COVER STORY: Negation War #1

What makes the best comic book covers? It is a great topic for debate. For us, as individuals, there is no wrong answer, of course; it is purely subjective. But, with a little thought it’s possible to explain what it is about a particular image that grabs you. The best images are the ones that make you stop and check out something you weren’t previously planning to purchase – and in some cases, you even end up picking up a title you’ve never even heard of before.

One might consider the late computer whiz kid Mark Alessi’s once-bold CrossGeneration Comics as a “House of Cards.” The cash-poor comics market of the early 21st century, as well as some unfortunate decisions and/or timing that ran afoul of CrossGen’s never-ceasing goal for critical and commercial success, were arguably responsible for its hopes and dreams being blown to dust.

Before that, though, in April 2004, CrossGen released the culmination of its sigil-based universe – or at least the start of it – with two-issues of the limited series, Negation War. Intended to take its characters and comics to the next phase of their development, the first part had writer Tony Bedard and artists Paul Pelletier and Dave Meikis pit a sigil-powered superhero against CrossGen’s chief villains, the Negation. Needless to say, as Alessi would arguably have wanted it, the superhero lost and lost bad. In fact, Pelletier and Meikis depicted the fallen hero, Mighty-Man, impaled on poles on the first issue’s cover.

Two months later, Alessi finally called a meeting of his dwindling staff and announced CrossGen was shutting down. Disney, having flirted with doing a movie based on the company’s Ruse, ended up scooping up its IP rights during the bankruptcy, paying $1 million – about 4,000 times less than it would pay for Marvel Comics five years later – for all of CrossGen’s titles, of which none have ever made it to the silver screen.

After CrossGen closed its doors, Alessi retreated to the tech world, starting a company that made legal software. He has since joined the Great Beyond, and the following may be Alessi’s last words on the subject – haunting both fans and his foes to this day.

“We never got to prove we were better than Marvel,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “We never got to finish the big story we were telling. And for that, I’m truly sorry.”

-Scott Braden