Dark Horse Comics

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Dark Horse Comics

• By Michael Kyriacou 11G

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Brief History

• July 1986 - Dark Horse publishes its first comic
  Dark Horse Presents 1.
• July 1988 - Aliens 1 hits the stands and
  response is tremendous. Issue 1 is reprinted six
  times in order to fulfill demand
• March 1989 - Predator 1 is released
• November 1989 - Aliens vs. Predator 1 is
  released and goes on to sell over 400,000 copies
  of issue 1 alone
• June 1991 - Frank Miller's Sin City is first
  serialized in Dark Horse Presents 51
• March 1994 - Hellboy Seed of Destruction 1 is
  published, marking Hellboy's first solo comic.
• March 1995 - Shirow Masamune's Ghost in the Shell
  1 is released
• 1998 - Dark Horse sweeps the Harvey Awards with
  three wins. Sergio Aragones takes the award for
  Best Artist. Frank Miller's Sin City Family
  Values wins for the Best Album of Original
  Material. Dark Horse Presents wins the Harvey for
  Best Anthology for the second year in a row. The
  first Dark Horse action figures - Ghost
  (September) and Martha Washington (November) -
  are released.
• Rest can be found on http//www.darkhorse.com/comp
  any/timeline.php

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General Overview

• 3rd Biggest publisher behind marvel and DC
• Produces both Licensed and Creator Owned Comics
• Produces many cross-overs.
• Produces a wide range of comics
• Strongly linked with Hollywood

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Famous Comics They Have/Still Produce

• Predator (Several Series)
• Aliens (Several Series)
• Alien Vs Predator (Several Series)
• Buffy The Vampire Slayer (Several Series)
• Conan (Several Series)
• Sin City (Several Series)
• Concrete
• Hell Boy (Several Series)

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Licenses

• They own a wide range of licenses
• Own such famous heroes as Superman, Batman,
  Aliens, Predator, Indiana Jones, Star Wars and
  Sin City.
• Full list can be found here http//www.darkhorse.c
  om/company/licenses.php

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Merchandising

• Dark Horse Comics also sell many other types of
  media.
• Novelisations of their most popular comics i.e.
  Predator Concrete Jungle
• Clothing Ranging from hats to shirts
• Stationary All Types
• Figurines Of comic book characters
• Full list can be obtained at http//www.darkhorse.
  com/products/title.php

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Films

• Produced many films and have a deal giving full
  creative access to Universal Studios.
• Notable Films
• Alien Vs. Predator
• Alien Vs. Predator Requiem
• Hellboy
• And the upcoming Hellboy 2

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Sin City

• First published in June 1991
• Set in a fictional Basin City
• Told in a film noir style
• Uses High Contrast
• Set in a series of Yarns
• Always has a story in which a
• strong male character has to
• rescue a female character
• possibly a stylistic nod to film noir
• Mainly black and white but
• effective use of colour

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Hellboy

• First Published in march 1994
• About a demon brought to
• the world by Nazi
• Thaumaturgists
• Many intertextual
• references to folk-law and
• religion
• A feature film has been
• made and a sequel is in
• production.

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Aliens

• Based on the film series Alien
• Many different series have
• been produced
• Mainly action comics
• They feature characters
• from the films
• Also have original plot lines
• Features many cross-overs

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Predator

• Taken from the film
• Inspired the second film
• Set in many locations
• Has many crossovers
• Many series developed

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Useful Links

• http//www.darkhorse.com
• http//www.amazon.com
• http//www.wikipedia.org
• http//www.imdb.com