Comics News
James Tynion IV Launches Razorblades: The Horror Magazine
Horror For Modern Tastes
Comic writer James Tynion IV (Batman, Something Is Killing The Children) has just announced he has launched an online quarterly horror anthology with Steve Foxe, Razorblades: The Horror Magazine…
Here’s what Tynion IV had to say about its genesis:
It started in the middle of another conversation.
I had read Alan Moore and Eddie Campbell’s From Hell in three sittings in one day, and felt like my brain was crackling with arcane power. I was texting my Department of Truth editor, Steve Foxe for horror comic recommendations, having decided to make the most of my time in quarantine from Covid-19. The kernel was already in my mind, truthfully. I had been pacing around the apartment for a few days at that point wondering how crazy I was to be seriously considering it. I told Steve that I had just ordered a full set of Taboo, the horror anthology magazine created by Steve Bissette in the late 1980s, where the first four chapters of From Hell originally ran as a serial feature. He texted me back with pictures of his own copies of Taboo, and we bemoaned the state of the anthology scene in American comics. And that’s when I just said what I was thinking.
“I would just fucking love to do a horror anthology that isn’t fucking nostalgic toward anything,” I texted. “Maybe I’ll make it my weird pet project, in the background of everything else. I just have a strong feeling of what something like it could be… I’d call it RAZORBLADES.” The conversation turned quickly toward the practicalities, a wish list of contributors, and a mutual apprehension of the crowdfunding model. A desire to just make a thing and put it out into the world, not having to get permission from anybody. I had hoped Steve, another horror nerd and writer like myself, would get lost in the possibilities, and I’m still grateful he did. Within days we were reaching out to our first contributors. And our strange experiment in self-publishing began.
And this IS an experiment. And probably a foolish one. You’d think that reading all the forwards to the late issues of Taboo, warning folks away from the model of oversized anthologies, and generally from becoming a publisher of other people’s work, would have deterred us. But honestly, the moment feels ripe for a move like this. Razorblades will be a quarterly magazine, running for at least one year, but hopefully much longer. As long as there’s an audience for it, we’ll keep making more of it. We’ve already approached some truly incredible horror talent for contributions over the next few issues, and we have our targets set on more. Our goal was to focus on the rising class in the comic book industry. Young creatives, starting to make their name in horror, or in comics in general. We’ve asked them to bring us their most frightening work, grounded in the modern world, not trying to evoke something from decades past.
Steve would come up with the best justification for the name Razorblades. He said it evoked a collection of small, sharp things that can cut you. And that’s what we want to do. We made this thing to be midwives to some great horror stories, in the same way that Taboo helped bring From Hell into this world. And in the spirit of the Taboo, every story and illustration in this piece is wholly owned by its creators. Razorblades claims no part of it, save a right to reprint. This isn’t about building a fortress of intellectual property, this is about creating a platform for the best talent in comics to put out deeply frightening stories.
This is only the beginning.
James Tynion IV
Publisher, Razorblades
7.26.2020
It looks like it has contributions from the likes of Tynion IV’s friend Scott Snyder (Batman, American Vampire) and Ram V (Catwoman, These Savage Shores)
A grounded, modern horror anthology co-created by James Tynion IV & Steve Foxe. Not pastiche. Not camp. Not nostalgia-driven with a crypt-keeper. Stories with one foot in the real world that are fucking scary. Available quarterly from Tiny Onion Studios.
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