New Books from Komikwerks
This story originally appeared in PW Comics Week on March 7, 2006 Sign up now!
by Calvin Reid, PW Comics Week -- Publishers Weekly, 3/7/2006
In the rush of news around the bankruptcy filing of iBooks Inc. and Byron Preiss Visual Publications, it was easy to forget that the late Preiss had an investment relationship with Komikwerks, an online comics site launched by Shannon Denton and Patrick Coyle in 2000. Komikwerks is unaffected by the Preiss bankruptcy filing and, more importantly, the site is celebrating its fifth anniversary by launching Actionopolis, a new line of heavily illustrated prose books with adventure stories aimed at young readers and created by some of the best writers and artists working in comics and animation.
Actionopolis (www.actionopolis.com) will release two books a month beginning in July. The books are all hardcover serials, and each book is heavily illustrated with more than 40 illustrations throughout each work. Komikwerks distribution is by PGW and Diamond. The list of artists and writers is a who's who of comics and animation creators and includes Marvel comics writer Rob Worley, Abadazad writer J.M. DeMatteis, WB creator and writer Dwayne McDuffie, Superman and X-Men writer Louise Simonson, DC Comics writer Dan Mishkin and Marsha Griffin, a writer for MTV's Spiderman. Artists include Colleen Doran (A Distant Soil), Will Meugniot (Spider-Man), Tom Mandrake (Batman), legendary illustrator Bernie Wrightson, Bruce Zick (Finding Nemo) and others.
Among the first titles to be released will be Heir to Fire: Gila Flats, a monster story by Rob Worley and Mike Dubisch, and What I Did on My Hypergalactic Interstellar Summer Vacation, a sci-fi adventure by Adam Beechen and Dan Hipp. By the end of the first year, Denton said, Komikwerks should have the first volumes of about 15 Actionopolis books in print and will be ready to release the second volumes in the serials by next year. Denten said their plan is to release the prose books regularly "like comic books." The books are all action adventure stories, "novella-sized books that the writers, who all have busy TV and comic book deadlines, can write in about a month."
Komikwerks is also expanding its online comics offerings, adding Rob Worley from Comics2Film, a Web site focused on comics and movies, as director of web development; and Gary Reed, formerly with Caliber Comics, has joined Komikwerks as special features editor. Look for new online comics series beginning in February and the occasional print graphic novel as well.
Denton and Coyle launched the site (www.komikwerks.com) to give comics and animation professionals a place to publish shorter comics works. The site has partnerships with America Online: Red to supply comics content, and a deal with the legendary Stan Lee to produce a series of online Sunday comics available online at Komikwerks. Komikwerks has also published five 180-page trade paperback anthologies collecting its online comics and sells the volumes through the AOL: Red site.
In 2003, Byron Preiss took a minority investment stake in Komikwerks. Denten said that Komikwerks severed its financial relationship with the Preiss companies shortly after his death in 2005 and that Komikwerks was not affected by the bankruptcy.. "Byron was a buddy," said Denton, "and our relationship was really with Byron and not iBooks. We separated amicably, but kept the doors open for the relationship to continue, but it didn't make much sense without Byron. He was always so ahead of the curve that it was flattering just to have him interested in Komikwerks."
"So many people get into this business to do family entertainment, but can't for one reason or another," said Denton. "We kept hearing that there's nothing for kids out there," said Denton, "so we went out and got all these great comics writers and illustrators."
