Created by Louise Simonson and Jon Bogdanove as a superhero riff on John Henry, the steel-driving rail worker who faced off against the new steam-powered rock drill. I could think of a few things I could do with him in a story these days.
Ink and screen tones on 9x12 bristol. This was the most complex cut job I’ve done so far with screen tones.
Nuke!
Created by Frank Miller and David Mazzucchelli. This pill-chomping super soldier created under Project: Homegrown can be found gunning down people in the Republic of Terra Verde or US citizens in their own cities. I don’t know why I thought of him. The drawing is digital.
Two commissions came in recently for Toxic Avenger Comics #1 sketch covers. One person wanted Toxie as Judge Dredd, the other requested Toxie as Savage Dragon. Well, twist my fucking arm!
Here’s some Toxie fan art from dumbcat on Bluesky. Down with goons. Abolish goons. Do a backside goon flip down a set of stairs.
New Comics
Toxic Avenger Comics #7: Our second installment of “Toxie Goes to Washington” is out this week. Toxie has been framed for the murder the President and the VP is sworn in, granting sweeping powers to the Planet Teens to clean up the United States from mutant terrorism. We even venture back to World World 2 and Operation Paperclip to introduce a new villain. There’s a review at AIPT raving about the direction this story is taking.
Toxie Team Up: A new collection of all five issues of Toxie Team Up came out this week. This book contains the Justice Warriors crossover with the Toxic Avenger by myself and Ben Clarkson, in addition to Mark Russell and Richard Pace’s popular character, Jesus Christ.
Cruel Kingdom: The new collection of comics from the EC revival is out, collecting all their fantasy stories. I wrote a comic for this called “Just Desserts” about a royal chef doing everything she can to impress the King, illustrated by Valeria Burzo. Recommended for anyone who likes The Borrowers or Arrietty.
Reminder: I will be signing at the Canadian Comic Bin in Stayer, Ontario, this Saturday at noon!
Let’s start this newsletter off with something pleasant. Over the winter break, I did some Miyazaki-maxxing with the kids and we plowed through some Ghibli films. Watching Spirited Away (2001) for the first time in 20-some years inspired me to draw No-Face with some screen tones. I dabble with tones whenever I have time and will show off a few more drawings in newsletters to come.
This is on a 9x12 piece of bristol.
Things in the US continue to degrade at a rapid clip. It’s disheartening to watch, particularly through a fully enshitified internet. I spent more time on social media than I usually do anymore watching the reaction to the shooting of Renee Good in Minneapolis and I have a breaking report: It’s very bad online. Worse than ever, really. X users are doing frame-by-frame forensic murder apologia while Facebook is overrun with fake AI crowd shots, fake AI-authored engagement bait stories, and fake AI images of the ICE shooter’s face.
You can and should turn away from this mind poison, but it’s important to at least understand this is now how millions of people get their most basic information about the world. It probably doesn’t help that most news outlets are totally paywalled. Oh well.
I’m not sure what to even say, except power to those who are out in the streets filming and resisting this shit rather than posting AI memes. Anti-government types seem noticeably absent from all this—or perhaps very present as participants! I was reminded about this cartoon I made in July of 2020.
If you have ever liked my political cartoons, you will want to read the story launching today in Toxic Avenger Comics #6. “Toxie Goes to Washington” is where I’ve put a lot of my ideas, jokes, and frustrations about the US rotting from the inside.
Unlike my political cartoons, however, this is meant to tell a real story—a violently entertaining one, I hope, with turns you won’t see coming, about sicko elites and phony hope in the halls of power. The story was conceived of years ago when I initially pitched the Toxie comics to Ahoy and Troma, though I would certainly consider it… relevant. It all begins when our boy Toxie is summoned to Capitol Hill to testify before the Senate…
I’m blessed to be working with Fred Harper on this, who is turning in career-best stunners. Here are a couple unlettered spreads—Fred Spreads, we call ‘em.
As always, go to your local comic shop and pick up a copy. A lot of times you might have to order them or subscribe to the series—tell them to get your ass Toxic Avenger Comics #6-10 to read this story!
I’ll be signing at the Canadian Comic Bin in Stayner, Ontario, January 31. That is around the release of Toxie Team-Up, the book collection of one-shots from Ahoy pitting Toxie against such culturally influential figures as Jesus Christ and the Justice Warriors.
