‘Hammer Head’ Brings Back the Slasher Who Refuses to Stay Dead

An unstoppable killer is a genre staple for a reason, but the good ones always find a new angle on why he keeps coming back. Hammer Head, a new five-issue series from Mad Cave Studios, arrives October 14, 2026, and the way it frames its killer, less a monster to be defeated once and for all, more a recurring nightmare its survivor can never fully escape, is exactly the kind of twist that gets us paying attention.

So, What’s the Story?

Jules is the only person who made it out alive the first time Hammer Head went on his killing spree, and she’s spent the twenty years since trying to outrun what she saw. The problem is that Hammer Head doesn’t stay dead. Every few years he comes back to kill again, and each time it happens, Jules sinks further into whatever she’s using to cope with carrying that alone. Then she’s arrested without a trial and thrown into a situation that has nothing to do with justice, a setup specifically designed to drag her back into the exact past she’s spent two decades trying to bury.

Who’s Making Heard?

Ed Brisson writes, Damian Couceiro draws, Dee Cunniffe colors, and Pat Brosseau letters, published by Mad Cave Studios.

Brisson’s resume is deep, he’s written Uncanny X-Men, Old Man Logan and its follow-up Dead Man Logan, New Mutants, The Displaced at BOOM! Studios, plus Predator and Ghost Rider at Marvel, both of which flirt with horror without fully committing to it. Hammer Head is being reported as his first full-length horror series, despite him dabbling in short horror work elsewhere, so this is genuinely new ground for him rather than just another genre he’s already mastered.

What we didn’t realize going in is that Brisson and Couceiro aren’t a new pairing at all, they’ve been working together since 2005, with roughly a thousand pages of shared credits by now, including Beyond the Breach at Aftershock. Brisson has talked about Couceiro being his first call whenever he has a new project in mind, which puts Hammer Head in a different light, this isn’t two strangers figuring out how to work together on a horror book, it’s two collaborators with two decades of trust finally pointing that partnership at the genre for the first time. Couceiro’s other credits include Wolverine and Kitty Pryde, X-Force, Old Man Logan, and Groot at Marvel, along with Mad Cave’s own Missing on the Moon.

Why We’re Watching This One

A killer who keeps resurrecting is only as good as the mystery underneath the mask, and this synopsis is clearly building toward a bigger reveal about what’s actually happening to Jules rather than just repeating the same slasher beats every few years. Knowing Brisson and Couceiro have that much history together makes us trust the execution even more, this isn’t a first-time pairing hoping to find a rhythm, it’s two people who already know exactly how the other works.

Mad Cave has also become a publisher we trust specifically for horror. They keep committing to the genre in ways that feel deliberate rather than opportunistic, and a few of their recent books make a good case for that: Pretty Hate Machine, It Killed Everyone But Me, whose lone-survivor setup sounds like a close cousin to Jules’ situation here, though we’re curious to see how differently the two stories actually play out, and The Slasher’s Apprentice, which scratches a similar slasher itch from another direction entirely.

Who Should Add This to Their Pull List?

Slasher fans looking for a fresh spin on the unkillable-killer formula should have this near the top of their list, and so should anyone who’s followed Brisson’s X-Men or Predator work and wants to see him go fully into horror for the first time. Mad Cave’s horror lineup has earned enough trust from us that we’d recommend this to anyone already reading their other genre books too.

Release Details

Hammer Head #1 releases October 14, 2026, from Mad Cave Studios, priced at $4.99 for 32 pages, as the first issue of a five-issue series. The main cover comes from Damian Couceiro, with variant covers by Justin Coffee (Cover B) and two additional covers from Bjorn Barends (Covers C and D).

FAQ

When does Hammer Head come out? Issue #1 releases October 14, 2026.

Who is writing Hammer Head? Ed Brisson, known for Uncanny X-Men, Old Man Logan, and Predator.

Who is drawing Hammer Head? Damian Couceiro, with colors by Dee Cunniffe and letters by Pat Brosseau.

What publisher is releasing Hammer Head? Mad Cave Studios.

Have Ed Brisson and Damian Couceiro worked together before? Extensively, they’ve been collaborating since 2005 on projects including Beyond the Breach, though this marks their first horror project together.

Is Hammer Head a new series, limited series, or one-shot? It’s a new five-issue series.

Who should read Hammer Head? Slasher fans looking for a fresh angle on the unstoppable-killer formula, and anyone who wants to see Ed Brisson tackle horror for the first time.