Jimmy Palmiotti, Dave Johnson + Juan Santacruz reignite the Sugar Wars in ‘Pop Kill: Big Candy’

The sequel to the satirical action series brings back Jon Pyle and Dina Deluxe as a secret candy consortium targets them over a revolutionary new sugar substitute.

Jimmy Palmiotti, Dave Johnson and Juan Santacruz are returning to their sugar-coated world of corporate conspiracies with Pop Kill: Big Candy, a new four-issue miniseries launching from Mad Cave Studios in October.

They’ll be joined by colorist Vittorio Astone and letterer Sean Konot for a story set eight months after the events of Pop Kill, which pitted rival soft drink empires against one another in a violent satire of corporate culture. In Pop Kill: Big Candy, the focus shifts from soda to candy, as Jon Pyle and Dina Deluxe find themselves caught in another deadly conspiracy.

Pop Kill: Big Candy doesn’t just escalate—it detonates, erupting into a sugar-fueled riot of adult chaos that makes our first run look like a warm-up,” Palmiotti said. “Mad Cave gave us one directive: Go wild. So we ripped off the brakes and hurled Jon Pyle and Dina Deluxe into a world where sugar is worth more than gold.”

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Subscription-based comics platform Zestworld will launch next year

New titles by Jimmy Palmiotti, Amanda Conner, Phil Jimenez, Eric Canete, Alex Segura, Dean Kotz and more are expected next year.

A new digital comics platform that’s focused on helping creators “monetize their creations” will debut next year with titles by Eric Canete, Amanda Conner, Phil Jimenez, Jimmy Palmiotti, Alex Segura, Peter Tomasi and more, according to The New York Times.

Zestworld, who have a very basic website set up here, was founded by Chris Giliberti, who told the NYT that “this industry is broken for creators; and it’s broken in publishing and TV and film; it’s also broken in events and collectibles.”

“We wanted to build something that’s useful across all areas of their business — anywhere they generate income,” he said, noting that the creators they’re working with will be stockholders in the company.

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Smash Pages Q&A: Jimmy Palmiotti and Dave Johnson

The two-award-winning creators discuss their latest project together, the second issue of ‘Pop Kill’ from Paperfilms.

Dave Johnson is the award-winning cover artist of 100 Bullets, Punisher, Deadpool, Hellboy and the B.P.R.D., Lobster Johnson, Abe Sapien, The Butcher of Paris and many other comics. Jimmy Palmiotti began his career as an inker, but quickly became a writer and editor, co-creating comics like Ash, 21 Down and The Monolith. In recent years, Palmiotti has continued to work with his wife, the great Amanda Conner, on a variety of projects, but much of his work has been writing and co-writing creator-owned graphic novels including Killing Time in America, Retrovirus and Random Acts of Violence, which was adapted into a film just released on video-on-demand, in addition to continuing the story of his characters Painkiller Jane and The Monolith.

Many of those projects, like Pop Kill, which is currently being kickstarted, are collaborations with artist Juan Santacruz. This time they’re joined by co-writer Dave Johnson on a series that’s violent, sexy, very absurd, and they were kind enough to take a few minutes out to talk about the second issue of the series, and continuing the absurd tale of violence, sex, and corporate espionage.

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