Comics
American McGee Enters the Comic World
American McGee, who is famous for his video game reworking of Alice in Wonderland and now Grimm Fairy Tales is adapting his work into comic form. The first comic adaptation is of American McGee’s Grimm, available this April from IDW. I really like his take on the different subjects, although I’m not really a fan of the game play in his work. More info after the break…
Celebrated game designer American McGee’s Grimm, an episodic videogame that debuted on GameTap, offers gamers the chance to create darkness across traditionally lighter fairy tales. And now Grimm, the game’s macabre dwarf who wreaks havoc on these fairy-tale tableaus, will be unleashed in a new comic book series coming from IDW Publishing in April 2009.
American McGee’s Grimm is a five-issue miniseries that takes the games’ high concept and tweaks it a bit, allowing Grimm to unleash his dark magic across five familiar comic-book universes. In issue one, Grimm exits the latest fairy tale he darkened only to discover bright and sunny superhero comics. He enters the world, kick-starting a “Crisis on Earth 57,” where he launches a secret invasion crisis into a domain where villains are doomed to fail… until he gets involved!
Subsequent issues of the series, written by Dwight MacPherson and illustrated by Grant Bond, will find Grimm invading — and forever changing — the worlds of romance comics, westerns, teenage high-school comics, and anthropomorphic comics. In each issue, Bond’s art style will reflect the archetypal art form of these traditional universes before Grimm’s dark influence fully takes over the comic.
About the comic series, creator American McGee said, “It’s great fun to see the transformative ‘Grimm effect’ applied to narrative universes outside the Brothers Grimm tales. The world needs more of this — exposure to the gritty, sometimes painful truth of the human condition — be it in Red Riding Hood’s well-earned demise, or the reversal of ‘good guys win’ scenarios that we all know to be far from everyday reality.”
American McGee’s Grimm, a five-issue limited series, debuts in April 2009. Season Three of the game launches on GameTap in early 2009. For more information on the comic, please refer to www.IDWpublishing.com. Information on the game can be found here: http://www.gametap.com/grimm/ and at American McGee’s game site www.spicyhorse.com and his blog:http://www.americanmcgee.com/wordpress/
The supernatural world of Korean folk horror movie Exhuma grows larger with the arrival of prequel spinoff webtoon Maengjong this weekend, Variety reports today.
Naver Webtoon debuts Maengjong on May 30.
The series hails from Haemuri (Olgami) and will trace the high school origins of how shaman duo Hwarim and Bonggil, played by Kim Go-eun and Lee Do-hyun in the 2024 film, came together to face occultish threats.
The story is set to begin when “Hwarim, who has been concealing her identity following a childhood encounter with a snake spirit called Jin, crosses paths with Bonggil at their school.”
Variety notes that Exhuma director Jang Jae-hyun participated in the project’s early concept stage.
“We are presenting ‘Maengjong,’ a new series capturing the appeal of the horror-occult genre, ahead of the full summer season,” said Lee Jeong-geun, Naver Webtoon’s Korea webtoon content leader. “With the high school story of Hwarim and Bonggil, who left a strong impression in the film ‘Exhuma,’ enhanced by Haemuri’s characteristic tense direction, we expect it will be a welcome work for genre fans.”
“It is meaningful that the spin-off story of ‘Exhuma,’ loved by many audiences, expands by meeting the new grammar of webtoon,” said Lee Hyeon-jeong, managing director of the film business division at Showbox, which distributed the film. “We hope it will be a fresh experience for both film fans and webtoon readers.”
Exhuma was a breakout hit in 2024, becoming the first Korean occult film to surpass 10 million ticket buyers and the country’s highest-grossing film of the year. I wrote in my review that “the intricately woven Exhuma delivers one of the year’s biggest surprises in horror so far.”
The bond between Hwarim and Bonggil was one of the film’s highlights, making this prequel webtoon a must for fans.
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