Posted in: Boom, Comics | Tagged: boom studios, james tynion iv, slaughterverse, Somrthing Is Killing The Children

Expanding Something Is Killing The Children Into "The Slaughterverse"

It's Something Is Killing The Children time! James Tynion IV is currently moving his social media on Twitter from his personal account to his company account, Read Tiny Onion, and stated that his personal interaction with fans will be switching to that newsletter. This might mean that more people will see the gems that Bleeding Cool is known for slicing and dicing. Will that stop us? Hell no. Does James want us to stop? We've never asked. But we do link to his newsletter and suggest that you all should have signed up by now. This week, of course, he had lots to say about Something Is Killing The Children and its newly announced spinoff The House Of Slaughter. And he suggests a personal queasiness with the overarching title The Slaughterverse, a queasiness that we do not share. That should definitely be its name.

Going back to the first introduction of the House of Slaughter in the pages of SIKTC, I knew there was a lot of story to tell around the house itself. Originally I was wondering if we'd do little one-shots in the flagship title to flesh that story out… But SIKTC is Erica Slaughter's book and that's where we're going to tell Erica Slaughter's story. As this first arc of HOS kicks off, Werther and I will be hunkering down to plot out Erica Slaughter's next adventure in her adult life, picking up from the end of SIKTC #15. That story will kick off in early 2022, but we wanted to take this opportunity to keep expanding the world. Think of HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER as the BPRD support title to SIKTC's Hellboy. SIKTC will always be me and Werther telling Erica's stories. HOS will bring in other rad creators working closely with both Werther and myself to bring the rest of this strange and fascinating world to life.

And the character I heard the most questions about while we were working on the first big story-arcs was AARON SLAUGHTER, and when we started talking about building House of Slaughter, I knew that he was the ideal central character for the story we wanted to tell. I actually got a very friendly but stern message a few months ago from a Dad who reads SIKTC with his teenage Daughter that she was heartbroken when we killed off Erica's effete handler and brother-figure from the House of Slaughter in the first SIKTC story cycle, and I was very very excited that I got to tell him that we had lots more plans for Aaron Slaughter in the future. In the present of SIKTC, Aaron Slaughter may be dead, but he died with secrets that he never got to tell Erica, and those secrets may come to haunt Erica in the present day later on.

There are two key story threads in the first arc of HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER. The "Present Day" story takes place directly before the events of the first 15 issue story cycle of SOMETHING IS KILLING THE CHILDREN, and details Aaron Slaughter's last case before he sent Erica to Archer's Peak. And then there's a storyline in the past that details a key period in Aaron Slaughter's teenage years at the House of Slaughter, picking up shortly after the events in SIKTC #16-20. This storyline is going to be the first to introduce another "House" in the Order of St. George, and a member of that house.

And confirmed Bleeding Cool speculation that the Free Comic Book Day title would lead up to the new series. Being called Enter The House Of Slaughter was our first clue.

Folks have been asking for a bit what the deal is about the FCBD Issue, "INTO THE HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER," and now I can confirm what we're doing there a bit… It takes all of the conversations we saw Erica having on the phone with Aaron Slaughter in the first SIKTC arc, and shows the other side of those conversation, with new material that hints toward the story we're going to be telling in the first HOUSE OF SLAUGHTER arc. It also might have a cameo appearance of the character we'll be introducing in earnest in House of Slaughter #1.

Yeah, no store has ordered enough copies of this one. Which, even though a) it is not yet available and b) will be free is still c) going for between $10 and $20 in advance on eBay.

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