Image Comics has unveiled the video trailer—from animator extraordinaire Drew Shields—for the forthcoming paperback edition of Griz Grobus, by co-writer/artist Simon Roy (Prophet, Jan’s Atomic Heart and Other Stories) and co-writer Jess Pollard, with colors by Sergey Nazarov. This high fantasy, graphic novel Kickstarter sensation will be available in trade paperback format for the first time this June 2024 from Image Comics.

“Despite a career-long commitment to excellency in storytelling and an unbridled imagination, Simon remains one of comics’ hidden gems,” said Eric Stephenson, Publisher & Chief Creative Officer at Image Comics. “If you’re only familiar with the outstanding work he did on Prophet, you owe it to yourself to check this book out. Not only is Griz Grobus a perfect example of Simon Roy at his very best, it’s pure, unadulterated comics magic.”

Originally a popular Webtoon sequential webcomic, the Griz Grobus story was brought to a wider audience with a 2021 launch of a Kickstarter campaign for a stunning hardcover edition. The campaign went viral, was fully funded in under a day, and raised nearly $70K—far exceeding the initial stretch goal. Now it will be published by Image in paperback format and gain exposure to an even wider fandom of readers.

Set in the same sci-fi universe as Roy’s Habitat, Griz Grobus is another tale of life after the collapse of the interstellar empire. But unlike Habitat—where a once utopian orbital community found itself descending into cannibal tyranny—the characters of Griz Grobus inhabit the rural world of Altamira, where post-utopian frontier life has blossomed into something a bit more wholesome.

Griz Grobus tells two parallel, intertwined tales from the far-off colony world. High in a sleepy mountain village, the overzealous academic ambitions of a young scribe lead to the resurrection of the town’s ancient colonial-era priest-bot. This long-defunct pastor finds himself in a world that has passed him by, but refuses to simply accept his obsolescence, much to the chagrin of the scribe and the local townsfolk. The second story, a mise-en-abyme, is Altamira’s most famous novel (being avidly read by the characters of the first story).

It is a fantasy tale about a war-god who gets trapped in the body of a goose, and the efforts of one pacifist cook to delay the war-god’s bloody return to the battlefield. The Griz Grobus trade paperback (ISBN: 9781534397866) will be available at local comic book shops on Wednesday, June 5 and independent bookstores, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-a-Million, and Indigo on Tuesday, June 18.