Joss Whedon announced at WonderCon that he was supervising a three-issue comic book series (from Dark Horse Comics) that would serve as a prequel to the movie Serenity, which is due out from Universal Pictures on September 30th.  The Dark Horse comics, which are being written by Brett Matthews (Angel), will be released this summer and will serve as a bridge between the cancelled Fox TV series Firefly and Whedon's new Serenity film.  Each of the three Dark Horse Serenity comics will come with three variant covers, each of which will feature one of the nine principal players in the film.  John Cassaday, who is currently illustrating Whedon's Astonishing X-Men series for Marvel, will be drawing Mal (Nathan Fillion) for one of the covers of the first comic in the series.

Whedon also announced that, after a short respite, he and Cassaday will return for second 12-issue stint on Astonishing X-Men and then finish up their storyline in giant-size Astonishing X-Men Annual.