It's been a long 7 weeks since Tony DePaul announced that he had resigned from writing The Phantom Daily and Sunday newspaper strips, and a nervous wait for phans as we looked to see who King Features would appoint in his place.
Happily today we hear the best news possible - the man himself is back!
On his blog today, Tony has announced: "I’m officially back writing the syndicated daily and Sunday stories for Lee Falk’s Phantom."
All the copyright and contract details have been ironed out, and are explained fully in the post - we encourage you to check it out here.
Excitingly, Tony has already sent four weeks of scripts to Sunday artist Jeff Weigel, who told us in Episode 70 of X-Band: The Phantom Podcast that he was nearly out.
So while we are sorry that Tony may not be able to get away for the motorcycle tour he was planning when we interviewed him, we are delighted that he will back to continue the stories that have even him excited.
In the blog post Tony says that he is really enjoying the phan reaction to the current Mike Manley drawn Daily story The Curse of Old Mozz and playing with the idea of the Phantom's immortality, saying "it’s easily one of the top three stories I’ve written since 1990." He also acknowledges the pressing issue of resolving the Heloise storyline, where she is currently rooming with The Nomad's daughter at college.
For reasons of continuity, wrapping up plots and the ability to keep some of the greatest villains the Phantom has ever faced, we are sure all phans will rejoice in the news that Tony DePaul has returned!!
