The Devil’s in the E-Mails
Hahaha how is it Friday already
LET THIS ONE BE A DEVIL
I nearly let another launch week slip past me, but not today, Satan! This past Wednesday, LET THIS ONE BE A DEVIL #1 hit stores from Tiny Onion and Dark Horse Comics. Co-written by James Tynion IV and yours truly with jaw-dropping art from my ALL EIGHT EYES collaborators Piotr Kowalski and Brad Simpson, along with letters from BLUE BOOK’s Tom Napolitano and edits from all-rounder Greg Lockard, LTOBAD (because you surely know we’re not going to type the whole title every time) is the first miniseries in a new line of TRUE WEIRD PRESENTS titles Tiny Onion is publishing through Dark Horse, each telling an original narrative story that blends fiction with the “real” facts and legends of a notable monster or cryptid.
I was thrilled to help kick this line off alongside James; he and I have been making comics together for about six years now, since he brought me onboard in the lead-up to launching THE DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH. We knew each other distantly before that, but what we figured out as time went on is that, in addition to working well together, we share a lot of the same obsessions and influences—chief among them, monsters and weird shit. Getting to edit DoT is a blast in general, but is particularly invigorating when we do arcs like our fan-favorite Bigfoot two-parter, or the medium-pushing Mothman issue with guest art from David Romero (both of which, it should be said, required a lot of lettering magic from Aditya Bidikar). And that’s not even touching on the DEPARTMENT OF TRUTH: WILD FICTIONS project, which resulted in an oversized tome of GORGEOUS art from some of the best in the business, along with a ton of research mingled with DoT-flavored insight. Doing deep dives into cryptid history is when that whole “do what you love and you’ll never work a day in your life” b.s. actually feels pretty accurate.
So why the Jersey Devil?
Well, see, I had a rough breakup with a guy from Jersey, and—
(Just kidding, hi [redacted]!)
The Jersey Devil has always been an odd cryptid out. To oversimplify things, the basic fissure in cryptozoology is between those who believe these unidentified beings need to be zoologically viable creatures to be pursued with any seriousness and those who don’t. The Jersey Devil, if it matches any of the accounts given of it, is just not a biologically reasonable being. It’s much more a creature of folklore than it is anything like Bigfoot or the Loch Ness Monster. There is no fossil record precedent for any bipedal creature with hooves, bat-like wings, and horns.
I also knew, if I was going to do a book with James, that I wanted to play in the HORROR sandbox, and I wanted to make sure we were flexing different muscles than the DoT stories he wrote and I edited. The Jersey Devil legend spans centuries, but has its foundations in the 1700s and again in the early 1900s—worlds away from Agent Cole Turner or Lee Harvey Oswald. It necessitated a very different vibe. (It also necessitated some of the most frustrating visual research I’ve ever done—do you know what a weird period of time the early 1900s were?! Everything existed but nothing was widespread. Never again…)
We were also attracted to how broad the Jersey Devil story is. Just saying “the” Jersey Devil story is bold—unlike Mothman, or even Bigfoot and Nessie, who have their defining footage or encounters, the Jersey Devil has wildly contradictory accounts of its origin, appearance, and motivations. Attempting to weave all of those into one comprehensive story was a challenge worth taking on.
And it was a challenge we couldn’t have done without the meticulous work of Piotr Kowalski, one of the unsung madmen of comics. Piotr, more than a great many artists working today, evokes a sense of place in his work. He doesn’t skimp on environmental details and setting, which enabled us to really lean into both the 1700s and the early 1900s in our story—as well as some indulgent cutaways you’ll get to as the series goes on. He captures the haggard, lived-in feel of existence in these earlier eras, but also the youthful edge of some of our cast, and a truly impressive array of spins on our central monster. Throughout it all, he’s aided by his frequent collaborator Brad Simpson, who brings out the best in Piotr’s artwork page after page. This is my second project with these two, and I am hard at work making sure it’s not my last.
We’re also lucky to have moody main covers from Gavin Fullerton—who was just announced as part of the NEXT thing I’m going to mention in the newsletter—as well as a truly monstrous variant on #1 from one of my favorite artists, Max Fiumara. I couldn’t resist buying the original off of him at NYCC this past fall—thanks, Max!