I wrote a comic in EC's Catacomb of Torment #6 out this week called "The Composite Man" about a woman who is repeatedly attacked over the course of several months, seemingly by a different man every time. It's something new from me—a straight thriller—with art by the exceptional Claire Roe and colorist extraordinaire Jordie Bellaire.
It’s something old from me as well. The idea behind “The Composite Man” was first entered into my notebook 23 years ago when I lived in Pittsburgh, working in restaurants and taking life drawing classes. Back then, I was beginning to draw weekly political cartoons but the exact direction of my career had yet to take hold. My notebooks were filled with ideas for comic books, strips, short stories, and graphic novels. As each one filled, I’d transfer my list of unused ideas to the next one, and keep writing.
The hook for this story stayed alive an unusually long time, but as the years passed I rarely thought of it. Then, last year, EC Comics was resurrected and I had a story accepted. Combing through all my ideas for more pitches (now a large multi-folder cloud document) I came across what had become my oldest unused idea and, blowing the dust off, knew that I could finally find a home for it.
You can read four pages of the story below, followed by five pages of Toxic Crusaders #3, which drops Wednesday. This issue focuses on Junkyard, a homeless woman merged with her dog by toxic waste, and the police who try to evict the Crusaders from their home.
Working with Tristan Wright has been another highlight of the year. He has rounded out our Toxic Avenger line perfectly with his incredible layouts and attention to the goopy, horrid details.
This Wednesday, Toxic Crusaders #3 hits shelves with an issue titled “The Three Little Pigs.” We focus on Junkyard, a homeless woman in Tromaville who was merged with her dog. Or a dog merged with her owner, depending on how you look at things.
We have our big bad wolf in Junkyard, but it’s the three little pigs who will be doing the huffing and puffing. They are disgraced New Jersey cops, mutated by the alien Mr. K and enlisted to forcibly evict the Crusaders from their home. Not by the hairs of their chinny chin chin!
I feel the need to show off the pigs.
There’s Jim Ramparts, fired over multiple excessive force lawsuits. Katie McKelley was dismissed from the Camden PD after stealing drugs from the evidence room and improperly seizing assets from victims. Then there is Gerold Hugget, who accidentally shot himself three times during a no-knock raid, resulting in severe nerve damage and being ruled unfit to serve.
Repulsive beings well before they are doused in chemical waste. Get a look at the before and after below.
I started this month thinking I would do all kinds of year-end wrap ups and reflections and that just ain’t gonna happen. Which is fine. I’ve got a few scripts to go before taking some downtime with the family and getting ready for 2026, but this year was good for me, particularly on the professional front.
Last year I made the transition to full time comics writing and in 2025 I helmed my first ongoing series, Toxic Avenger Comics, along with a new Toxic Crusaders miniseries and work with the new line of EC comics from Oni. So it has been nearly full time on Toxic Avenger books this year, though I have had a creator-owned book humming along in the background that will be announced in 2026. A project or two I had high hopes for were killed dead this year, while others may still see the light of day. That’s showbiz. While exactly what I do in comics seems to change every five years, I try to keep in mind that I’ve still figured out a way to do it for more than 20 years.
Continuing my work with Fred Harper, launching into Crusaders with Tristan Wright, and reuniting with Ben Clarkson for a Justice Warriors/Toxic Avenger crossover—working with collaborators like these and seeing them absolutely crush pages has powered my year.
Writing an ongoing comic is a blessing in today’s precarious comics market, one I don’t take for granted. The truth is we are only five issues in, which is not a very long run! That makes this next year of stories really important…
Toxie Goes to Washington
On January 7 we begin “Toxie Goes to Washington,” a five-issue storyline plunging the Toxic Avenger into the sick world of Congressional testimony, Senate procedural votes, and ruthless political assassination. We’ve been laying the groundwork for this story for two years and it was part of my original pitch to Troma and Ahoy.
After the chemical waste spill in Tromaville, Toxie has been enlisted by the Senior Senator of New Jersey to help convince the public to support a sprawling environmental bill. Toxie will find himself facing a number of weird threats in our nation’s capital, including Doctor Planet and the Planet Teens, new environmentally-themed heroes put forward by the federal government. You can read a preview at AIPT.
