It has been known for months that at the end of writer Jonathan Hickman’s “Three” story arc in Fantastic Four, one member of the classic Marvel team would die. Despite efforts to keep the news secret by shipping the issues in black polybags featuring the “Three” logo and shipping the comic a day early, several major news outlets spilled the news hours before any comic shops were open to sell the issue. Marvel themselves issued a press release with the news this morning.

Find out who dies and see preview pages from this issue after the break.
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I’ve written and rewritten this post at least three times today as new developments have surfaced. So lets get the basics down. Wizard magazine and ToyFare magazine are now defunct publications with most of their respective staffs being laid off effective immediately.

A now-former Wizard employee spoke with ifanboy and had some interesting things to say.

A self-aggrandizing press release from Wizard owner Gareb Shamus announced that the company was now a public company, will be launching an online magazine called ‘Wizard World’, and plans to have a 12 city convention tour. There was no mention of the discontinuation of the company’s two major publications.

Those who had subscriptions can expect not to be reimbursed since Mr. Shamus has something of a reputation for non-payment of contract work, and other shady practices.

As someone who had a subscription early in the magazine’s career and has roughly the first 100 issues, its sad to see it go, but I can’t tell you the last time I picked an issue up. It was a shadow of its former self. ToyFare’s end was a low blow for the toy industry as it was one of the few examples of a print publication based on toys that had remained successful and managed to get exclusive reveals of unseen figures.

You can see the press release and statement from Wizard World PR after the jump.

[Via Newsarama]
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An image of the cast from the forth-coming film, X-Men: First Class surfaced the other day online. It was a pretty horribly photoshopped image that caused quite a bit of anxiety among fans. In an attempt to make up for it, Fox released three new stills from film the next day. I thought the most interesting of the stills featured Kevin Bacon and January Jones, playing Sebastian Shaw and Emma Frost, the White Queen, respectively.

  

In a seeming fit of rage, Director Matthew Vaughn released two additional stills to settle some of his anger over the initial poor image’s release two days earlier.

 

And finally, we got our first look at the teaser poster for the movie.

We’ve known for a while that Tom Hardy would be in the next Batman flick, but we didn’t know who he would be. Speculation fuleed by plot rumors put him as Dr Hugo Strange, but an official press release from Warner Bros has eliminated rumors and confirmed another cast member.

Tom Hardy will be Bane, a Batman villain notorious for breaking the caped crusader’s back during the Knightfall plot in the mid-90s. Bane’s power is derived from a super potent steroid-like substance called Venom that amplifies his musculature.

Additionally, Anne Hathaway has been cast as Selina Kyle, better known as Catwoman. A very popular character for decades in the Batman mythos as both a villain and a hero, its unknown what role she will play in Nolan universe. One thing is for sure: it will likely be better than Halle Berry’s attempt.

Read the full press release:
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Since the alphabet is the building block of our language, the Powet Alphabet is the building block of what makes us geeks.

When Steve Rogers was forced to either blindly serve the government or give up his identity as Captain America, he chose the later, and was replaced by John Walker. When Bruce Wayne’s back was broken by the villain Bane, leaving him unable to continue being Batman, he handpicked Jean Paul Valley, previously known as Azarel, to take over the cape and cowl. When Tony Stark succumbed to his alcoholism, he asked long time friend Jim Rhodes to take over his role as Iron Man. When Superman perished in battle with Doomsday, no less than 4 successors showed up, each either claiming to be him or wanting to pick up where he left off.

If there is one thing comics teaches us, it’s that no one is anybody until they’ve been killed, crippled, or forced to retire under dubious circumstances, only to be replaced by a younger, cooler, sexier, more badass version of themselves. However, there is another side of the coin as well. Usually this replacement doesn’t last very long, maybe a year or two, until the successor is killed, goes insane, or is revealed to be a pawn of a sinister plot, and the original hero is either resurrected (or revealed to not have been dead at all), recovered from their ‘crippling injury’, or is forced to come back out of retirement and resume their identity. Indeed, John Walker’s stint as Captain America was revealed to be a plot by the Red Skull, and soon Steve Rogers resumed his identity as Captain America. Jean Paul Valley had gone off the deep end, forcing Bruce Wayne (whose spine was miraculously healed) to retake his identity of Batman. Iron Man recovered from his alcoholism to battle Obadiah Stane after Rhodes was injured by the villain, while Superman recovered in the Fortress of Solitude and reclaimed his identity after the Eradicator sacrificed himself to restore his powers.
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A few weeks ago, we reported Conan O�Brien joining Bruce Timm in designing a super hero, and now here is The Flaming C’s debut in Young Justice.

I know this news has been out for a while, but I’m trying to catch up on news I missed during the busy holiday/year end period. I’m not a big DCUC collector, but I have to admit, this is one tempting wave. From the facebook reveal:

Well the rumors this time are true! Wave 17 for DCUC is coming soon and it is our first step into the Blackest Night!

While we do have more Blackest Night concepts in the wings, this wave should help whet fans appetite for all the colored Lantern goodness!

Wave 17 will consist of Orange Lantern Luthor, Yellow Lantern Scarecrow, White Lantern Hal Jordan (with Black Lantern Variant), Violet Lantern Wonder Woman, Blue Lantern Flash and Indigo Lantern Atom. Together they will create a Collect and Connect modern Anti-Monitor!

And to answer the inevitable question, we did look into Red Lantern Mera. The only way to do her right is with a 100% tool and for that cost we can do 4 other figures. So while she did not make the cut this time around, we do know fans want complete sets and we are committed to one day getting her out there!

For now, a very happy holidays from all of your friends at Mattycollector.com and we’ll see you all in the New Year. Wave 17 will be on sale in late Spring 2011!

       

Jean Grey, the original Marvel Girl, is Phoenix once again in Marvel Vs Capcom 3.

And Mayor of Metro City Mike Haggar has joined the fight as well!

Marvel Vs Capcom 3: Fate Of Two Worlds will be out on February 15. Pre-Order the Special Edition now to get one month of Marvel Digital Comics, 12 Art book, 12 page prologue comic, and access to the first DLC pack of Jill Valentine and Shuma Gorath a month before other players.