DC and Ghost Machine swap superstar artists for cover-crossover

This isn’t a traditional comic book crossover, but Jim Lee and Gary Frank are set to swap illustrations for both Batman and Geiger.

Artistic collaboration

Probably better called a collaboration than a crossover, a pair of huge names are indeed swapping places for what’ll be a pair of covers. The talent in question are both titans of the industry too, since we’re talking about both Jim Lee and Gary Frank.

As to who’s doing what, Lee will be providing an illustration of The Glowing Woman for Image Comics and Ghost Machine’s Geiger #19, while Frank will bring the Dark Knight to life for Batman #163.

“Jim’s a great friend and inspirational artist,” said Frank. “When we first began talking about doing covers for each other’s projects, it instantly became a moment where you realize why you got into comics. The community, the friendships, the love of the medium and the appreciation of each other’s work is something unique to comics and its creators.”

“When Jim delivered his Geiger cover featuring The Glowing Woman, Ashley Arden, it was a special moment for all of us at Ghost Machine,” continued Frank. “It was also fun for me to dip back into the world of DC with a Batman image featuring the Dark Knight and some of his greatest villains.”

“I’m thrilled to be able to collaborate with the massively talented Gary Frank who I’ve had the good fortune to call a true friend since the early 1990’s,” said Lee. “Gary is a consummate professional, a Bonafide artist’s artist, a master of capturing light and form, and he’s drawn some of my favorite comics ever.”

“We hatched this idea to do a ‘crossover’ even if it is truly only compositionally,” continued Lee, “and I’m so honored to have a Gray Frank Batman Hush piece grace our ‘who’s who’ list of variant virtuoso cover artists!”

DC Comics press release

A pair of returns with some new tales

While the above is interesting enough, it’s made a little more so just by the histories of the artistic talent involved. After all, Jim Lee was a founding member of Image Comics way back in 1992, creating the brand alongside Todd McFarlane, Erik Larsen, Wilce Portacio, Jim Valentino, and Rob Liefeld. Not that it’s been quite that long since Lee did work for the publisher, as he was involved with McFarlane’s landmark Spawn #200 back in 2011, issuing his own variant cover for that book.

As for his issue of Geiger, that will see the return of Ashley Arden, known as the Glowing Woman. Set in a war-torn Earth, Geiger typically stars the title hero, but Arden will take center stage in this particular book. October’s Geiger #19 will see her continuing her quest to hunt down human traffickers across the nuclear wastes.

On the flip side, Gary Frank has famously been a Batman artist before. He worked on both Batman: Earth One and the massive Doomsday Clock event series for DC, before we went on to found Ghost Machine. Created in 2023, the imprint was born from Frank, along with Geoff Johns, Brad Anderson, Jason Fabok, Bryan Hitch, Rob Leigh, Lamont Magee, Francis Manapul, Brad Meltzer, Ivan Reis, Peter Snejbjerg, Peter J. Tomasi, and Maytal Zchut. So there’s an interesting parallel there between the two stars.

Batman #163 will debut in August, and will be a part of DC’s current H2SH storyline. If you haven’t been following that, it’s the sequel to the original Hush tale from the early 2k’s, and has been running since Batman #158. August’s issue will actually bring the arc to a close for 2025, though it’ll be kicking up again next year for an additional six issue run.