero mode. You only get 10 cards each and no heros are used this time. Each player will choose only one card but this time the goal is to not be overrun by zombies(to not collect points). The card placement rules are similar to hero mode, except if you play a card lower than all the cards at the end of the row then you have to pick one of the rows to take and place your card as the new starting card. After the ten rounds of playing cards, you count the bullets the same way and either choose single game or multiple games and the person with the lowest score wins.

Both games are quick and easy to pick up after the first game or two. I personally like the feel of survival mode more. The game starts off a little slow but after you have played about half your hand, everyone seems to be a little more panicked about which card they are going to play and trying to figure out if someone else will steal the pile before their card gets played on it. Overall its a fun party game for people whether you have seen The Walking Dead or not. I would say the 15+ years on the age is about right because of the strategy and almost bluff like tactics to the game.

The pirate adventure centers on the tales of Captain Flint (played by actor Toby Stephens) and his men, taking place twenty years prior to Robert Louis Stevenson’s classic novel, Treasure Island. Flint, the most brilliant and most feared pirate captain of his day, takes on a fast-talking young addition to his crew who goes by the name John Silver (Luke Arnold). Threatened with extinction on all sides, they fight for the survival of New Providence Island, the most notorious criminal haven of its day – a debauched paradise teeming with pirates, prostitutes, thieves and fortune seekers, a place defined by both its enlightened ideals and its stunning brutality.

The series also stars Zach McGowan (Shameless) as rival Captain Charles Vane; Toby Schmitz as Rackham, Vane’s right hand; Hannah New as Eleanor Guthrie, a determined young woman who runs the smuggling operation on New Providence; Jessica Parker Kennedy as Max, a tortured young prostitute who sees the dark side of New Providence; Clara Paget (Fast and Furious 6) as the beautiful but cold-blooded Anne Bonny and Tom Hopper (Merlin) as Billy Bones, boatswain of Flint’s ship.

Black Sails is executive produced by Michael Bay (Transformers) and his Platinum Dunes partners Brad Fuller and Andrew Form, producers on the 2003 Texas Chainsaw Massacre and 2009 Nightmare on Elm Street. The series was created by showrunner and executive producer Jon Steinberg (creator of Jericho) and co-executive producer Robert Levine (Touch). It is currently filming in Cape Town, South Africa.
If you didn’t see the first trailer we posted for Black Sails last month, we strongly recommend you go back and visit that article for an amazing peek at the show and some sexy images of Toby Stephens and Clara Paget in full garb as their characters Captain Flint and Anne Bonny. But if you’re looking for some new video, below we have 2 teaser clips announcing the shows new premiere date. There sadly is no new footage in these clips, but they’re still rather great.

The ad was filmed in New Fantasyland back in mid-April, and Disney has recently shared a great behind the scenes video showing Lana Parrilla and Disney cast members on location in the Magical Kingdom, filming the commercial.

Once Upon A Time is just finishing up its second season, with the finale airing next week, Sunday, May 12th at 8PM. It really is quite the fun TV series, and comic fans might also want to pay attention as rumor floats that there might be something Avengers related in the ads that Sunday.

Written by Marc Gaffen and Kyle McVey, with a story by series creators David Greenwalt and Jim Kouf, Grimm #1 features art by Jose Malaga and will be in stores this Wednesday, right after the episode “Kiss of the Muse” airs on NBC. Beginning this issue, Kelly (Nick’s mom) begins her quest to destroy the Coins of Zakynthos. Dynamite, as always, offers a couple of cool covers for this issue, with the main cover painted fabulously by the legendary Alex Ross. Their is also a black and white pencil incentive cover of Ross’ work, as well as a TV photo cover for subscribers. Now if you’re more for high end variants? Dynamite isn’t one to disappoint, with a Phantom variant and Midtown comics exclusive variant. But for those that just have to have something rare, there is a variant with only 25 copies in existence! That’s not a 1-in-25 variant, but a variant that literally only has 25 copies total. Drawn by series artist Jose Malaga, it looks pretty hot and will certainly be quite the collectors item with a fan base for the show exceeding 5 million viewers. Check out all the covers and a 5-page preview down below. Grimm #1 hits stores this Wednesday, May 8th!