Hello Friends,
It’s been a minute since I’ve written one of these out directly. I’m sorry for that. I keep having the thought that I’ll pull together the time I need to do a big write-up in the way I used to do these sorts of things. The long, rambling, twenty pages in a word document kind of newsletter posts. Most often when I have the time to do something like that, it’d be better spent knocking out the next script of one of my comics. But I do miss it, and I’d like to do a bit better about showing my “face” around here.
Back at the start of the year, I announced the creation of a new Comics Non-Profit, BODEGA - Or the Brooklyn Organization Dedicated to the Endurance of the Graphic Arts.
You can read some great coverage from The Comics Journal here, and an interview with our board of directors here.
This November, we’ll put on our first event, the Brooklyn Expo of Comics. This show will be an indy alternative comics expo, spotlighting the work of cartoonists whose work you can find more often in the pages of a Drawn & Quarterly, Fantagraphics, or Silver Sprocket comic book than you’d see in the pages of Image, Boom, DC, or Marvel. In many cases these cartoonists publish their own work. It’s the artistic frontline of the medium, and I really deeply love it. New Yorkers who remember the great old indy fest, Comics Art Brooklyn, will find this show familiar. Gabe Fowler, the creator of the original CAB, and the owner of the phenomenal indy comics store, Desert Island, is overseeing our programming slate, and I absolutely cannot wait for you to hear what we’ve got cooking.
BEC is just the beginning of what we are planning with BODEGA. Like with many of my ventures, I’m not really one to think small. From other events celebrating the myriad other corners of the comics medium, to special grants to comic creators, there’s a lot we want to get done. And now that our plans for BEC are locking in, we’re getting ready to start building the internal infrastructure we need to start accomplishing these dreams for 2027 and beyond.
If there’s an ethos that I ought to have absorbed from my years in superhero comics, it’s probably the most powerful moral code that genre ever put into the world. With Great Power Comes Great Responsibility. I love comics. I owe my life and my success to this medium and its fans. I am in a position to directly and materially help the artistic medium I love so much, and the community in which I live and work. But there’s only so much I can fund out of my own pocket.
Soon there will be some more traditional fundraising drives. We’ll have merch, and we’ll be promoting and selling our initial publication for you to buy to support us around the Brooklyn Expo of Comics. Expect to see and hear some of that promoted here, and on my Instagram. I’m also considering what I could personally do to raise some money that would excite fans who have been following this newsletter from the beginning… I might dig through my storage unit and pull out some old rare covers and auction them off… Maybe I’ll do some terribly drawn blank sketch variants… Maybe I’ll do some limited zoom Q&As with donors. Sound off in the comments if there are ideas for the sort of thing that you’d be interested in throwing some dollars toward. I’m open to suggestions!
But before we get any of that going, I’m asking each of you if you’d consider donating $5 to BODEGA today, to help us get off the ground. The cost of a single comic book issue.
If you can’t swing that right now, do me a favor and boost our fundraising efforts when we kick them off in earnest over the coming months.
Thank you all so much. There’s a lot of crazy cool stuff happening on the Tiny Onion front I wish I could shout from the rooftops. I wish I could tell you all about both of my days in the Blumhouse offices this past week talking SIKTC (and maybe some other projects too). I wish I could tell you about the amazing screenplays and teleplays sitting on my desk. And even just hint at all the evil plans Tiny Onion is putting in motion.
More soon. In the meantime, I hope you’re all doing well.
James Tynion IV
Brooklyn, NY
8.2.26
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