Ignition Press has announced a new romantic comedy series from an iconic team, The Dogsitter, and The Beat has all the details.
Written by Jamie S. Rich and illustrated by Megan Levens, who previously collaborated on Ares & Aphrodite and Madame Frankenstein, The Dogsitter follows a a 20-something vet student on a leave of absence whose life gets thrown into chaos when she stumbles into a love triangle. The series features colors by Nick Filardi and letters by Crank!
Here’s the full synopsis:
Gemma Monroe should be reveling in her ’20s. Instead, she’s on a leave of absence from veterinarian school to save for rising tuition, stacking shifts at a flower shop and juggling
her side gig as a dogsitter.Gemma’s favorite canine client—an Akita with an identity crisis—comes with the most demanding dog-mom: Portia Ross, a high-powered executive with deep pockets who sees Gemma as a pet project of her own. It’s delicate, but Gemma knows that getting her life back on track means this customer is always right.
And the policy works…until Gemma locks eyes with the charming Neal Mandell, and what starts as a welcome casual fling unleashes a transactional love triangle that could throw her future to the dogs.
Check out main cover art by Levens and Filardi and a variant by Nicoletta Baldari below. Issue #1 will also feature a 1:10 retailer incentive cover by Jae Lee and June Chung.
“I’m thrilled to finally announce that I’m returning to my rom-com roots and reconnecting with Jamie S. Rich on The Dogsitter,” said Levens. “Returning to the romance genre on this miniseries feels like coming full circle for me, and that I get to draw lots of cute dogs into this story is just a huge added bonus. I’ve spent years drawing friends and colleagues into my comics as background characters…now the pups get to have their cameos as well!”
Rich said, “I miss the classic romantic comedies of decades past. I wanted to take some of the more modern conventions from rom-coms of this century but pair them with the top-notch writing of classic Hollywood, all the while bending things to make it all work on the comic book page.
“In that regard, there was no one else I could imagine doing this with but Megan,” Rich continued. “I needed someone that could capture the emotion and the acting, be it from our human character or the canines. The Dogsitter is intended to be breezy fun, until it catches you off guard and hits you right in the feels.”
Ignition Press Senior Editor Maggie Howell said The Dogsitter is “a must-have for lovers of all irresistable dogs—the four-legged and human ones alike! It’s a bright and hilarious breath of fresh air, made with love for readers who crave classic romantic entanglements with a modern bite.”
On the creative team behind the series, Howell added, “Nobody can showcase that genre mastery like Jamie, and artist Megan Levens is reaching new heights with her character work (including an archive of world-class, emoji-ready canine reaction shots). Add colorist Nick Filardi’s radiant vision, effortless lettering from Crank!, and The Dogsitter is summer vacation on the shelves.”
The Dogsitter #1 will be available digitally and at your local comic shop on June 3. To guarantee a copy, pre-order no later than Monday, April 28.
