Heavy Metal Magazine Returns to the Stands in Ambitious New Relaunch

Heavy Metal is easily one of the most popular and influential anthology magazines ever published, so we're pretty excited to see the series making its grand return to comic book shops. Following a hugely successful crowdfunding campaign, the new volume of Heavy Metal kicks off on Wednesday, April 30.

Ahead of that release, IGN can exclusively debut a new preview of Heavy Metal #1. Head to the slideshow gallery below to see pages from a number of stories featured in the first issue, along with all the previously revealed covers:

The new volume of Heavy Metal features a mix of classic, returning creators and Heavy Metal newcomers. And yes, that includes new stories featuring Heavy Metal icon Taarna. Here's the full list of stories and creators featured in the first issue:

• BUG - Enki Bilal
• Burton & Cyb - Antonio Segura & José Ortiz
• The Mercenary - Vicente Segrelles
• Valentina - Sergio Gerasi
• Sixella: The Last Roots - Janevsky
• Taarna: Rebirth - Leah Moore, John Reppion, Anna Morozova
• Cold Dead War: The Aftermath - Craig Wilson
• Grimaldi - Keron Grant, Josh Sky, Frank Forte
• Legends of Taarna: "Autophonomania" - Matt and Shawn Fillbach, Joseph Michael Linsner
• Gladiatrix - John Stanisci
• Evil Sex Bitch - Steve Mannion
• Lester, That Old Feeling - Fernando Dagnino
• The Bus - Paul Kirchner
• June 2050 - John Workman
• Millstone - Michael Conrad, Ilias Kyriazis
• Transcendestiny - David Quinn, Tim Vigil
• Cobot - Jonathan Wayshak
• All American - Jason Spell, Jok
• Kecksburg UFO - Jim Rugg
• They Dug Too Deep - Dwayne Harris
• Floyd the Giant Killer - Michael L. Peters
• GUNK - Curt Merlo
• Harry Canyon - Josh Sky, Frank Forte
• Zeke & Edsel - Frank Forte
• The Devil's Teeth - Lia Bozonelis, Agustin Alessio

Heavy Metal #1 boasts a print run of 73,000 copies, mking it the most heavily printed issue of the series in several decades. This issue is priced at $14.99 and clocks in at 232 pages.

Heavy Metal #1 is set to hit comic shops on April 30 and newstands on May 13. Future issues will be published quarterly, though the publisher notes that there's room for a more frequent release schedule if the demand is there.

In other comic book news, Mike Mignola is returning to the Hellboy universe this summer, and we chatted with the creative team behind Spider-Man & Wolverine.

Jesse is a mild-mannered staff writer for IGN. Allow him to lend a machete to your intellectual thicket by following @jschedeen on BlueSky.