In spite of a full slate of superhero writing chores that includes Captain America, Daredevil and an upcoming stint on Uncanny X-Men, Ed Brubaker is going back to his first love, crime comics, for a new creator-owned series for Marvel's ICON imprint.

Brubaker, who sees the current comic market as overcrowded with superheroes, promises to make Criminal a book that will 'tread the line between comics like (Warren Ellis') Fell, and (Frank Miller's) Sin City, and TV series like The Sopranos.'  Although crime comics represent only a small percentage of comic market sales today, in the years after World War II they were the dominant genre, dwarfing sales of superhero and western comics.

The cast of Criminal will be a loose knit gang of crooks including a pickpocket, a hit-man, and a crooked cop, which should provide for considerable narrative flexibility.  Each issue will feature a main continuing story that gradually illuminates the secret history that binds the series' main characters, plus a self-contained back-up story, and articles by Brubaker and other writers about crime books, movies and comics.