American Gods Shadows #1 is out from March 15th in comic book form, and there is also a TV series on the horizon, which will be shown on the Starz network. This series was originally a novel entitled American Gods, written by Neil Gaiman and published in 2001.

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The premise of this title is that mythological creatures exist because people believe in them and immigrants have brought their spirits and gods with them to the United States. However the power that the mythological beings wield has diminished as people’s belief in them has waned, now new gods have replaced them, reflecting modern day obsessions with media and celebrity, among other things. Several characters from the novel are present in the comic book, including protagonist Shadow Moon a down on his luck ex-convict who gets mixed up with a variety of characters, many of which are incarnations of deities, such as Mr Wednesday, who is actually the norse god Odin.

The comic is published by Dark Horse, a press release from them for this title states: “Shadow Moon just got out of jail, only to discover his wife is dead. Defeated, broke, and uncertain as to where to go from here, he meets the mysterious Mr. Wednesday, who employs him to serve as his bodyguard – thrusting Shadow into a deadly world of the supernatural, where ghosts of the past come back from the dead, and a brewing war between old and new gods hits a boiling point.”

The Old Gods present in the novel, who we could be seeing in the upcoming comic series, include the biblical Queen of Sheba, Egyptian God Thoth, Loki, Hindu Goddess Kali, as well as lore from cultures such as Celtic, Slavic and Native American. The new deities include a goddess of television and ‘The Intangibles’ – gods of the modern stock market. The original novel by Gaiman has a popular following and won many accolades, including the Hugo, Nebula and World Fantasy awards, so this comic is likely to be hotly anticipated. The comic is written by Gaiman himself, with art by P. Craig Russell and there are several variant covers available by the likes of Glenn Fabry, David Mack and Dave McKean.

Neil Gaiman’s American Gods: Shadows #1 is available from March 15th.