Next month, AfterShock Comics will release Maniac of New York: The Bronx is Burning #1. The first issue of the horror satire series is written by Elliott Kalan, illustrated by Andrea Mutti, and lettered by Taylor Esposito. Today The Beat is pleased to present an exclusive preview of the issue, which finds Maniac Harry back at it again, and a pair of civil servants hot on his trail.
Here’s how AfterShock describes Maniac of New York: The Bronx is Burning #1:
The bloody saga of Maniac Harry continues!
After the tragedy of The Death Train, Detective Zelda Pettibone and mayoral aide Gina Greene have lost the trail of the Maniac — and the support of the city. Copycats are springing up, tensions are high and traffic is a nightmare. So, what happens when your favorite unstoppable, mindless killer resurfaces in a Bronx high school? Can Zelda and Gina get there before Maniac Harry adds to his body count? Will the students tear their attention away from their phones long enough to notice there’s a monster in the halls?
Writer Elliott Kalan and artist Andrea Mutti return for the next chapter of the hit horror-satire that’s somehow even scarier than the world we actually live in!
The Bronx is Burning is the follow-up to Kalan, Mutti, and Esposito’s initial five-issue installment of the series. A collected edition of that series was released by AfterShock last month.
In an interview with The Beat‘s Ricardo Serrano, Mutti described his approach to creating truly terrifying artwork:
When I want to draw something terrifying, I think a lot about blacks and inks, but I also think about having real colors to keep everything balanced. I don’t want it to feel too fantastical. Maybe a way of putting it is I try to give pages a color vibe. Not necessarily go for complete realism. Just enough so people can put together what everything is and how terrifying it can be.
Check out the eight-page preview, including three pages exclusive to The Beat, of Maniac of New York: The Bronx is Burning #1, as well as variant covers for the issue by Mutti and Jonathan Luna, below. The debut issue of the series is due out in stores and digitally on Wednesday, December 1st.