Hello everyone,

It is written: “He Who Pulls the Fuel-Injected V8 Out From the Stone Shall Henceforth Be King of All England!”

Well, okay, that brilliant bit of writing never actually appears in the second issue of the IDW Publishing miniseries SPEED RACER: CHRONICLES OF THE RACER – which was written by yours truly – and which went on sale at comics shops everywhere Wednesday March 5th. (March 5th sounds suspiciously like “Mach 5,” doesn’t it?) But the story IS a riff on the Arthurian legend. And it boasts incredible art by Robby Musso and German Torres. Here’s the promo copy:

“Arie Kaplan and Robby Musso continue to tell the story of past Racers throughout history. In medieval England, inexperienced teenager Sprint Rackham must outrace a madman who’s kidnapped Lady Beatrix via his giant mechanical dragon. Even with a suit of armor designed by a wizard, can Sprint rescue her in time? Meanwhile in the present, Speed, Racer X, and Trixie find themselves one step closer to the mystery carjacker, as they come under attack in a super-garage beneath Mercury Pictures!”

And I was recently interviewed by the Internet podcast COMIC GEEK SPEAK. Here’s CGS co-host Peter Rios’ description of the interview: “The Speakers of Geek take a look at IDW’s new Speed Racer: Chronicles of the Racer series with writer Arie Kaplan as well as his work on MAD, his new book Krakow to Krypton: A History of Jews in Comicbooks, the Speed Racer cartoon, writing for all ages, Terry Gilliam and more.” Here’s a link to the interview (CGS Episode 377): http://www.comicgeekspeak.com/episodes/comic_geek_speak-508.asp

Scroll down to the “Monday, March 3rd” entry on IDW publisher Chris Ryall’s blog RYALLTIME to see the first page of SPEED RACER: CHRONICLES OF THE RACER #2:
http://www.ryalltime.blogspot.com/

Also, feel free to check out the “Comic Books” page of my website, which contains cover art for all four issues of my SPEED RACER: CHRONICLES OF THE RACER miniseries, as well as links to IDW’s press release for the series and B&W art promo for SPEED RACER: CHRONICLES OF THE RACER #1:
https://www.ariekaplan.com/comics.htm