‘Toxic Summer’ Exclusive Excerpt Invites You To A Frantic Mutant Beach Party
Mary Beth McAndrews
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Coming soon from Oni Press and the mutated mind of Eisner Award-winning cartoonist Derek Charm (Jughead, The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl) is Toxic Summer, a series described as one part Riverdale and The Creature From The Black Lagoon. Get ready for acidic sludge and perverted beach maniacs!
“Inspired by classic beach movies, gross-out teen horror, Mad Magazine, and my own insane friendships, this is a story that has been cooking for some time,” said Charm. “I couldn’t ask for a better home for it than Oni Press, or better collaborators than Bess Pallares and Frank Cvetkovic.”
In Toxic Summer:
Best friends Ben and Leo had the perfect summer planned after high school graduation. As lifeguards in the idyllic beach town of Port Dorian, they were planning for three months of hot guys, late-night bonfires, and no regrets . . . until a toxic spill of unknown properties on the beach transformed their dream summer into a waking nightmare. Now Port Dorian is flooded with panicked tourists, a local researcher is paralyzed while investigating the spill, and a horrifying pack of subhuman monstrosities is snatching beachgoers in the night.
We have an exclusive excerpt from the first issue about beach clean-up. Charm exclusively told Dread Central,
“Here we’re briefly introduced to Amy, who notices her father is missing, before joining Ben and Leo on their first night of beach clean up. I really wanted to lean into the stupid, gross-out humor here with the rotting fish and how this is the exact opposite of what they envisioned their summer. It also leads to the discovery that something spookier is going on in Port Dorian. This sequence was actually from my initial pitch, I redrew it for the book but it otherwise remained pretty unchanged through all that time.”
Read the excerpt below:
Toxic Summer #1 features covers from Charm, Scott Forbes (Aggretsuko), Skylar Patridge (Jill and the Killers), and Eisner Award winner Francesco Francavilla (Afterlife with Archie). The story will be told across three specially formatted, bi-monthly issues.
Toxic Summer #1 comes to comic shops everywhere on May 1, 2024 (Free Comic Book Day).
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