Dennis Hopeless

Career

Dennis Hopeless worked in a comic store in the mid-2000s while trying to break into the comics industry. In 2007, he created GearHead (with penciller Kevin Mellon), a four-issue comic about a female auto mechanic searching for her lost brother. The series was published by Arcana Studio. His next notable work didn't hit shelves until 2011 when Hopeless reunited with artist Kevin Mellon to create LoveSTRUCK, a supernatural graphic novel inspired in part by Frank Herbert's Dune and Garth Ennis's Preacher that was published by Image Comics. That same year, Hopeless began working with Marvel Comics, writing the second volume of Legion of Monsters (with penciler Juan Doe). The series starred the titular Legion and monster-hunter Elsa Bloodstone.

While Legion of Monsters was still being published, Marvel tapped Hopeless (along with pencillers Jamie McKelvie and Mike Norton) to create a graphic novel called X-Men: Season One as part of a series of four graphic novels focusing on the origins of some of the company's biggest characters. While some publications were hesitant to embrace the Season One concept, Hopeless's novel garnered generally positive reviews, with Comic Book Resources calling it, "easy to understand, fun to read and still pretty wide in scope."

Hopeless's next work for Marvel was 2013's Avengers Arena, an 18-issue comic series in which the villain Arcade kidnaps 16 teenage superheroes and forces them to fight each other to the death. The series starred characters from Avengers Academy, the Runaways and Hopeless's newly created Braddock Academy and featured covers referencing Lord of the Flies, The Hunger Games series, the game show Survivor, and the Japanese film Battle Royale. The comic won Hopeless the 2013 Harvey Award for Most Promising New Talent. That same year, Hopeless wrote Cable and X-Force (with artist Salvador Larroca), a 19-issue series that ran concurrently and eventually crossed over with Sam Humphries and Ron Garney's Uncanny X-Force Vol. 2. Also in 2013, Hopeless co-wrote a 4-issue series called The Answer! with Eisner Award winning creator Mike Nolan for Dark Horse Comics. In 2014, Hopeless and artist Kevin Walker authored Avengers Undercover, a direct follow-up series to Avengers Arena with many of the same characters.

Hopeless's next project was the limited series All-New Captain America: Fear Him (with co-writer Rick Remender). Part of Marvel's Infinite Comics series, it starred Sam Wilson in his new role as Captain America. The following year, Hopeless began working on the fifth volume of Marvel's Spider-Woman comic with penciler Greg Land and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (with artist Tigh Walker), an all-ages western adventure comic based on the classic Disney theme park attraction. That summer, Marvel began their Secret Wars crossover event and Hopeless wrote two books in the storyline, Inferno (with Javier Garron) and House of M (with Mark Failla), both based on both based on previous Marvel events.

Upon the conclusion of the Secret Wars event Marvel relaunched their Spider-Woman comic in January 2016 with Hopeless now joined by artist Javier Rodríguez who had worked with Hopeless on the previous volume after Land's departure. The relaunched series centered on Spider-Woman, Jessica Drew's newly announced pregnancy and impending motherhood. Critics praised the relatable, fun storytelling of the comic with IGN calling it, "laid back at times and outlandish at others" while scoring it an 8.6 out of 10. The following month, Hopeless served as writer for another relaunched series, the second volume of All-New X-Men, a comic starring the time-displaced original X-Men now traveling the country with three young Jean Grey School students.

In late 2016, Hopeless wrote the main story in a one-shot licensed comic called WWE: Then, Now, Forever, which was published by Boom! Studios with Dan Mora providing the art. The comic became a ongoing series simply called WWE the following year with Hopeless continuing to write the main story and Daniel Acuña replacing Mora on pencils.

Awards