NEWS
NYCC: DARK HORSE ANNOUNCES NEW MANGA BY FORMER STAN LEE COLLABORATOR
Plus: ‘Blue Eye Samurai’ Series, More Lovecraft from Gou Tanabe
Posted by Brigid Alverson on October 13, 2026 @ 9:02 am CT
Dark Horse’s NYCC announcements included a new series by Hiroyuki Takei, who collaborated with Stan Lee on Ultimo, as well as a series based on the Netflix show Blue Eye Samurai and a collection of short manga stories by Gou Tanabe.
Martial War is a Japanese/American collaboration co-written by Takei, who is also the creator of Shaman King and Neokogahara: Stray Cat Samurai, Will Carter, and Aidan White, with art by Takei and art assistance by Jet Kusamura. The manga is set in a world where ninja have been disgraced and fight in a special arena, the Octagon, where they wield the deadly Tatara stones and features a young man determined to battle his way to the top. The story will read from right to left, in traditional manga style, and the first volume will be released in paperback on April 6, 2027, with an MSRP of $14.99.
Takei worked with Stan Lee on Ultimo, which was published in both Japan and North America (see “VIZ to Publish Stan Lee Manga Project”).
Blue Eye Samurai: Cry of the Yurei, by writers K. Perkins and Mike Johnson, artist Aviv Or, and colorist Valentina Bianconi, is based on the Netflix series about a mixed-race woman on a quest for revenge in samurai-era Japan. The comic series follows the main character, Mizu, as her gender and mixed heritage are revealed and she flees to the woods, pursued by a samurai, and forms and alliance with another woman. The first issue will have covers by David Mack, Ito, and Angela Wu.
H.P. Lovecraft’s The Outsider and Other Early Adaptations is a collection of short manga stories by Gou Tanabe, who has adapted a number of H.P. Lovecraft stories into manga (see “More Lovecraft”). In addition to the title story, this volume includes the original story “Ju-Ga” and adaptations of Anton Chekhov’s “The House with a Mezzanine” and Maxim Gorky’s “26 Men and a Girl.”
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Brigid Alverson
Contributing Editor. Alverson has been writing about comics since she launched MangaBlog in 2005. She wrote the Comics A.M. column for Robot 6 (now part of CBR), and currently edits the Good Comics for Kids blog at School Library Journal. In her earlier life, she had roles at magazine and book publishers.
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