The world of magazine publishing is a dynamic and shifting landscape that is seeing the old world order of printed pages being slowly usurped by a new dynamic digital world of interactive apps and websites. Since the closing of Wizard in January this year the main source for comics news has been via websites like Comic Book Resources, but now that gap may be filled with the arrival of Champion! – the ultimate comic book magazine.

An interactive iPad app/magazine from former Wizard Creative Director Steve Blackwell and former Wizard Editor in Chief Mike Cotton Champion! contains news, previews and interactive interviews . A free preview issue is now available on iTunes and it features Jim Lee discussing the DC relaunch and a roundtable with Mark Millar, Mike Mignola and Robert Kirkman on the growth of creator owned comics.  As well as traditional magazine style pages, there are also interactive elements such as 360 degree rotating product shots of action figures and embedded audio in the interviews. There also an interactive cover with exclusive Jim Lee art which shows you the development of the image from pencil to ink to coloured masterpiece and you can  interact direct with the team thanks to the live Twitter feed sections which allow you to give feedback directly to the creative team along the way.

The app itself looks great and is filled with the kind of high production values you would expect from such an experienced team. As with all launches, the first issue is still quite buggy with many of the pop ups not disappearing properly and so not allowing you to return to the original text which you have just navigated out of. However there are enough potentially new and exciting ideas in this that it will fill you with confidence about the product going forward as the potential is there for it to be something genuinely exciting.

The preview issue is available for free here with the first complete issue arriving 1st September