Hellboy Creator Mike Mignola and Acclaimed Artist Ben Stenbeck Unveil an All-New Fictional Universe :: Blog :: Dark Horse Comics

Legendary Hellboy Creator Mike Mignola and Acclaimed Artist Ben Stenbeck
Unveil an All-New Fictional Universe: Lands Unknown

Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown
is an Anthology of Folklore-inspired Fantasy Stories, Written and Drawn by Mignola,
Colored by Dave Stewart and Lettered by Clem Robins
That Introduces a Shared Universe of Stand-Alone Stories Created by Mignola and Stenbeck

Thirty years after Mike Mignola created Hellboy, the legendary cartoonist is introducing readers to a brand new shared universe, created with frequent collaborator Ben Stenbeck, the writer/artist of the acclaimed series Our Bones Dust. In November, Dark Horse Comics will publish Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown, an anthology of folklore-inspired fantasy stories written and illustrated by Mignola, colored by Dave Stewart, and lettered by Clem Robins. The book will be the first publication from Curious Objects, Mignola’s new imprint at Dark Horse and will set the stage for more weird, wicked, and whimsical stories in the “Lands Unknown” universe from Mignola and Stenbeck.

In Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown, the stories are fantastical, odd and charming — from a search for the beating heart of a long-dead sorcerer, to a pirate girl who makes a deal with the devil, to the titular boy who wins a grim prize in a game with undead interlopers.

“It all started with an Italian Folktale about a boy who goes bowling with corpses,” said Mignola. “I fell in love with the story as soon as I discovered it but I wanted to play fast and loose when adapting it, so I created a whole new world. Not TOO different than our world a few centuries ago, but with a lot more gods and monsters. Once I created that world new characters and stories just started pouring out of it. There is a whole lot to play with here and I expect to be at it for a very long time.”

“For a few years now Mike has been emailing me designs and pages and ideas and maps and lists of place names for this world, and his enthusiasm for this project is indomitable and infectious,” said Stenbeck, who will be writing and drawing other, unannounced future Lands Unknown comics. “So often my reaction to these emails is ‘that’s great Mike! But I still have two books to draw before I can even move on to this work!’ and then I find myself taking three days off to write a new story. Luckily Mike likes my stories. My first project is set far off in a distant corner of this world. That way I can’t bump into anything Mike is doing and make a mess. Spoiler…it will have monsters in it.”

In addition to the Hellboy Universe he created three decades ago, Mignola has co-created the Outerverse Universe with New York Times bestselling novelist Christopher Golden, co-created a series of eerie and off-kilter Victorian-style gothic mysteries with Warwick Johnson-Cadwell, starring Professor J.T. Meinhardt, Mr. Knox, and Ms. Mary Van Sloan, and recently co-created Radio Spaceman with Greg Hinkle and Leonide the Vampire with Rachele Aragno. In addition to his work on the Hellboy and Outerverse universes, Stenbeck’s writer-artist debut Our Bones Dust has generated widespread acclaim.

Bowling With Corpses and Other Strange Tales From Lands Unknown is a 112-page hardcover that will be released in bookstores on December 4, 2024 and in comic shops on December 3, 2024.

About Mike Mignola
Mike Mignola’s fascination with ghosts and monsters began at an early age; reading Dracula at age twelve introduced him to Victorian literature and folklore, from which he has never recovered. Starting in 1982 as a bad inker for Marvel Comics, he swiftly evolved into a not-so-bad artist. By the late 1980s, he had begun to develop his own unique graphic style, with mainstream projects like Cosmic Odyssey and Batman:Gotham by Gaslight. In 1994, he published the first Hellboy series through Dark Horse.There are thirteen Hellboy graphic novels (with more on the way), several spin-off titles (B.P.R.D., Lobster Johnson, Abe Sapien, and Sir Edward Grey: Witchfinder), prose books,animated films, and two live-action films starring Ron Perlman. Along the way he worked on Francis Ford Coppola’s film Bram Stoker’s Dracula (1992), was a production designer for Disney’s Atlantis: The Lost Empire (2001), and was the visual consultant to director Guillermo del Toro on Blade II (2002), Hellboy (2004), and Hellboy II: The Golden Army (2008). Mike’s books have earned numerous awards and are published in a great many countries. Mike lives in Southern California with his wife, daughter, and cat.

About Ben Stenbeck
Ben Stenbeck is the creator of Our Bones Dust and a long time Hellboy collaborator who is also known for his work on Baltimore, Frankenstein Underground, and Koshchei.