(But first, some background:)
At its beating heart, The Brothers James is about family, loyalty and sacrifice.
Co-creators Brian Level (Batman/Fables, Absolute Carnage) and Ryan Ferrier (D4VE, Sons of Anarchy) return to The Brothers James Redux with love in their hearts and more highway miles behind them to revisit the series that pushed them into the comics limelight! Artists Michael Walsh and Eamon Hill (Roadkill Rampage) join the team to drive the story to its bloody and heart-wrenching conclusion.
Identical twin orphans, Jack and John James terrorize the southern US highways to wrap up unfinished business: Hunt down and kill the bikers that butchered their parents fifteen years earlier!
Starting with a massacre of unsavories at the Sunshine Diner in Kentucky the boys rip-roar their Dodge Challenger through 5 issues of mechanics’ garages, death-cults, drug-dens all the way to prison in Louisiana. But having a hard time was always part of the plan. If they can survive state police from the past and present, and a shady woman who seems to offer help, brotherly spats and good-old-fashioned violent bikers, they may get their revenge and come out of it alive. The real question is, will their relationship withstand the truth of what got their parents killed in the first place?
Alongside that come furious car crashes, grindhouse violence, classic rock and roll, and a few road-beers to wash it all down. Rowdy, fast-paced and in glorious black and white, The Brothers James shows two brothers hanging on with white knuckles as they speed toward oblivion and try to take every offending member of the murderous LUCKY DEVILS with them. But it can’t all be pedal to the metal, now can it? Between twists, turns, and double-crosses. Women with secret motives, blood cults and cops that can’t be trusted, The Brothers James, keeps your butt in the seat and your head spinning ‘til the bitter end.
“This project put me on the map as a comic book artist,” said Brian Level. “It was an early work where I first got to exercise my artistic voice, both as a cartoonist and a writer, and as an unfinished work, it made perfect sense to update the issues and tie it all up with love and care for everyone that supported us all those years ago. I’m forever grateful to The Brothers James and Ryan for bringing me along. It’s been a massively important book for my life both professionally and personally.”
“The Brothers James concluding, after so long, means a lot to me because at the time it was a start,” said Ryan Ferrier. “It was made with joy and fearlessness; grit wrapped in determination, wrapped in hope, wrapped in blissfully unaware gumption—all lovely things a want-to-be creator clutches; even one with blood, guts, bullets, twisted metal, and southern fried revenge. Above all else, this comic represents what I'm most grateful for, looking back: an indelible friendship--a brotherhood and love--that will outlive and outshine any body of work or printed page. For readers, I just hope they have fun.”
“Being afforded the opportunity to get down in the dirt with the James boys is a true treat,” said Eamon Hill. “With the abundance of capes and mask books out there, the purity of a gritty revenge tale is something I find incredibly fulfilling.”
Finished and collected for the first time ever, The Brothers James Redux runs out in just 15 days. Lettered by Ryan Ferrier.
And now...the EXCLUSIVE from BRIAN LEVEL himself!
"I’ve fielded a lot of questions regarding The Brothers James but the most common has been 'why now?' There’s never a good or easy answer for why we would finish this 10-year-old book now. Mostly because we never thought in terms of 'why now' as much as 'we are able.' The same story happened ten years ago. We love it. And we can’t get out of the car before the destination.
I’ve spent the better part of the last decade working in various capacities across comics. Inker to finisher to assistant inker to artist to co-creator to writer and on and on. But I never let The Brothers James go. Maybe I’ve got a bad clingy brain or maybe there was something in the book worth holding on to.
Probably both. The Brothers James was the first series I got brought on to draw. I attacked hard. Ryan was very encouraging of my weirder artistic tendencies and we bonded like family. We experimented and had fun. We grew as artists and delivered something a little different in the market. We trusted each other and built something we fell in love with. Sure, something we owned, but also something that was an extension of ourselves. Our voices reach out into the world.
As a primarily work-for-hire comic book artist for the past 5-7 years, I’ve often crammed my voice into the box created by someone else. And that’s a fine job if you’re suited for it (and I often am). Though grateful for the freelance work, Brojams was purer. The people that came, came for us and the brothers. We were able to make art and tell stories that generate a vitality in me that no work-for-hire job ever does. That’s worth more than silver and gold to me.
I’ve had the privilege of working in about every possible scenario, and none of them were able to rattle me out of the car that I started in. The road is always a loop and I’m always driving home. There’s really no place like it."
BONUS: Please enjoy some never-before-seen, exclusive process shots for The Brothers James Redux!
