Warning: contains major spoilers for Batman/Fortnite: Zero Point #5! 6u363h

For the heroes of the DC Universe, the threat of Leviathan looms just on the horizon. DC writer Brian Michael Bendis and artist Alex Maleev will re-team for the mini-series Event Leviathan: Checkmate and the one-shot mega issue Leviathan Dawn that will set up the event. Now, fans are getting a special preview straight from DC Comics.

The creative team of Brian Michael Bendis and Alex Maleev return in April 2020 with the six-issue miniseries Event Leviathan: Checkmate, the next installment of their DC ComicsEvent Leviathan storyline. From the beginning, the story arc involved the various intelligence agencies and organizations within the DCU systemically dismantled by a new, masked villain calling himself Leviathan - who somehow had a private army at his disposal. By the conclusion of the first miniseries, Leviathan had managed to avoid capture and was revealed to be a former hero. This reveal, along with the elimination of the various spy agencies of the DCU, left the heroes and the world reeling by the organization's sudden and explosive arrival.

For Superman, like most of the heroes in the DCU, 2019 was not an easy year. He dealt with the line-wide Year of the Villain event along with the mysterious new character initially known only as Leviathan. In Action Comics #1018, as promised in the last of Event Leviathan #6, Leviathan has returned to Metropolis with new allies: Apex Lex and the Legion of Doom.

Warning: SPOILERS for Event Leviathan #5

Brian Michael Bendis' recent journey into DC Comics has already brought many changes to Superman's life, but it's the miniseries Event Leviathan that will be rewriting the game for the world of superheroes by putting every secret agency from ARGUS to Checkmate at risk of extinction. While the grand-scale event does kick off its first of six issues until June 12th, Bendis has already been planting seeds in the last few issues of Action Comics - and those seeds begin to grow in the 25-cent DC's Year of the Villain one-shot, out this Wednesday.