Witchblade Cover: 1 From 3

When the 'War of the Witchblades' story-arc ends with issue #130 (9 September 2009) readers have been promised that we'll know who'll be the new Angelus and, furthermore, who'll be bearing the Witchblade itself.

Publishers Top Cow have come up with a nice solution to the problem of satisfying and exciting readers without giving away too much of how the story-arc ends during the 3 month solicitation process: they've prepared 3 covers, each featuring a different character as the new Angelus, that are already provoking plenty of debate and discussion amongst the fans.

Over at Newsarama Publisher Filip Sablik and writer Ron Marz explain their thinking behind preparing three covers and the demands this has put on Witchblade artist Stjepan Sejic.

Credit to Top Cow for this initiative I say - there are few things more annoying as a fan than investing [time and emotion] in a title month after month and then coming across a major spoiler just as the storyline is coming to a climax.

Meanwhile, the penultimate issue of 'War of the Witchblades' - #129 - is due at the end of August and features a variant cover from John Tyler Christopher alongside regular artist Sejic.

Christopher has written an interesting feature, published at Comic Book Resources, explaining his own creative process - from initial sketch to finished cover - as well as touching on some of the logistical challenges involved with producing the cover.