WHEN: Saturday, September 4, 2010

• Registration: 10:00 AM
• Dice Roll: 11:00 AM

WHERE: Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy Austin

FORMAT: 2500 points – each round will be pitched battle

REGISTRATION: This event is limited to only 18 players, so please make sure to sign up early. There is a registration sheet at the Customer Service counter at the store, or you can call Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy® Austin at 512-454-2399.

Island of Blood

This fantastic new box set comes with High Elves & Skaven!

There’s a ‘Getting Started’ booklet for tips on painting, modeling and battling! It’s a great resource for anyone new to Warhammer and is full of maps and bits of background! There’s also a small-format rulebook with all the rules you’ll need to play Warhammer Fantasy
- ideal for tournaments and events!

Summer Rampage bursts back onto the scene in August 2010 evolved and rearmed for Mk II. A three-week campaign, Summer Rampage 2010 pits the factions of WARMACHINE and HORDES against one another in game stores around the globe. Bringing back the brutal finishing moves and feat-like rampages, this league event will let players prove just who is dominant on the tabletop!

Our league will run Tuesday August 17 through Monday September 6!

For more information, email our Events Coordinator, Robbie LaBanca at events@dlair.net or download the rules here!

This fantastic new box set comes with High Elves & Skaven!

This is Warhammer in a box! Complete and playable Skaven and High Elf armies, rulebook, dice, templated and everyting you need to play but a table!

There are 74 miniatures in the new set, including a Griffon, an Elf Mage, two Rat Ogres and a Skaven Warlord!

There’s a ‘Getting Started’ booklet for tips on painting, modelling and battling! It’s a great resource for anyone new to Warhammer and is full of maps and bits of background! There’s also a small-format rulebook with all the rules you’ll need to play Warhammer Fantasy and is ideal to take to tournaments and events!

Get your pre-order in early!

Shadowfist is a trading card game from Inner Kingdom Games and is played and playtested at Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy® San Antonio!

Shadowfist is a trading card game based loosely on action movies from the studios in Hong Kong with a splash of Hollywood for spice. The cards represent people, places, and things involved in the Secret War to control the world’s feng shui sites, mystical places of power that guarantee victory and prosperity for those who control them. Each game represents a small battle in the larger war raging all around us.

Players represent factions fighting in a secret war for control over the world by harnessing the life force of chi.

During a game, you’ll play various cards to advance your side of the story and move closer to your goal of controlling feng shui sites. Each player needs his or her own deck of Shadowfist cards to play, but the exact mix of cards you play with is up to you.

Shadowfist is a very combat-oriented game that features many of the same game mechanics as Magic: The Gathering such as attacking, defending, permanent character enhancements and instantaneous game effects. At face value, it’s not all that different from most other CCGs, but a closer look reveals that it is the single best multi-player card game on the market with a wealth of nuances to enhance games of three or more players.

Check out Shadowfist Game Info here!

Organized Play

The San Antonio & Austin Shadowfist playgroups meet every other Tuesday night from 5pm to 10pm. Our weekly activities range from friendly play to tournaments to playtesting for the forthcoming expansion set. All are welcome to join the fun!

Contact

• Daniel Griego
• Peter Trudell

TIME BOMB #1 BY RADICAL PUBLISHING

CREATORS & WRITERS: Jimmy Palmiotti & Justin Gray
ARTIST: Paul Gulacy
ADDITIONAL INKS: Charles Yoakum
COLORIST: Rain Beredo
LETTERER: John J Hill
EDITOR: Rob Levin
COVER: Paul Gulacy & Rain Beredo

56 pg FC $4.99

After the Omega Bomb of Nazi Germany is accidentally launched, giving the human race 72 hours to live, four specialists are sent back in time to prevent the disaster. Unfortunately, instead of getting send back two dys, our heroes find themselves 67 years in the past, landing right in the middle of a German POW camp.

As the four time-displaced heroes hurry to ground zero, they take careful steps not to alter the past. However, their presence has alerted a sinister and evil enemy to their mission, the creator of the Omega Bomb himself, Axel Von Metzger, The Butcher!

Everyone I know – comic book reader or not – loves to imagine the world is a more mysterious place than they think it is. Everyone wants there to be places we haven’t found. Everyone wants a little magic, a lost civilization or a corner of the planet with ancient, unexplained ruins.

