BLACK Universe Expands With BLACK [AF]: Widows & Orphans Miniseries
by Hannah Means Shannon
We’ve already been anticipating new original graphic novel set within the universe of BLACK, BLACK [AF]: America’s Sweetheart in April, but now publisher Black Mask Studios have also announced a spin-off miniseries to arrive shortly after the OGN.
BLACK [AF]: Widows & Orphans will be a four part mini starting in April, too.
The original series of BLACK, now available as a trade, posits the presence of latent super powers in the populace, but only among African Americans, and the gradual realization of this fact causing panic in the USA. Co-creators Kwanza Osajyefo and Tim Smith 3 are heading this new series.
On sale timed to Black History Month, the original graphic novel BLACK [AF]: America’s Sweetheart introduces America’s first superhero, a black teenage girl. Though Eli Franklin’s friends and neighbors in rural Montana think of her as a typical 15-year-old, she just might be the most powerful person on the planet. This standalone YA book will arrive in book stores on January 31st and in bookstores on February 13th.
Then, the four-issue series Widows & Orphans will reunite co-creators Kwanza Osajyefo and Tim Smith 3, with Osajyefo writing the series and Smith illustrating it. The series highlights Anansi, one of the characters introduced in BLACK, and marks the first BLACK series to be illustrated by Smith, who designed the characters that Jamal Igle illustrated in the first BLACK comics.
Osajyefo says:
Tim and I first came up with the concept of BLACK almost a decade ago. It’s a thrill to see these characters come to life through his art in the pages of this series.
Smith explains:
Like the other titles, BLACK [AF]: WIDOWS & ORPHANS is no-holds-barred storytelling. This story features Anansi and Hoodrat investigating a human trafficking ring that will take them across the globe and bring them face-to-face with dark pasts of abuse, child soldiers, and families torn apart. The series asks a genuinely disturbing question—in a world where only black people have superpowers, what price do they fetch on the black market?
More BLACK titles are also in development from the co-creators, according to Black Mask Studios.
Here’s our order information for both the graphic novel and the first issue of the new miniseries:
BLACK AF: AMERICA’S SWEETHEART
written by Kwanza Osajyefo; illustrated by Jennifer Johnson
$9.99; 80 pages; Full Color
On sale: in comic book stores on January 31 and in bookstores on February 14, 2018
BLACK [AF]: WIDOWS & ORPHANS #1
written by Kwanza Osajyefo; illustrated by TIM SMITH 3
$3.99; 32 pages; Full Color; Mature
On Sale: April 2018
