Real Life Columnist Meets His Fate On 'CSI' Comic

In the next CSI comic series, entitled Lying In The Gutters, Grissom and the gang will investigate the death of Rich Johnston.

What makes this case so peculiar is the at Johnston is a real person, rather than a work of fiction. Johnston owns a long-running online gossip column devoted to the comics industry, and his release of rumors and gossip has placed him in a lot of comic professionals' black lists.

"There are people who love him and people who hate him and a lot of people who kind of feel both ways about him," said Chris Ryall, IDW's editor in chief and publisher. "So we thought, 'If we're going to kill anybody, let's do in a comic what a lot of people have said they'd like to see happen in real life.'"

The crime will take place at the Las Vegas comic book convention, and real life comic icons will be featured as murder suspects. Johnston reportedly liked the idea from the start, according to Ryall. "I just dropped him a line saying, 'Hey, we'd like to kill you.' He said, 'You and everybody else.'"

This stunt by IDW will hopefully breathe life into comic sales. "With all comics, the sales kind of steadily decline over time, so we were just looking for a way to revitalize the CSI line," Ryall added.

Johnston's comic gossip column can be found here. Visit Fort Wayne.com to read the original article.

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