Scratch most people a bit, and you’ll find folk who secretly hope for conspiracy theories and secret technologies and science fiction fantasies brought to life, because there is a part of everyone that hates the idea that our world is explained, defined and quantified.

Most people are still afraid of the boogeyman; the nameless figure in the dark, the unexplainable bad guy who could turn out to be a mad scientist out to steal your body parts for a horrific experiment or the creepy clown serial killer.

Or a Nazi.

Radical Publishing’s Time Bomb is a simple story on the surface, but it really does plumb some of deeper fears and longings that almost everyone I’ve ever known has possessed.

The year is 2012 (in which the world may or may not be supposed to end) and there is an accident in Berlin that uncovers a hermetically sealed underground Nazi compound. A (possibly) shadowy organization called the New World Order is sent in to investigate.

Nazis are the best bad guys, because they really were bad guys, and so much about what went on behind the scenes in Hitler’s government is still a relative unknown, especially by the average citizen.

Usually, the Nazi’s lose. Intrepid archeologists, adventurers and plucky young heroes defeat the Nazis in magnificent displays of derring do.

Honestly? When I saw the first panel with the Nazi compound, that’s what I expected.

A few pages later, I was actually surprised. How often do Nazis win decades after their defeat and destruction? How many times in pulpy comics do you see a Nazi contingency plan succeed?

It’s a rare enough occurrence that I never suspected it might happen.

The next thing I know, there’s a Nazi super-virus that kills humans but not animals, hints that the Nazi compound had modern technology and four super secret special agents are travelling back in time to save the world.

Among our super secret special agents, we have a femme fatale (Peggy) who had only just signed divorce papers from Christian – another member of our intrepid team. And any girl who signs her divorce papers wearing a string bikini in a hotel lobby is okay in my book.

There’s Ken, who we are first introduced to in Venice, Italy where ice-cold and silk smooth, he seduces and kills a beautiful woman. His only request when told he’s going back in time? That he gets to bring a lot of guns. He is the most disciplined of the four.

And there’s Jack. He’s the class clown and juvenile delinquent; he’s late to meetings, smokes in the command center and has no respect for authority. He’s also the first of the super secret special agents we’re introduced to, which may or may not mean anything.

After some mandatory team bonding (Literally. Tom Krueger, The Guy In Charge, tells them to), the super secret special agents climb inside a Time Bomb. Again, literal. Using some undefined property of quantum physics, an atomic bomb will blow them backwards through time. The trick?

Time Bombs are relatively untested and the only test subject to return from a trip through time was a monkey who needed therapy and valium afterwards.

Time travel is not exactly unfamiliar territory for me. I’ve been reading comics since Superman died and I’ve been reading/watching science fiction for longer than that. Usually, when people go back in time, they have to worry about changing the past so they don’t destroy the future.

Except…our super secret special agents bring up a good point. The world is already going to be destroyed by the Nazi super-virus, so they have a bit more latitude.

And who hasn’t wanted to shoot a Nazi?

Time Bomb is one of those series that gives comic readers a little bit of wish fulfillment without sacrificing plot. Jimmy Palmiotti really delivers in this book, showing his years of skill with careful character development interwoven with plot movement. He combines the off-the-cuff one-line wit popular with adventure TV these days with the snapshot nature of comic panels, marrying the two styles of writing with a signature flair.

The art team on this book must have been reading my mind, because when I read the synopsis for this book in Previews, I figured there was no way the kind of hyper-realized, blur-edged art Radical’s become known for in books such as Caliber: First Cannon of Justice (which, if you haven’t read, you really should), Shrapnel and the critically acclaimed Hotwire could carry this tale. But the art on Time Bomb is just right. It’s very classic in style, but the attention to detail is fantastic. That detail is such a good fit with Palmiotti’s skilled writing that you can almost see the story move as you read it.

There’s no confusion on who’s speaking, no blurred letters you have to squint at to make out and no characters you have to look at just so to make sure you know who’s doing what and speaking where.

There are some fairly mature themes in Time Bomb, but instead of being garish of examples of sex, drugs and rock n’ roll used to advertise and sell the books, those themes are used to help the reader identify with the characters as people instead of super secret special agents. For the most part, this works well, but I wouldn’t recommend you let your young teenager read this without you reading it first.

