New   York Times best-selling author Mark   Waid has worked for every major company in the   comics industry in a nearly three-decade-long career, writing thousands of   issues, including runs of Amazing Spider-Man, X-Men, Ka-Zar and Fantastic   Four. His other works of note include his   collaboration with painter Alex Ross on Kingdom   Come, which earned an Eisner Award for Best   Limited Series. Waid enjoyed his greatest outpouring of critical acclaim with   the Eisner Award-winning Daredevil — which included a revered collaboration with frequent   artistic partner Chris Samnee. He later took on such diverse pop-cultural   icons as Princess Leia and Archie, and ushered in a new era of greatness for   Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in All-New, All-Different   Avengers. His Marvel work continued with Avengers, Black   Widow, Captain America, Champions   and Doctor Strange.
Jonathan   Hickman is the award-winning writer/artist of critically   acclaimed independent titles Pax Romana, Transhuman and The Nightly News. Teaming with writer Brian Michael Bendis, he launched   Marvel’s Secret Warriors,   spinning out of Secret Invasion. He then wrote the Dark Reign:   Fantastic Four limited series, which served as a   warm-up for his revered runs on Fantastic Four and FF,   and two S.H.I.E.L.D.   series. Hickman penned numerous Ultimate Universe titles before bringing his   intricate plotting to Avengers and New Avengers. Hickman’s years of planning culminated with the Marvel   Universe-shattering Secret Wars. His impressive list of credits includes a trio of lauded   series for Image: East of West, Secret and   the Eisner Award-nominated The Manhattan Projects. Hickman returned to Marvel to mastermind a transformative   relaunch of its mutant titles, beginning with House   of X and Powers of X, and continuing with X-Men.
As the   creator of The Sandman for DC   Comics, writer Neil Gaiman has won every major award in the comics industry, as well as   the prestigious 1991 World Fantasy Award for Best Short Story, the only   comic-book writer ever to be awarded this literary honor. Cited by the LA Times as “the greatest epic in   the history of comic books,” the ten Sandman collections have sold several   million copies and remain in print to this day. Having thus made his mark,   Gaiman wrote another highly regarded series for DC with Books of Magic. Also noteworthy was   his work on Eclipse Comics’ Miracleman, which he picked up after close friend Alan Moore left the   book. In addition, Gaiman collaborated with Terry Pratchett on the wistful   apocalypse novel Good Omens and in 1997 wrote the BBC teleplay Neverwhere, a story he later adapted into a novel. Gaiman’s other novels,   American Gods and his   children’s book Coraline,   garnered New York Times   best-selling status and international acclaim including the Hugo, Nebula and   Bram Stoker Awards. In 2001, Gaiman made his first foray into Marvel Comics   with his series Marvel 1602, a series in which Gaiman took the core cast of Marvel’s   Silver Age comics, placed them 400 years in the past and retold their stories   in his own inimitable way. Aided by stunning art from Andy Kubert and Richard   Isanove, Marvel 1602   was the top-selling comic of the year. Next venturing into film, Gaiman   collaborated with artist Dave McKean — a compatriot from his days on Sandman — on the   feature Mirrormask, a   mix of live-action, animation and puppetry that saw its critically acclaimed   premiere in late 2005. As a passionate defender of the First Amendment, the   Comic Book Legal Defense Fund named Gaiman the 1997 Defender of Liberty, and   he now serves on that organization’s Board of Directors. Born in Porchester,   England, Gaiman lives outside Minneapolis with his wife, Mary, and their   three children.
The   pencils of Ryan Stegman first   gained rave reviews in the Marvel adaptation of Raymond E. Feist’s Magician Apprentice and Riftwar. The popularity of his work   there led to assignments on Incredible Hulk, Marvel Adventures Spider-Man, Incredible Hercules and She-Hulks. With writer Christopher Yost, he launched a new incarnation   of Scarlet Spider; with   Dan Slott, he shocked fans with Superior   Spider-Man; and with Gerry Conway, he offered a   different take on the wall-crawler and his family in Amazing Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows.   Stegman’s other Marvel credits include Wolverine, Inhuman   and Uncanny Avengers as   well as his smash-hit run on Venom.
After graduating in Law and Information Sciences at Paris   University, Marguerite Sauvage became an illustrator in 2001 working in advertising, magazines, and   publishing. In 2008, she began working in the animation industry as a concept   artist and script writer, as well as drawing for European bande dessinée. In   2014, her work was spotted by Vertigo and she started a career in North   American comics with covers for Hinterkind. She debuted sequential art on Sensation   Comics Featuring Wonder Woman and then initiated   the “DC Bombshells” series with Margaret Bennet in August 2015. Since then,   her work can be found at Marvel (Scarlet Witch, Secret Wars, Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel, 1602: Witch Hunter Angela, Captain America), Dark Horse (Zodiac Starforce), Image (Wayward, The Wicked + The Divine), Dynamite (Red Sonja), Valiant (Faith), Oni and DC Comics.
Artist   Michael Allred established   himself as a leading creative force in the industry with his creation Madman, which earned him three   Eisner Award nominations and a Harvey Award win for Best New Series. He first   came to Marvel in 2001, helping relaunch the pop-inspired and acclaimed X-Force (later X-Statix). He illustrated The Golden Plates, an adaptation of   the Book of Mormon, and began a new Madman series, Madman   Atomic Comics, for Image Comics. Allred and Neil   Gaiman created the Metamorpho story in DC Comics’ Eisner and Harvey   Award-winning Wednesday Comics, while his DC/Vertigo collaboration with Chris Roberson, iZOMBIE, was adapted into a TV   series. He returned to Marvel with FF and then Silver Surfer. Allred is also an accomplished filmmaker, actor and   singer/guitarist for The Gear.