James Tynion IV's name is synonymous with comics and horror. With Exquisite Corpses, he is taking the energy of big superhero comic event books and bringing it to the world of slashers. With Michael Walsh, Jordie Bellaire, and Becca Carey, Exquisite Corpses is unlike any horror comic that has come before. The comic is up for pre-order from Image Comics and Tiny Onion, anywhere comics are sold, and will be out Wednesday, May 14th.
I had the chance to chat with James Tynion IV about what it means to be the first horror comics event and how a book like this came to be. We also have an exclusive cover reveal for you of Jenny Frison's “stealth” variant cover.
You've called Exquisite Corpses a horror comics event. What does that mean to you?
My whole career started in superhero comics. I spent about 10 years writing in the Batman line and all over, primarily DC Comics. As a part of that, I got to participate in these fantastic writer summits, which were such a burst of concentrated creative energy. It was one of my favorite things that would happen whenever we could do it.
Pulling that kind of energy off in a creator-owned space is more challenging. Thankfully, in developing Exquisite Corpses, I worked with the phenomenal Michael Walsh, who is very open to an experimental approach to building a project. Basically, the two of us designed 12 incredible killers. We created the entire world around these killers. I wrote the whole 60-page script and Bible, and then we brought in a group of incredible creators to crack the rest of the story. It wouldn't have been the same if it were the two of us. It's the impulses of everyone in that room pushing us in different directions.
There are killers that we thought would die off in the first few issues, but they end up lasting towards the end of the game. I fully believe that the best superhero events come from that kind of profound creative energy in the room with creators working together, and that the creative collaborative power of a bunch of really cool people making cool stuff together translates to a book that reads like an event with the scale and power of anything that the big two are putting out.
You're embarking on a signing tour for Exquisitie Corpses. What is it like engaging with the horror community in that way?
I love the horror community. They're open to different story experiences and stories that break the rules. Horror almost always breaks the rules because many of the standard story types within the horror genre have a set of rules, but then we are so familiar with all of that, that the joy comes in how to break them.
It's a bunch of people who have their favorite monsters and their favorite monster type, but they love seeing how somebody can approach it from an angle they've never seen before. On top of that, it's such a great subculture because it has such a weird history filled with creative people making bizarre things and trying to get away with stuff. It's all about these kinds of visceral emotions. It's wonderful to tap into as a creator, but also wonderful as a fan.
Exquisite Corpses starts with a 13-issue season, but you have plans for more. How are you storyboarding the more overarching universe?
The initial 13-part story is about the game Exquisite Corpses being played on Halloween night in Oak Valley, Maine, in 2025. Essentially, we have 12 insanely dangerous killers dropped into an ordinary small town sealed off from the rest of the world. Their mission is to fight each other to the death. The last killer standing is the winner of the game. So that 13-issue cycle tells the game's story in Oak Valley here. But this opens up this huge universe of storytelling potential because, for one, we're introducing 12 incredibly dynamic, interesting killers.
I think every reader is going to have their favorite killer. So you're going to want more about “who is that killer? Where did they come from? How did they become like this?” And then we get to start telling those stories out of the main series, and then we'll ultimately come back to another game. We could go back and do the game that took place in 1985 and lean into the slasher aesthetic in a big, big fun way. There are so many options for what we could do with this. There will be exquisite comics.
Exquisite Corpses comics will be on the shelves monthly for the foreseeable future, as long as people support it. We have a lot of faith in this universe and the stories that we're telling it.
When you were working with Michael Walsh and your cornucopia of talent, what did you want to stand out visually about your slashers versus the slashers of the past?
I talked to Michael Walsh about this for a long time because we wanted to blend aesthetics. We did not want this to be just a nostalgia play where we were trying to evoke horror stories of the past. We're operating in comics, in the visual language of superheroes and supervillains. We didn't just want to incorporate that; we wanted to take what we loved about classic slashers and superhero characters and bring in manga and video game influence. Some of these characters have a Fortnite quality, and that's deliberate. We want these characters to have dynamic, complicated, fascinating, and simple designs.
This is fantastic about working with a brilliant artist like Michael Walsh. He had the idea that every character would have two primary colors that define them and are their iconic colors, which allows us to simplify them down to their base silhouette with just a few accents of those colors. It just sells the entire character from the jump. I had my first conversation with Michael Walsh a year and a half ago, sort of broadly pitching him the concept of this, and within two days, he was sending me ideas for different Killers.
One of the major themes of the book is the evils of the uber-rich and their control. How do you handle the world at large through your work in horror?
One of the things I love most about writing horror is that you're not trying to write a comforting story. You are not trying to tap into the feel-good parts of your heart and mind. This is where I dig into my ugliest fears about the world, myself, and the people around me. I lay them bare in the books, and they will be exciting in a way that's exciting to read to other people. I do a series called Department of Truth that is very much about my fears about America and the history that led us to this moment.
I do another series called W0rldtr33 that is all about the horror coming from the Internet, the dangerous ideas that grow and spread in there. I continually heighten it into a concentrated form. But I want to be able to tell human stories with these extreme horror elements that are visually dynamic. I want to say something real. If it doesn't make me feel uncomfortable or unsettle me, I feel like I'm failing as a writer, building these worlds.
And now, as promised, behold… Jenny Frison's cover variation.
Tell your local comic book shop you want CVR E Stealth Var (MR) to preorder this version!
For more, check out our list of new horror comics coming this year.
