Marvel to Publish Super-Princess Diana?

Please tell me it isn't true...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Britain's Princess Diana will be reincarnated as a mutant comic book superhero this fall, according to publisher Marvel Comics.

The character will appear in a five-series storyline called 'Di Another Day' in Marvel's 'X-Statix' monthly comic, a spinoff from its popular X-Men, Marvel spokesman Brian Reinert said on Monday.

The first of the comic books will go on sale on Sept. 10.

Di appears as one of the team of super-powered mutants in a satirical look at fame and pop culture, Reinert said.

'They're more concerned about their bank accounts than saving people from injuries and saving the world,' he said.

'X-Statix' writer Peter Milligan said the late princess was 'tailor-made' for the series because she is 'someone famous for being famous.'

'At a glance, Diana may not resemble the flying, teleporting, lethally oscillating characters that populate my comic, but the strange power she exerts from beyond the grave certainly makes her a valid subject to explore,' Milligan said in a statement issued by Marvel. 'And, of course, she looks great in Spandex!'

A Buckingham Palace spokesman has called the idea 'utterly appalling' and a 'cheap attempt to cash in on Diana's fame and the tragic circumstances surrounding her death.'

Please tell me it isn't true...

Yup sure is I'm afraid. I believe X-Fan first broke the story a few weeks back.

So good.

i am buying multiple copies to give to the di-ists i know. now if we can form a team her along with dale ernhart, elvis and other dead celbrities that have a cult following. . .

It's entirely true, but being X-STATIX, it's going to be satirical.

There's an odd synchronicity at work in the universe these days, then, because I began reading this just as one of the online comic strip subscriptions I use began re-running the classic Charles and Di 'Bloom County' strips.

Makes me really wish that Breathed was doing a satirical comic book, strip... *anything*.

So it's a 5-issue story arc, running through the rest of '03. (X-Statix issues 13-17) It's fitting with the whole theme of the series (satire), but I also see it as an act of desperation, because it's so far detached from the rest of the X-line, because of it being a satire book, that Pa-Jemas wants to boost sales any way he can. If it flops, as Rawhide Kid did, Milligan may end up regretting this whole storyline was ever written.

J. C. Gilbert

I was flipping and caught the tail-end of a story on CNN or CNBC (one of those news channels) that said Marvel was backing out under threats from royal family, and now not doing the story.

Anyone else hear anything?

-Chris C.

that's the gist on all the comic news sites

Threats?!? What was the Royal Family going to do? Send in their elite hit squad?

There's an update over at Newsarama implying that this story will be appearing after all