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elcome welcome welcome. Welcome to Heli (if you’re reading this page first and think I’m just being rude, stop now and go read the book front to back, like you should)... the most glorious sort of Heli we can give you. (Please, any of you letter-writers, no “LA already was hellish” or “Hel-L.A.” comments. I might be San Diego-based now, but thats still my town!). Welcome to Angel: After the Fali, a tale we’ve wanted to tell sińce we first started publishing Angel comics. Our Angel run started just about the same time as my tenure with the company three-and-a-half years ago, and in that time, the one story we’ve been wanting to tell is the one you’ve all been wanting to read— what happened next?

As any of you who’ve followed our Angel comics know, we’ve tried to skirt the issue, we’ve alluded to the fact that our comics mmmight take place after the TV series ended... we gave someone an eye patch, for Gods sake! If thats not a sign of an apocalyptic battle in a darkened alley, well, I don't know what is.

But the fans aren’t having any allusions to the show’s finale, they’re not going to canonize a tale because we’d like it to be so. And really, nor should they—they should enjoy our Angel tales on their own merits but not drive themselves crazy trying to slot a tale into a certain time period when it doesn’t ultimately affect the story itself. No, if we’re going to tell stories that fans can truły consider canon, only one person can anoint them as such—Pope Joss Whedon.

Which brings us to Angel: After the Fali.

Actually, it brings us first to Spike: Asylum, and its creative team of Brian Lynch and Franco Urru. Brian, a successful LA-based screenwriter, was excited by the book—and deservedly so, sińce it's one of the best-received projects we’ve done—and he had the fortuitous timing to run into Joss at an LA eatery the day before the first issue hit comics shops. The day before. And he did what he never does but couldn’t help in this case, he introduced himself to Joss, mentioned the comic coming out the next day, and went about his day.

The next day, Joss picked up the comic and read it. And contacted me and told me that in Brian, he saw a writer who captured the voices of his characters so perfectly that he could finally envision making an “Angel: Season Six" comic, if Brian would work with him on it.

seconds), and we were off and running. Brian and Joss returned to the same restaurant and began plotting out the entire tale. Many of Brians ideas jibed with the plan Joss had for the shows sbrthtf season, had it happened, and it grew organically from therę. Oh, and Joss told Brian he really liked Betta George (the giąnt telepathic fish from Asylum) and that he should appear in After the Fali. And thats the story of how a giant telepathic fish became part of Angel canon.

Franco Urru, just to cover the other indispensable part of our creative team, came to me from David Messina, our original Angel artist. Franco hails from Italy, too, and in addition to his amazing work ethic and sheer talent, is just one of the most charming human beings I’ve ever had the good fortunę to meet. And Joss loved his work on Asylum and Spike: Shadow Puppets, too, and when we were discussing the proper artist to handle this new title, Franco was our only choice.

Having an Eisner Award-winning artist like Tony Harris, and one of my favorite artists around, provide a cover for this issue was just the coup de grace.

So, here we are, courtesy of Joss, Brian, and Franca And now that you’ve read this debut issue (right?), you know that Angels world has changed. You still don’t entirely know quite how much, but you’11 see soon enough. In fact, in addition to the cast you’ve seen here so far, those of you wondering about the fates of some of your other favorites won’t have long to wait (and you fans of giant telepathic fish won’t be left hanging for long, either). You can expect morę familiar faces next issue, and in issue three, in addition to a giant knock-down brawl, you’11 get a shock ending that makes the shocker at the end of issue two seem normal by comparison. If you think you know what was going to happen after the end of season five, if the show was to continue, well, I wouldn’t necessarily count on it all rolling out like you think. It’s going to be better.

I don’t mind saying that Angel Season Five was my favorite season in the shows half-decade run. Now, I know that this opinion isn’t going to endear me to certain fans on message boards—oh, how I know—seeing how so many Angel fans are so split in which season represented the character the best. But its Season Five for me all the way. What can I say, I’m an old