A fresh mix of underground and slice-of-life comics to sci-fi horror and Webtoon hits.
LOS ANGELES, June 25, 2024 – Hot on the heels of a run of successful Kickstarter campaigns, convention appearances and direct-to-consumer sales, indie comics darlings, Cosmic Lion Productions, are bringing their well-curated range of titles to comic shops and the direct market for the first time starting in September.
The publisher’s initial offerings are listed in Diamond Comic Distributors’ July PREVIEWS catalogue for September on-sale, which perfectly showcases the depth and breadth of their range. This will be followed up by another four titles to be offered in August PREVIEWS as they seek to establish themselves with a broader mainstream audience.
“We’ve been producing some incredible work by highly talented creators for a couple of years now,” says Cosmic Lion founder and publisher, Eli Schwab, “and the time has come to show more people what we’ve got. We really do have something for everybody, and people who appreciate good comics will probably find that they enjoy several of our offerings.”
One of the big titles for September, which has already been acclaimed since its soft-launch at Indie Comics Creator Con earlier this year, is Gideon Kendall and Doug Latino’s Wait, It Gets Worse … If Only We Knew (Diamond Order Code: JUL241522). This gorgeous hardcover collection of the popular indie comic features 270 pages of the original series’ greatest hits, as well as 10 new stories and 50 pages of never-before-seen material, plus a foreword by indie comics legend Denis Kitchen.
“The rogue’s gallery of auto-bio comics authors is replete with some truly messed-up personalities. Crumb, Pekar, Wilson, Eichhorn, Joe Matt… the list goes on,” says Eisner Award winner, Gideon Kendall. “Do these incredible creators embellish and play up their foibles for dramatic and comic effect? Sure. But to varying degrees these are all people with problems. The funny thing about Doug is he’s actually pretty sane. Stable, even! But no amount of wholesomeness or stability can withstand the slaps and slights that life throws at you, and that’s what these stories are about.”
Also joining Cosmic Lion’s solicitations for September is the over-sized debut of Deathslinger (Diamond Order Code: JUL241520), which is co-created by writer Shane Berryhill (Scout Comics, Albatross Funnybooks), artist Ben Perkins (GHOST Agents, Anthro Comics) and letterer/designer Keith Finch. This 80-page giant is a gritty, adult space western full of cyborg assassins and alien gangs.
“The book is everything I have wanted to draw,” says Perkins. “Sci-fi locales, crazy alien characters, robots, and gunslinging!! This is some of the best comic storytelling I’ve done in my career; I’m excited to show people what I’ve done for this book.”
And rounding out the line-up is the first collection of Ro Higashi’s Half of the Crown (Diamond Order Code: JUL241521). With nearly 17k readers on Webtoon, the title is already a well-established fan-favorite, and Cosmic Lion is proud to present the first ever print edition of the material. When Penny Chiu, a girl haunted by the unseen world, is invited to a new school, she didn’t expect to be sharing a space with the stand-offish yet kind Issei Devlin, much less her soul; but their bond might be the deciding factor in an ancient conflict as it finally comes to a head.
“The older I get, the more vulnerability scares me,” says Higashi. “My comics and work mirror a lot of the things I’m afraid of. Reading my comic is like getting to know me. On the surface, it appears harmless, sweet, and maybe ‘adorkable.’ As you read more into it and invest time, you may realize there is this huge mess that totally changes your view about what you thought you were agreeing to read. My hope is that you stick around and stay invested in the story and characters along with all their changes, twists and turns.”
All three titles will be listed and available to order in the July PREVIEWS catalogue for a September on-sale date. Further solicitations will follow in Diamond PREVIEWS each month as the Cosmic Lion range continues to expand.
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