LET THIS ONE BE A DEVIL #1 is on comic store shelves now. If you want to hear me talk more about the book, as well as how James and I worked together, I had an excellent chat with the Capes and Tights Podcast that’s up now. We’ve got three more issues of historical horror coming for you, drawing in everything there is to know about the Jersey Devil, linked by one man’s encounter with a strange creature out behind his family’s shed. We hope you’ll check it out.
EXQUISITE CORPSES
Okay, well, I didn’t actually think I was going to type all that about LTOBAD, but the other BIG news of the week is that EXQUISITE CORPSES has been revealed to the world. Previously teased as PROJECT EXQUISITE, this is Tiny Onion’s first MAJOR release launching in May. Co-created by James Tynion IV and Michael Walsh (The Silver Coin), EXQUISITE CORPSES is the story of the richest families in the country unleashing twelve of the deadliest and most colorful killers in the world on a small town to see who will be the last killer standing. But that barely scratches the surface of what the book really is, both in the world of the story itself or how we made it.
See, James and Michael co-created EXQUISITE CORPSES…but a whole Corpse Crew brought it to life. You should read all about it over on James’s newsletter, but the short of it is that Michael and the Tiny Onion crew met in Syracuse (IN THE DEAD OF WINTER, FOR SOME REASON) over a year ago to do the initial planning of what would become this book, including conceiving the cast and broad structure and…the rest of our creative team. Then, this past summer, we held a summit, again in Syracuse (WHICH IS MUCH NICER IN THE SUMMER), where we brought out all of our writers to plan the entire series together. In addition to James, Jordie Bellaire, Pornsak Pichetshote, Tyler Boss, Che Grayson, and Michael himself are all writing issues of this series, which we spent several days in a room workshopping and planning together.
When we went into the room, we had the rough cast and structure set up. We did not know who would live or die, or how the series would play out and end. All of that was decided in real time, by passionate, active collaboration. I’ve never been a part of something like this and can honestly say it’s one of the coolest creative experiences I’ve ever witnessed and participated in.
With the story in motion, we then finalized our outstanding artistic crew. Michael Walsh is drawing the 60-page (!) first issue, as well as parts of every subsequent issue, before coming back for the finale issues, but in between we have the powerhouse talents of Marianna Ignazzi, Claire Roe, Valentine De Landro, Gavin Fullerton, and Adam Gotham, with Jordie Bellaire on colors and Becca Carey lettering.
Thus, our Corpse Crew was complete.
This series has been a massive undertaking. Along with my fellow editors, Eric Harburn and Greg Lockard, I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many jaw-dropping variant covers come in at one time. And the wildest part is that we haven’t even revealed everything we’re planning yet.
Head over to James’s newsletter to see more of our amazing covers and read more of his nefarious plans for the project, which we hope will be one of your spooky highlights of 2025…and beyond.
WHAT ELSE???
Okay, clearly this ran long. I love all of my children, but I have to go write some stuff before darkness falls. This week also saw the release of ALIEN: PARADISO #2. I am particularly proud of how mean the opening pages are—really didn’t think they were going to get approved, tbh! Edgar Salazar and Peter V. Nguyen keep it gruesome.
And last week was NEW CHAMPIONS #2 week. I am, issue after issue, so freaking in love with this cast of characters. I am completely offline so I don’t know what the reception has been—I know it’s friggin’ hard to launch new characters at all, let alone entirely new teams, let alone entirely new teams that started life as variant covers, but artist Ivan Fiorelli, colorist Arthur Hesli, editor Alanna Smith, and I have really just been having a party over here. With each issue, more of these kids reveal themselves to us, and I’m really excited to tell the rest of the stories we have planned for you. We had some pretty big stuff already approved, and we only made it wilder and more exciting as we’ve gone along. Fingers crossed we get to do more, but what’s coming down the pipeline as it is will make for some of the MOST FUN stories I’ve been a part of, I’d say!
And oh, yeah—THE DEVIANT Vol. 1 made the Preliminary Ballot for the 2024 Stoker Awards! I was immensely proud to see this. The Stokers do a tiered nomination system, so this doesn’t mean it’s a nominee yet, but it’s cool to see it make it to this level. Congrats to every comic—and other work of horror—to get recognized here!
Until next time…xoxo