Press Office Note: Liberator is a revolutionary comic series about animal liberation, written by Matt Miner. We have seen Liberator blossom into a new and creative medium to reach other audiences (outside of preaching to the choir) about the importance of animal liberation and those who risk their freedom behind the mask to free others. We are excited for this new compilation not only for our own selfish reasons of wanting more story and the adventure to continue, but also the comic’s ability to transform how other communities look at and treat animals and the ideas surrounding people who fight for their freedom. After reading Liberator, Miner stated that people have written in about how they are now vegetarian/vegan, started volunteering at rescues, and donated to sanctuaries after reading Liberator! (Pre-order Liberator/Earth Crisis: Salvation of Innocents here)
The following is a review from Bleeding Cool
about the new series.
Earth Crisis is a New York metalcore punk band popular in the nineties, who reformed relatively recently. Keen supporters of animal rights, they are straight edge, vegan and politically active.
Which is why they are crossing over with Black Mask’s animal activist comic, Liberator, in a new series launching in March, Liberator/Earth Crisis: Salvation Of The Innocents which ties in with a new album from the band with the same name, out in the same month. The album, from Candlelight Records will be out on March 4th, the comic on March 5th, and each will tell a different side of the same story.
The comic synopsis reads:
When Sarah Mann takes a crappy custodial job at a cosmetics lab, she discovers cold-blooded scientist Dr. Elena Reznik’s secret facility where illegal vivisections are performed on live, conscious animals. Inspired by the stories of Jeanette and Damon’s animal liberations, Sarah pulls on her own mask and sets out to rescue the tortured animals.
And the creative team are:
Creator: Matt Miner
Producer: Matt Pizzolo
Writers: Matt Miner, Earth Crisis
Illustrators: Javier Aranda (pencils/inks), Joaquin Pereyra (colors).
Cover A: Menton3
Cover B: Rod Reis
Here are some PR quotes.
“Earth Crisis has wanted to have a comic that went along with an album’s lyrical concept for a while, but we didn’t think one existed that shared the same vision of the band, until now! Liberator and Matt Miner are just what we’ve been waiting for, and we are honored to have him help us tell the story!” -Earth Crisis
“Working with EARTH CRISIS on the comic book side of Salvation of Innocents has been a dream project for me. Our styles, ethics, and ideologies are a fitting match and I’m super excited for folks to read the story.” -Matt Miner, creator Liberator
“It’s crazy to me that it took twenty years for comics to produce a set of animal-minded vigilantes strong enough to roll with EARTH CRISIS. It’s probably the most perfectly aligned superhero team-up ever.” -Matt Pizzolo, Black Mask Studios
“Salvation of Innocents isn’t just the story of a badass vigilante rescuing animals. It’s a challenging hero story because it’s true, and it’s the type of heroism any of us can step up and do ourselves.” -Matt Pizzolo, Black Mask Studios
“It’s refreshing to see a comic hero fighting for something I care about, rather than protecting the financial security of the rich.” (-Earth First Journal)
It’s not the only Liberator volume out in March from Black Mask. They are putting out a graphic anthology of previous Liberator issues, but with forty pages of new Liberator stories by a wide comics creative group, that have previously been unseen. And who, you ask? Well, they include…Tim Seeley, Ales Kot, Ed Brisson, Alex de Campi, Frank Barbiere, Megan Hutchison, Fabian Rangel Jr, Matt Pizzolo, Matthew Rosenberg and Adam Egypt Mortimer.