Time Bomb is what a lot of comics strive to be: a good story, with unexpected twists and turns, a lot of gratuitous fun for the reader and characters you can cheer for. At 56 pages for $4.99, it’s worth picking up and adding to your pull.

SPIKE THE DEVIL YOU KNOW #1-2 by IDW

WRITER: Bill Williams
ART: Chris Cross

You know how some things get handed down, generation after generation? Furniture, wedding dresses, psychoses, businesses, etc? In Bill William’s miniseries Spike: The Devil You Know, Tansy Fry, one of the Master’s children, takes over the family business of opening hellmouths and trying to destroy the world.

The Master. Y’all remember him? Creepy nosferatu-looking vampire from season one of Buffy, played by Mark Metcalfe (aka Doug Neidermeyer of Animal House)?

Opening hellmouths, destroying the world and other such fun activities seem to be very popular in the Buffyverse. But really? You’d think that after all the times one slayer or another has put the kibosh on them or how often one of their own has betrayed them to keep the world safe for ‘happy meals on legs,’ those with a real yen for destruction would have turned to hobbies less likely to cause them to end up dead – like kicking over sandcastles or something.

Still, points for tenacity. Or maybe not. Einstein did say that doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results was the definition of insanity.

Tansy, at least, seems to have a new plan: she’s developed a new kind of hellmouth. (Makes you wonder what the r&d on that was like!) Large enough for creatures to pass through, but small enough to keep off the slayer-radar (harder than ever, with so many of them running around these days.) The rub in the ointment is Spike. He has a coin – stolen fair and square – that can do something about her new hellmouths.

A daughter of the Master, Tansy is a stickler for tradition. She has her chief lackey Andrea send a good squad after Spike, interrupting what looked to be a fun evening. Suffice it to say that even though they get the coin from Spike, they also get Spike’s attention. Hero or villain or electronically-neutered house guest, Spike’s attention is usually awkward, violent and messy.

Spike, of course, finds out where they took his coin and interrupts a meeting where at least part of the plan is revealed.

The Order of Aurelias is once again on the move. Once one of the most feared groups of vampires, having been responsible for some of the supernatural world’s preiminent heavy-hitters: Angelus, Spike, Darla, Drusilla – and, of course, Spike. Basically, a cult dedicated to destroying the world and allowing the Old Ones to walk free.

Spike never made a very good cultist.

After killing the Annointed One and basically ending the Order of Aurelias, Spike spent more than a bit of his career as a violent bad boy curb-stomping folk interested in bringing about an apocalypse – even before he went off and got himself a soul.

Doesn’t mean the Order doesn’t want him back. Andrea makes one last, chilling appeal:

“Now Spike, there have been some ugly rumors about you going around. We will not discriminate against you if you have a soul. People with souls commit atrocities every day.”

This comic had me from the beginning, but this sealed the deal: it epitomizes the kind of story Joss Whedon’s Buffy has become. Spike’s response – which you have to read – epitomizes who Spike has become. I could write an entire review on that line alone.

Sometimes I wonder if Joss Whedon knew what kind of character he created when he introduced Spike? Or where the character would eventually end up?

Williams has a gift for writing Spike’s irreverant and cynical wit and knows how to pack a lot into a short amount of dialogue. He doesn’t waste words. Even his internal monologue boxes add to the story, in both plot and flavor. Combine Williams’ gift for banter with Chris Cross’ dynamic art and you have a must-read comic. Dramatic poses, slick outfits, posh lairs and steampunk warehouses paint a landscape that feels just like an episdoe of Angel.

Williams’ moves things along at a breakneck pace but doesn’t miss a trick; he has a quick scene between Spike and Illyria that seems almost an aside from the story, but it brings into sharp relief the similarities between Illyria and Spike – and reminds the reader of just how far Spike has come.

Even as we see Spike tracking down what was stolen from him, we also see Tansy laying her plans and find out that she’s not in this alone. There is someone else on the other end of her cell phone that she – quite possibly – has to answer to.

Williams set up his mystery, his villain and his hero, leaving the reader wanting to know.

