Geoff Johns and artist Jerry Ordway team up to present you with the return of Superboy-Prime. The grasp of BLACKEST NIGHT knows no bounds, and it’s reached the doorstep of Superboy-Prime. And, if you can believe it, Prime has met his match. But we can’t say much more. What we can do is show you a batch of pages from the issue.

ADVENTURE COMICS #4 hits 11/18.

Superboy is back and he’s enlisting one of his oldest friends, Tim Drake, formerly known as Robin. Tim’s now traveling the globe as Red Robin. But the reunion isn’t all hugs and smiles, as secrets Tim has kept from the Boy of Steel could endanger their very friendship. Join writer Geoff Johns and artist Francis Manapul as they continue to chronicle the adventures (get it?) of Connor Kent.

ADVENTURE COMICS #3 hits 10/14.

What’s the best way to get over having to come back to work after a long weekend? Well, how about some cool news? I can’t really complain, as I’m sending this while heading south to the Florida Keys. But this news is big enough to interrupt my vacation — and it really should be shared now. Remember how we announced that after the completion of THE FLASH: REBIRTH and BLACKEST NIGHT, writer Geoff Johns would be writing a new ongoing FLASH series? One thing we didn’t mention was the name of his artistic collaborator. Johns will be teaming up with none other than superstar artist Francis Manapul to chronicle the adventures of the Scarlet Speedster next year.

The pair knocked it out of the park with their amazing work on ADVENTURE COMICS, so having Johns and Manapul continue their magic partnership with one of the DCU’s most iconic characters was definitely a no-brainer. They finish up their run on ADVENTURE COMICS with January¹s #6 to get ready for FLASH #1, which kicks off the high-octane and mysterious storyline “The Dastardly Death of the Rogues!” Stay tuned to The Source for news on the new creative team taking the reigns on ADVENTURE and a sneak preview of Francis’s art from FLASH. How’s that for a welcome to the working week?

Well, you will, dear Source readers. All in due time. But first, a few things:

Because of the holiday, “blogging will be light” today. Meaning, this is basically it. Also, I’m on vacation. Heck, I might be on the beach as you read this. But fear not — thanks to great advances in blogging technology, it’ll be like I never left. You’ll get your regular dose of Source goodness at the usual times. But please, try to miss me.

Oh, right. I promised the cover to ADVENTURE COMICS #5. Well, here it is. See you in a week.

Geoff Johns and superstar artist Francis Manapul continue to tell the tale of the revived Conner Kent, as Superboy settles back into life in Smallville. But all is not well in Superman’s hometown. And while Conner reunites with Wonder Girl to discuss their future, Lex Luthor and Brainiac form a partnership that will put the entire DCU at risk.

Meanwhile, in the Legion of Super-Heroes co-feature, co-writers Geoff Johns and Michael Shoemaker team with artist Clayton Henry to spotlight the heroes of the 31st century, as Lightning Lad travels to the prison planet of Takron-Galtos to confront his brother, Lightning Lord, and to learn an unexpected family secret that could set in motion a war to end all wars. Yeah, that big.

ADVENTURE COMICS #2 hits 9/9.

Happy Friday, DC Nation! Elisabeth Gehrlein here, DCU editor of…well, a really nice range of titles. One of the things I love about my current slate of books is how varied they are – I’ve got everything on my plate from JONAH HEX to TINY TITANS, with ADVENTURE COMICS and DOOM PATROL and WONDER WOMAN in between. So every day is a genre-bending journey where one minute I could be thinking “Where did those penguins get rocket packs in the first place?” and then suddenly a colorist calls with this disturbing question: “What color should I make the fragments of his shattered legs?”

To give you an idea of what I’m talking about, I’d like to show you some of the fantastic stuff that has crossed my desk recently.

Let’s start with WONDER WOMAN, where Aaron Lopresti’s beautiful covers are a joy to get in my inbox every month. Here’s a sneak peek at the cover for #39, first in sketch form and then with full tonal work:

Oh, and I just got an email from Tony DeZuniga, co-creator of JONAH HEX, who is hard at work on the art for the Hex hardcover graphic novel, due in-store next spring. Tony and writers Justin Gray and Jimmy Palmiotti have teamed up before on Hex, and here’s what the results looked like:

I thought you might like to see some of Tony’s work-in-progress, though. Here are three pages of his roughs from the hardcover, also written by Jimmy and Justin, that tell an awesome little story all their own. That story is “Don’t mess with this man while he’s drinking.”

Moving on to ADVENTURE COMICS, where Francis Manapul and Brian Buccelato are turning out some gorgeous variant covers. Here are Francis’s inks for the #2 variant:

And then Brian takes Francis’s lovely ink washes to a whole new level with his color. Here it is with color and all:

Sticking with variant covers for a minute – you’ve seen the Matthew Clark/Kevin Maguire jam variant covers for DOOM PATROL issues #1 and 2 in previous posts. I love these covers very much, so I wanted to show you the final one for issue #3, starring Negative Man and a Metal Men obstacle course. We’ll start with Keith Giffen’s layout, and then there’s Kevin Maguire’s inks, Matthew Clark’s pencils over Kevin’s inks, Matthew’s and Kevin’s inks together at last, and finally the color by Guy Major.

Oh, and speaking of DOOM PATROL, remember that thing about the shattered legs? Yeah. When BLACKEST NIGHT comes to Oolong Island, things do not go well for the Chief. These wonderfully creepy cover pencils for issue #5 by Justiniano tell the tale:

Writer Keith Giffen’s comment? “Well, he won’t be getting far on foot.”

Yeesh.

But let’s end on a lighter note, shall we? TINY TITANS! This month in issue #20, Art Baltazar and Franco answer the age-old question, “After you win the Eisner for Best Publication for Kids (AW YEAH EISNER!), where oh where do you put the award for safe-keeping?” Well, where could be safer than Wayne Manor?

OK, I think I’ve spilled enough beans for one day. More to come next time – stay tuned!

Monday’s winding down, and while there are still four more work days looming, let’s take a glance at some of the notable bits in the press from the last few days:

• Over at EW.com’s shiny new book blog, SHELF LIFE, Ken Tucker talks up the first issue of BLACKEST NIGHT: SUPERMAN, calling the issue this week’s “smartest, grisliest mainstream comic book.”

• AIN’T IT COOL NEWS reviews the first issue of ADVENTURE COMICS, by Geoff Johns and Francis Manapul, succinctly summing up the issue: “This is the good stuff.”

• Speaking of ADVENTURE COMICS #1, THE ONION AV CLUB reviews the issue, along with the first issue of DOOM PATROL. Both debut issues nabbed a “B+” rating.

• NEWSARAMA’s posted their latest 20 Questions and 1 Answer with Dan DiDio, which is well worth reading if you’re looking for a few newsbits. Two words for you: BATMAN BEYOND?

We’ve covered the RED CIRCLE characters from pretty much every angle here on The Source, and we’ve got a few things to toss your way on this lovely Friday afternoon. Below, you’ll see the cover to THE SHIELD #2, by Francis Manapul and the cover to THE WEB #2, by FINAL CRISIS AFTERMATH: DANCE cover artist Stanley Lau. Nice, eh?

Geoff Johns. Francis Manapul. Superboy. Adventure Comics. Enjoy.