Pittsburgh comic artist Ed Piskor drawing new 'X-Men' series
An award-winning Munhall artist has a gig to write and draw a new comic covering the first 30 years of Marvel's "Uncanny X-Men," the publisher announced Thursday at San Diego Comic-Con.
Ed Piskor, who won an Eisner Award in 2013 for his ongoing "Hip Hop Family Tree" series, said he has been working a year and a half on "X-Men: Grand Design," a six-issue series scheduled to be released starting in December.
Marvel just dropped the news that they gave me the reins to make a comic encompassing Uncanny X-Men issues 1-280 into one tight story. #sdcc pic.twitter.com/bEINnmQJRg
" Ed Piskor (@EdPiskor) July 20, 2017
"I'm basically taking the first 30 years worth of X-Men comics and treating them as elaborate notes or a first draft for me to then comb through to make the best X-Men comic I can," wrote Piskor in an email. "I can design my career however I like thanks to Hip Hop Family Tree's success, so I don't much consider this a job that you punch a clock and work for the weekend. It's a dream project 25 years in the making."
You gotta understand this X-Men joint is over 25 yrs in the making. pic.twitter.com/kGFaUxBuFc
" Ed Piskor (@EdPiskor) July 21, 2017
Still, Piskor said he's been working seven days a week drawing, turning out about two pages per week. He's on page 107 of 240, he said.
Piskor grew up in the Mon Valley drawing X-Men, and now sometimes posts throwbacks to his youthful comics on his Twitter feed. He was known mainly for his indie comics and his collaborations with Cleveland-based Harvey Pekar before Hip Hop Family Tree earned critical acclaim — often with poses and page layouts modeled on the superhero comics of Piskor's youth.
Comic Book Record reported that each chapter of the "Grand Design" series will cover a decade of X-Men storylines, going back to the 1960s. The X-Men debuted in 1963, often with the young mutant superheroes's struggles often standing in as proxies for prejudices, puberty and efforts to fit in.
Matthew Santoni is a Tribune-Review staff writer. Reach him at 724-836-6660, msantoni@tribweb.com or on Twitter @msantoni.