The best part about it is that even if – like me – you haven’t been following Angel or really know much about the Buffyverse you can still pick up Spike: The Devil You Know, read and enjoy without needing to know much than the basics.

Issue one sets the stage – issue two ups the ante. Spike finds himself teamed up with Eddie Hope to stop Tansy Fry.

Wait. I didn’t mention Eddie Hope, did I? That’s because if I did, I would ruin it for you. So instead of telling you how Eddie enters the story, I’ll tell you a bit about Eddie. He’s a demon who remembers what happened in Hell and he’s out to punish those who gave in to the darker natures. He’s got ice-beams and a rather impressive demon form – complete with horns and a prehensile – tail, is a fair hand with technology, a good shot with a pistol and has just as much attitude as Spike.

If you think these two teaming up is a volatile combination, then you’re right. If you thought anything else, you’re probably new to the Buffyverse. In which case: Welcome to the show. Leave your expectations and sanity at the door. You won’t need them here.

Williams’ takes you on a wild ride in the second issue. Spike and Eddie get along about as well as Spike and Angel did when they first started working together and generally aren’t fond of each other, despite having the same approach to the situation.

Go straight in, hit everything that’s not on your side, break everything that looks like it could be evil and have a pint or six before going home.

Eddie tries to leave Spike behind when they first get to Tansy’s warehouse (Spike has to be invited in, it being the ‘home’ to someone or another), but the vampires invite him in, much to Eddie’s dismay.

Most of the issue jumps between Spike and Eddie battling Tansy’s multitude of minions inside her warehouse of mechanized evil while trading one-liners while Tansy and a demon-sorceress go about opening yet another portal to Hell.

And it is awesome.

It’s what made the Buffyverse so much fun; witty banter, fight scenes where you realize there is no such thing as ‘the unbeatable fighter’ (because enough guys trying to beat you down and even a guy who kills slayers is going to have some trouble), transforming demons and ritual magic.

Magic, in the Buffyverse, has always been something of a vague concept; rules and systems and such have never been established. It’s exactly what it purports to be – magic. Unexplainable, powerful and usually creepifying and requiring unpleasantness.

When you put down issue two, you’ll feel like you’ve just stood up from your couch for a commercial break that will unfortunately last until you get the next issue.

At it’s heart, Buffy the Vampire Slayer is supernatural pulp noir for the modern consumer and Bill Williams treats his readers to the quietly absurd and overtly cynical themes that only the best noir has. Villains who tell you almost all of their plans, hard-boiled heroes and quirky dialogue that makes you look at the normal world we live in just a little differently.

Spike: The Devil You Know is one of those comics that’s a must-read for fans of Whedon (because Williams’ really has mastered the tone and themes and reparte Whedon loves) and fans of good pulp noir.

We Kill Monsters TP by Red 5 Comics

By Alan M Rogers

STORY: Christopher Leone & Laura Harkcom
WRITER: Christopher Leone
PENCILS: Brian Churilla
INKS: Hilary Barta, Brian Churilla & Richard Ellis
COLORS: Ronda Pattison
LETTERS: Jeff Powell

It’s just one more day. You wake up, fix a few cars, mourn your father’s passing, awkwardly interact with your ex-girlfriend and help your socially-inept genius brother slay a giant blue monster.

Things get weird when said genius brother drinks monster brain juice and is miraculously healed by it.

We Kill Monsters is a fairly cut-and-dried tale. Comic readers, sci-fi pulp fans, anyone who’s watched sci-fi-ish TV in the past 25, anyone who’s seen a Bruce Campbell movie – we know the story. Small town is invaded, just about overnight, by monsters. Real, Grade A B-movie monsters with horns and rubbery skin in every color of green, brown, red and blue. Horns and spikes and fangs abound, some of them even in biologically logical locations.

You know everyone says it: there is nothing new under the sun. However, clichés are clichés because people pick them up off the shelf and read them, week after week. We Kill Monsters is should be no exception to this, because anyone who likes the awesome pulp action and classic plots should read it, because Red 5 does quality classic pulp.

What makes We Kill Monsters good isn’t the time-honored tale it tells, but the way it’s told. I know, I know. Y’all have heard that one a thousand and one times before, but if you ignore me, it’s your loss. This time, the story is all character with a bit of plot to tide you over while you find out just what they’re going to try next.

