Comics

Frank Miller returns: ‘The Dark Knight III: The Master Race’ coming this fall [update]

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Months after it was rumored to be in the works, Frank Miller has finally broken his silence and officially announced The Dark Knight III: The Master Race, the third and presumably final installment of his Dark Knight series.

Little is known about the new miniseries, which follows the legendary 1986 story The Dark Knight Returns and 2002’s controversial The Dark Knight Strikes Again, but Miller will be joined by Brian Azzarello and not Scott Snyder as initially speculated. Azzarello is best known for his runs on Wonder Woman and 100 Bullets, and he also wrote the 2008 graphic novel Joker.  No artists have been announced as of yet, but we’ll update as we learn more about the project.

The long-awaited 8-issue miniseries will ship bimonthly later this fall, which will come just months before the 30th anniversary of The Dark Knight Returns.

Check out the full press release below:

DC Entertainment announced today that bestselling, iconic Batman writer and artist Frank Miller will write the epic conclusion of the celebrated THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS saga.

The “THE DARK KNIGHT III: THE MASTER RACE” is the sequel to Miller’s 1986 classic THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS – heralded by TIME Magazine as one of the 10 greatest graphic novels of all time – and its 2001-2002 follow-up series BATMAN: THE DARK KNIGHT STRIKES AGAIN.

Miller will be joined by acclaimed writer Brian Azzarello (100 BULLETS, JOKER, and WONDER WOMAN) on the eight-issue comic book periodical, to be published twice a month under the DC Comics imprint.  Marking the 30th anniversary of THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS original series, this periodical is slated for publication beginning in late Fall 2015.

“Batman remains my favorite comic book hero and a sequel to Dark Knight is going to be daunting,” said Miller, “but we’ll do our best.”

“We are thrilled to have Frank back home at DC writing Batman,” according to Dan DiDio and Jim Lee, Co-Publishers for DC Entertainment. “The story he and Brian have crafted is an astounding and triumphant conclusion to this seminal body of work which influenced and shaped generations of readers and creators alike.”

According to Azzarello, “It’s been an amazing experience collaborating with Frank these past six months. I think we have an epic story that these characters truly deserve.”

Artists for the project have yet to be announced.

UPDATE: Based on the Twitter Q&A Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo participated in, it seems that Snyder may be involved in some capacity as originally reported:

Nothing thing else was revealed beyond that, but it’s definitely interesting.  As always, we’ll keep you posted as new information arises.