Comics publisher Bad Idea wants to send you into the belly of the beast with Whalesville, a new one-shot from writer Matt Kindt and artist Adam Pollina. The all-ages story introduces Wawae, a young boy who is swallowed by a whale -- and finds a tiny town with talkative sea creatures inside.
"If Alice got to fall through the looking glass into a colorful world of crazy characters, Wawae falls into a whale and gets pulled into a cast-off, reclaimed-trash and driftwood town full of delusional characters that seem doomed and have accepted their fate,'" Kindt explained to CBR.
"In a way, Wawae is the only character that realizes where they are and what's going on, and he has to try to convince the others that the life they're living," he added. "There's something more, something better. But they're all content. So do you destroy the life they're enjoying because you know there's something better out there? It's kind of a tough moral decision for a kid to have the wrestle with."
Matt Kindt, Adam Pollina and Matt Hollingsworth's Whalesville one-shot goes on sale May 2021 from Bad Idea. An exclusive lettered preview and some character design sheets appear below.
WHALESVILLE #1
- MATT KINDT (writer)
- ADAM POLLINA (artist/cover)
- MATT HOLLINGSWORTH (colors)
- You never thought you'd see a Bad Idea like this! From the limitless imaginations of New York Times best-selling writer Matt Kindt (Mind MGMT), veteran artist Adam Pollina (X-Force), and Eisner Award-winning colorist Matt Hollingsworth (Hawkeye) comes a very special whale tale for all ages (and species) in the tradition of Hayao Miyazaki and Pixar!
- When young Wawae -- the seaborn son of a whaling captain -- is thrown overboard and swallowed whole by a whale, he knows his father will relentlessly pursue revenge against the creature that stole away his boy. What he didn’t expect, however, is what he's about to find inside: the town of "Whalesville" -- a colorful, cobbled-together village inhabited by an astounding collection of talking sea creatures, including a crab named Caleb, an angler fish called Angela, and a seadragon that prefers to go by Lilly. But, to Wawae's new friends, Whalesville isn't just their home, it's the whole world -- and they don't understand the danger that now pursues them from above the waves or that they are even inside a whale at all. To rescue his new best buddies, Wawae will have to convince them of the truth... and save Whalesville before his own father sends them sinking into the inky depths forever.
- WHALE-SIZED ONE-SHOT
- ON SALE MAY 2021
