OCTOBER 10, NEW YORK, NY—David Lapham, the Eisner Award–winning creator of the smash hit Stray Bullets, is writing and drawing his own series again for the first time in five years, on not one, but two new creator-owned titles: Juice Squeezers and Kid McAlister!
Called “a perfect start to an addictive new serial” by Newsarama after its run in the Eisner and Harvey Award–winning anthology Dark Horse Presents, Juice Squeezers follows a covert group of tweens who form the main line of defense for the residents of Weeville against an army of giant bugs. The only ones who can fit into the cramped subterranean battlefield, the aptly named Juice Squeezers keep the endless swarm of bugs from overrunning the city. That is, until a new kid moves to town and threatens to awaken a dormant bug population. The exterminators may become the exterminated in this all-ages adventure story!
Hot on the heels of Juice Squeezers, Lapham weaves a western sci-fi tale with Kid McAlister, which follows a fifty-year-old cowboy trapped in the body of a twelve-year-old, as he returns home to Yuma, Arizona, after a long stint on the road. It’s not easy to stay hidden for long when you’re an eternally young “Electric Cowboy” and the best darn bull rider on the circuit. Also, Kid’s the only one who can see the body-snatching aliens taking over the populace, and he’s the only one who can stop them from taking over the world!
Praise for Juice Squeezers:
“How the hell can I ignore David Lapham writing and drawing again! My god that was a nice treat to discover and upon reading . . . I’m really looking forward to the next chapter and Lapham’s art was fantastic.”—Comic Bastards
“It’s a modern take on the innumerable monster movies of the 1950s that featured enormous bugs . . . The character dynamics are still in play, even as the group contends with maggots the size of corgis.”—Unleash the Fanboy
Juice Squeezers #1 (of 4) is on sale January 1, 2014, in comic shops everywhere!
David Lapham‘s got a lot going on at Dark Horse Comics. In fact, he may just be writing and drawing a full DH release every month in 2014 and beyond. The Stray Bullets and Young Liars creator’s newest series, Kid McAllister, is set to debut with a 22-page #1 issue in May, while DHP alum Juice Squeezers graduates to a full series with its own brand-new #1 in stores and on Dark Horse Digital in December. Both series fit in with Lapham’s body of work by blending offbeat concepts into character-driven narratives, but while Juice Squeezers follows seemingly normal small town kids in an underground battle against giant bugs, Kid McAllister will see a not-so-normal preteen cowboy doing his best to deal with what could be a secret alien invasion. Just in time for New York Comic Con 2013, CA got in touch with Lapham for the scoop on his big year of Dark Horse launches.
ComicsAlliance: Kid McAllister seems like it’s going to mash up some cool, offbeat concepts. What were some of your inspirations for the story?
David Lapham: I wanted to do something fun and science fiction — or fun science fiction and I just came up with the title. Kid McAlister Electric Cowboy. It just kinda oozed off my brain and there you go. That sparked this notion of a hero with electrical powers who was really old but a side effect of his powers was they kept him from going through puberty. Which made me think he’s had to be a wanderer and a mechanical bull rider and is being chased by aliens, and he has a horse friend. Then I thought up an old sea captain who runs a mechanical bull bar in the desert, and away we go. All pretty logical, right? Basically, it’s a story about a guy searching for somewhere to belong… and aliens.
You can read the full interview at ComicsAlliance.com!