Acclaimed Batman writer Scott Snyder has revealed that a new weekly Batman series, Eternal, will launch in Spring 2014, in an interview with
USA Today. Snyder will contribute to the weekly series in addition to his work on the main Batman title, but will also share writing duties with a line-up of writers including James Tynion IV, John Layman, Ray Fawkes, and Tim Seeley with art primarily by current Detective Comics artist Jason Fabok. Batman: Eternal will focus on exploring areas of Gotham previously unseen in Batman comics that will seek to redefine the city while introducing a slew of new characters and stories for Batman. Snyder said:
"It's a place for me to be able to work with good friends in terms of shaping Gotham in a bigger, grander and more game-changing way than ever before," "You'll see bombastic arcs as well but there'll be plenty of room for Ray (Fawkes) to explore some of the darker, more mystical aspects of Gotham that he loves or Tim (Seeley) to explore some of the crime we haven't seen before."
Snyder went on to praise his co-writers on the project calling Tynion "a great world builder" with an "incredible expansive mind", while Seeley would bring "the humanistic stories to the table for us about the people living in Gotham and their reactions to the huge things happening in the series". Layman is "always up for a really fun, out-of-control story" and Fawkes, the current writer on justice League Dark, is planning a supernatural story arc where readers will experience the "tragic, haunting elements of the city". Batman: Eternal will be a similar in style to comics like 52 and Gotham Central, focusing on lesser-known and completely new characters as well as the Dark Knight and his more famous counterparts.
Snyder also talked about the forthcoming Detective Comics #27 and Batman's 75th Anniversary next year. As Batman fans will know, Detective Comics #27 is the first issue that Batman appeared in back in 1939 and, when DC reset the issue numbers back to #1 with their New 52 reboot in September 2011, readers in 2014 will now be able to pick up a brand new Detective Comics #27 in January 2014. The issue is planned to be extra-large to suit the occasion coming in at 104 pages long, and boasts an all-star cast of writers and artists including Frank Miller, Paul Dini, Brad Meltzer, Gregg Hurwitz, Peter Tomasi and Scott Snyder, along with illustrators Neal Adams, Dustin Nguyen, Fracesco Francavilla, and Sean Murphy with variant covers from Jim Lee, Neal Adams, Greg Capullo, Chris Burnham, Kelley Jones, Patrick Gleason, and Mike Allred. Of the legendary Batman writer Frank Miller's inclusion, Snyder said:
"He's still that guy who if I could meet him, I have a whole paragraph in in my mind: 'This is why you matter so much to me ...' Hopefully one day. His Batman stuff is just untouchable."
Given Snyder's current run on the title, future writers will doubtless be saying the same thing about him one day. Detective Comics #27 is scheduled for release on January 8, 2014.