Production company Starburns Industries, which is responsible for fan-favorite TV show Community, will open a new publishing division on this year’s Free Comic Book Day.
According to the press release, Starburns Industries Press will publish “books, comics and specialty cassette tapes” and “feature contributions from SBI-affiliated talent Dan Harmon (Community, Rick and Morty), Dino Stamatopoulos (Moral Orel, Community, Mr. Show), and the vast network of comedians, writers, and podcasters affiliated with Starburns Audio.”
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“We are a creator driven studio and we are always looking for new voices and storytellers to work with and create things that maybe wouldn’t have existed if we didn’t take a chance on them,” President of SBI Press Simon Oré said of the new endeavor. “We are working with a lot of incredible artists and writers and musicians, it’s mostly about building a playground where people we love to work with can create anything they want. Our driving force is we want to make things we want to own ourselves.”
The publisher’s first comic — Starburns Presents — will release on this year’s Free Comic Book Day and feature a short story from writer Patton Oswalt, artist Troy Nixey and colorist Michelle Madsen.
“Launching on Free Comic Book Day lets us put our best foot forward,” SBI Press VP and Executive Editor Brendan Wright said. “The lineup the SBI Press team has assembled have a variety of voices and styles but share a unity of vision that make for a truly satisfying issue, with a mix of complete stories and excerpts from upcoming books. Readers looking for something fun and original on FCBD will find at least one — and hopefully several — things to love in Starburns Presents.”
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The press released contained a description of some of the comics that will be part of SBI Press and their covers, which can be found below.
Coinciding with Free Comic Book Day, the May edition of Diamond’s Previews catalog will include the company’s first launches: Dan Harmon’s biting take on supervillainy, Gregory Graves, cowritten with Eric M. Esquivel and illustrated by Brent Schoonover, Ted Naifeh, and Rebecca Nalty; Dino Stamatopolous and Leah Triscione’s graphic novel Trent, ‘a lighthearted tragedy with music’; and the company’s first series, Hellicious, a family comedy set in Hell, written by Alan C. Medina and Mina Elwell and illustrated by Kit Wallis and Jio Butler.
From there, the first wave of titles in 2018 continues with Comics Comics, teaming fan-favorite stand-up comedians with leading comic industry talent in an anthology series, Oddwell: The Frog of War, a fantasy-adventure comic series from writers David A. Clarke and Walter A. Bryant III and artist Acacia T. Rodarte; and The Crawling King, an illustrated dark fantasy novel by award-winning filmmaker and animator Einar Baldvin.
Free Comic Book Day is on May 5.