Today is the pre-order cutoff for the first issue of the story, Toxic Avenger Comics #6, meaning this is the last day comic shops put in their numbers before we go to press. Please pre-order with your local shop! The comics market basically lives and dies on pre-orders. If you don’t have a shop near you and live in the middle of nowhere (like me) then you can order direct from places like Midtown Comics and Comix Zone in the US. In Canada, try my friends at the Dragon in Guelph or Knowhere Comics in Toronto—they all ship!
Main cover by Fred Harper, variant by Erica Henderson, and Fred’s cover for issue #8 featuring Doctor Planet.
Fuck ICE
I illustrated the cover for the December issue of In These Times. Sarah Lazare writes the cover story, reporting from Chicago where ICE raids have been terrorizing workers for months. The issue also includes a comics section I edit and my first political cartoon in years, memorializing the late war criminal Dick Cheney. I’ll continue editing comics with them through 2026 too, so subscribe here.
Teenage Fantasy
Toxic Avenger Comics #5 is out in comics shops now and I really love what artist Grim Wilkins was able to do with our Fantasy issue. The story depicts a future New Jersey that is now one sprawling landfill and an un-mutated Melvin Junko leading a band of mutants to reclaim it. It all makes sense in the context of the story, but I’m not here to explain the plot, just show off some gorgeous unlettered art from Wilkins to convince you to go grab a copy.
How To Make Nonfiction Comics
Finally, I wanted to use this newsletter to highlight a major new book from Nib alumni. Eleri Harris and Shay Mirk have co-authored Making Nonfiction Comics: A Guide for Graphic Narrative, out now from Abrams ComicArts.
Harris and Mirk have written and drawn a very well-crafted exploration of the practice, art, ethics, and business of reporting nonfiction through comics—the best medium, which we all love. If you are interested in how we thought about and created the work we published at The Nib, no book will give you more insight.
It also contains interviews with close to 40 cartoonists about the process and considerations that go into their comics.
Photo: Shay Mirk
Upcoming Comics
Dec 17 - Catacomb of Torment #6
Dec 24 - Toxic Crusaders #3
Jan 7 - Toxic Avenger Comics #6
Jan 28 - Toxic Avenger Comics #7
Jan 28 - Toxic Avenger Team-Up
That last one is a trade paperback collecting all five issues of Toxie Team Up, including the crossover with Justice Warriors by myself and Ben Clarkson. Pre-order this puppy with your comic shop, bookstore, or anywhere online that sells books.
I’m feeling good today. I have a new comic book out. Zohran Mamdani won the race for mayor of New York City. Dick Cheney is dead. I went back to the drawing table in celebration. The idea for this cartoon has been carried in my notebook for 17 years; yesterday morning I finally got to sit down and draw it.
This was published by In These Times in their latest comic section, featuring the likes of Jen Sorensen, Mattie Lubchansky, Keith Knight, and Ruben Bolling.
Kamala Harris went to X, the platform run by an oligarch who threw a quarter billion dollars into an election to bury her already-troubled campaign, to mourn the loss of “a devoted public servant.” Cheney, she wrote, was “a figure who, with a strong sense of dedication, gave so much of his life to the country he loved.”
Let’s discard this thinking and the type of politician prone to it. Cheney lived a long life of comfort and never faced justice for his crimes. For an honest look at his legacy, read friend-of-the-newsletter Spencer Ackerman’s scathing obituary in The Nation.
As they say in comics, ‘nuff said.
Black Ops Friday
Toxic Crusaders #2 hits stores today. After laying some track in issue one, I feel like we really start cooking with this one.
This issue focuses on team member Major Disaster and his background in black ops, which is employed to take down a new villain—an alien hedge fund manager manipulating the global economy. AIPT gives it a rave 9/10 review citing the “wonderfully jarring” satire and Tristan Wright’s “unwavering inventiveness” on the art.
So whether it’s Toxic ripping off an alien’s face in sweet, gory action, or Major Disaster communing with the very earth (in a moment that feels massively informative for the state of our current wellbeing), the art continues to push and pull our sensibilities like a veteran potter.
Below are some preview pages along with my art for the Major Disaster trading card in bagged versions of the issue. Get your ass to a comic shop and pick this up along with last week’sToxic Avenger Comics #4 and Toxic Team Up #5 featuring Justice Warriors.
