Comics: ‘Home Brew Vampire Bullets’ reveals cover and line-up for TWO

Home Brew Vampire Bullets TWO (HBVB)

We’ve mentioned several times how much we love Australian anthology Home Brew Vampire Bullets, so much so that Richard Gray has been quoted in the publicity repeatedly. The HBVB Brains Trust have just dropped details and cover art, from the awesome Sacha Bryning, for the second issue. It’s an even bigger line-up than their already massive line-up, including Australian legend Tony Martin (the funny one, not the one who played Rev Bob Brown on E-Street).

HBVB has released a full slate of writers and artists, including some returning names and a whole mess of new talent as well. Here’s the good word from the heart of darkness. You can grab your own copy from 31 March on their official site.

Welcome Mr Tony Martin (The Late Show, Martin/ Molloy, credits too numerous to list here) to the party! Tony has graciously supplied our foreword in the none-more-Strayan voice of provocative auteur and ‘cinematic’ maverick Warren Perso!

We also welcome on board writer John Harrison (Sin Street Sleaze), who’ll be teaming up with Matt Dunn (De Selan, Crippled Black Phoenix) to school you on Aussie horror cinema; Sacha Bryning (GQ, Squishface Studios), whose visceral watercolours deliver an incredible knee to the solar plexus in ‘Fuck Off, We’re Full’; Matt Huynh (Ma, Harri and Some Change, Rolling Stone), whose gorgeous brushwork and emotive line are sure to astound; Emmet O’Cuana (Beardy & The Geek), who goes deep with a stellar investigation of the roots of Tony Abbott’s Catholicism; Dr Emma Beddows (Whatcha Podcast, transmedia guru), investigating misogyny in Australian geek culture; photographer extraordianaire Kellie Gollings taking us on an urbex jaunt to one of Melbourne’s many secret spaces; the legendary Dean Rankine (Bongo Comics, Action Lab Comics), whose Johnny Fuckface makes his debut; and games academic Laura Crawford, who’s going to school you on the state of Aussie indie gaming!

Returning to the fray?

Neil Blanch’s Dr Radium shares his manifesto for revitalising the Mardi Gras;Arran McKenna (Happydance Studios) puts the boot into The Hobbit; the metal-bastard madness of Simon Sherry’s (Something Wicked, Game of KingsHeavy Angel makes its triumphant return; Justin Hamilton (Barry award winner, beloved Aussie standup) provides a creepy slice of rural horror; Stefan Delatovic’s suburban sci-fi ‘In Retrospect’ gets serialised; Matthew Dunn takes billionaire Clyde Parma on a trip in the Northern Territory; Scott Fraser’s‘Shadowrumble’ continues its exploration of contemporary Melbourne’s supernatural underworld; Doug Holgate (Clem Hetherington, Zinc Alloy) teams up with Dean Rankine for something very special indeed; Micca Delaney hits you with suburban demon fable ‘Reggie’s Day Out’Mark Selan(Ozcomics Magazine, Gusty Smythe) explores the world of Australian comics legend Ron Devereux; more tasty slices of patented Nick Lewis‘ Turd Circuslunacy, AND, if you could possibly believe it, there’s even MORE.

But we need to keep something up our sleeves, right?

Wrangled by Editor and Brains Trust Garth Jones, HBVB TWO is less Fosters and more craft beer

Or, as Newsarama’s Richard Gray pointed out in his ‘Best Shots of 2013’, ‘(Home Brew Vampire Bullets is) like a super-sized Dark Horse Presents for the southern hemisphere, and a great roadmap for the future direction of one of the most talented groups of artists on the planet’.

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Home Brew Vampire Bullets TWO (HBVB)