Our protagonists are Drew and Jake Basher, a pair of mechanics. Drew’s the older one; responsible and card-carrying member of the Common Sense League. (Which, if you didn’t know, doesn’t have many members from the Comic Characters Union.) Drew is the younger brother; a socially inept genius, he’s got a bit of mad scientist in him and a bit of the lovable dumb guy in him. He’s sort of an idiot savant but, other than his fumbling with people, doesn’t have much ‘idiot.’

These guys are as blue collar grease monkey as you can get: drinking beer, flirting with barmaids and fixing cars. The Requisite Girl, Vanessa, tends bar (and may or may not own the bar), lives with her father, who is a retired
sheriff and used to date Jake, back before they broke up over Drew.

She’s got a new beau these days; a marketing executive for a breakfast cereal company who drives a Beamer and has a smile that gleams in even dim light. He screams ‘used car salesman’ before he gets a speech bubble on paper.

The art in this book is consistently good; sometimes, you get a lot of characters who look the same, who don’t look like the kind of person they’re written to be. Not We Kill Monsters. From Jake’s chubby cheeks to Drew’s Fonzie hair to Vanessa’s girl-next-door chic, the characters are unique and bring a lot of life to the story. Awesome as that is, for me, it’s the colors in this book that really drive the art. Everything is bright and vibrant jewel tones, giving depth and motion to each panel.

That art makes things like eating dead monster bugs and drinking blue brain juice a bit more visceral that it might other be. And it’s really that gross bit of culinary masochism that drives the story. Jake’s got a bit of problem (and no, I won’t tell you what it is) that means he has to keep drinking monster fluids or he’s in a lot of trouble, which is part of why the Basher brothers got out killing monsters instead of running for the hills like everyone else.

That, and one of the monsters eats Vanessa’s Dad. There’s nothing like a bit of rage-fueled revenge to get a damsel in distress and there’s nothing like rescuing said damsel to inspire heroism like McGuyered air-compressor
ballistae mounted on jury-rigged armored trucks.

And if that doesn’t convince you to read this book, nothing else I say will.

The end of the story is more surprising than I thought it would be; it’s the first time in a long time a pulp plot has made me raise my eyebrows. I will say, however, that I’ll never look at breakfast cereal mascots in the same light ever again.

We Kill Monsters. Pulpy, creative and absolutely fun to read.

The Core is calling…

Your survival in the world of Battle Spirits is determined by your mastery of Core. These precious gems will determine your control over the Spirits that inhabit these strange lands. Dragons, snakes, zombies, plants, animals, insects and machines are yours to command.

Will you answer the call of the Core?

Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy® Austin is invited you to come and try Battle Spirits. This premiere collectible card game by Bandai is fantastic in quality, artwork and design. There is an active organized play network and fantastic support from BanDai!

Come in a check out Battle Spirits and answer the call of the Core!

Betcha’ you knew that, didn’t you? Old news, right? Not only that, the comic won’t even be out until November!

But I’ve got your preview right here.

Four pages of hack n’ slash violence, veiled gaming jokes and Tolkien-style epic. It never goes out of style, does it? Thirty years of game play, four(-ish) editions of the game and so many hours left to give over to games and characters we haven’t yet created.

So check it out – http://www.newsarama.com/php/multimedia/album.php?aid=36305

Tickets are on Sale Now!

Austin’s favorite sci-fi radio thriller comes to life in a entirely new form! Three actors once again portray a variety of characters as sludge-monsters from the Planet Zygon invade the earth. Only this time, their adventures are accompanied by more than 1200 drawings by graphic wizard Tim Doyle, projected on the Long Center’s huge screen and accompanied by Graham Reynolds’ original score. Keeping Austin weirdly wonderful!

Intergalactic Nemesis is playing at the Long Center!

• September 3 at 8:00 PM
• September 4 at 8:00 PM

Tickets range from $14:00-$49.00!

When you buy your tickets, either by calling (512) 474-5664 or online, enter the code ‘DLAIR’ when prompted!

This puts Dragon’s Lair Comics & Fantasy Austin in the running for a very special prize!

Want to know more about Intergalactic Nemesis?

Check out this review by the Austin Chronicle or this interview with Intergalactic Nemesis creator, Jason Neulander!