This month marks the two year anniversary of the release of “Wrong Earth” #1, the first publication from AHOY Comics. To mark the occasion, Multiversity’s history column is taking a look back at those two years, plus the decades of experience that laid the company’s foundation.
Choosing a name for the company turned out to be pretty easy: Frank through out AHOY right away and everyone liked it because it had special meaning to the group. Beginning during their college years, they had an annual party where guests voted to elect the Ass Hole Of the Year (Richard Nixon was the inaugural champion). When advertising themselves in the press, though, they altered the acronym a little bit. It now means Abundant page count, Humor, Originality, and Yes (for the overall positive mood).
The trio all live in Syracuse, New York, and at first is was just the three of them. As plans began to take shape, they recruited some more talent to complement their weaknesses: operations manager Stuart Moore, publicist David Hyde, and production coordinator Deron Bennett among them, with Sven Larsen acting as a consultant. Moore’s experience was primarily as a writer, but at one time or another he had been involved with many areas of production. As the company took shape, Peyer officially took an editor title Cammuso became the chief creative officer.
As AHOY came together, the company began to take on an identity. The main element to an AHOY comic is humor – the material doesn’t need to be a comedy, but it does need to have some fun and lighthearted elements. The less-than-serious approach to business can be seen in the company’s FAQ page, where question one is “Can I have $20?” The team dug out old comics to scrutinize. When they found something that worked, they took note so they could try it. When they found something that didn’t work, they’d ask themselves how it could’ve been better, and they try that too.
Old comics (1940s and 50s) used to include two pages of prose stories solely to get a reduced rate at the postal service. Those stories were very low quality, hammered out as fast as possible by guys being paid as little as possible. AHOY took that as a challenge, so every issue includes extra prose content completely unrelated to the main comic from creators as wide ranging as Greg Scott, Grant Morrison, Rick Geary, Shannon Wheeler, and Chris Giarrusso. At no extra cost to readers (each issue is the standard $3.99), they get two or three extra short stories, a letter column and/or a message from the creators, and other extras like recipes and games.
After announcing their first wave of books in June 2018, “Wrong Earth” became the first AHOY comic to grace comic shelves on September 12, 2018. Written by Peyer with art by Jamal Ingle, the premise of this story is simple: a goofy Silver Age superhero and his darker, Modern Age counterpart switch places and must figure out how to survive in a world both similar to and strikingly different from what their own. It was followed soon after by another Peyer book called “High Heaven”, “Captain Ginger” written by Moore, and the anthology “Edgar Allan Poe’s Snifter of Terror”. Despite the difficulty anthologies often have in the direct market, the name recognition has helped draw in both creators and readers, making “Snifter” one of AHOY’s most popular titles. Each was released as a miniseries as a precaution against potential scheduling problems, and material for at least five of the six issues was completed before the first issue was released. This production method has been successful for AHOY so far – they’ve never missed a sales date outside of unavoidable ones caused by COVID-19 shutdowns of distribution.
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As new projects arose, AHOY planned their schedule so several new titles could be announced at the same time. This “wave” method helped with publicity, because having multiple things to promote makes for splashier news. It also means any potential readers will be introduced to all the possibilities at once, increasing the odds they’ll be interested in something. Wave two hit in the spring of 2019 with “Bronze Age of Boogie”, “Planet of the Nerds”, “Steel Cage”, and “Second Coming”.
“Second Coming” was a big coup for AHOY. The comic stars Jesus Christ as a superhero, and was originally slated to be published by DC. However, DC’s announcement for it drew so much criticism and claims of blasphemy that they canceled it before releasing the first issue. The creators, Mark Russell and Richard Pace, were already involved with AHOY through the “Snifter of Terror”, and “Second Coming” had the right feel for an AHOY book. Despite the negative press DC got for it, AHOY received no complaints at all. After publication, they actually received respectful praise from religious readers. The deal also brought AHOY a whole new level of attention from some retailers who had previously overlooked the company. In fact, Moore cites securing “Second Coming” as one of AHOY’s most significant moments in their first two years.
In May 2019, AHOY participated in Free Comic Book Day with a sampler showcasing the wave one titles. Although there’s no doubt the event helped raise awareness of “Wrong Earth”, which was about to begin its second miniseries, Moore is uncertain it was cost effective in the long run. Peyer, Hart, and Cammuso spent the day signing books at Comix Zone in North Syracuse, just as excited to meet their fans as the fans were to meet them.
That was followed by a booth at the Baltimore Comic Con later in the year, where retailers sought them out to express appreciation for their content and effort. The team still found it surreal to meet so many fans of their work. And, indeed, their fan base was growing. Sales of “Wrong Earth” bucked the trend and increased as time went by.
Another big moment came in October 2019 when a division of Paramount Pictures optioned the film rights to the AHOY book “Planet of the Nerds” by Paul Constant, Alan Robinson, and Randy Elliott. Although the odds are against a film being made anytime soon, the news put more eyes on AHOY and was a huge moral boost for the founders.
AHOY announced a fourth wave of titles in November 2019, but COVID-19 threw a wrench into those plans. AHOY responded by moving the second season of “Captain Ginger” to digital-only serialization and accelerating the releases of “Ash & Thorn” and “Billionaire Island”. The other fourth wave title, “Penultiman”, was delayed to the fifth wave, which starts in October 2020. Other upcoming titles include the distopian “Happy Hour”, the “Wrong Earth” sequel subtitled “Night & Day”, and the newly re-titled “Edgar Allan Poe’s Snifter of Blood”.
