Tynion to Expand Tiny Onion into Production Company

Eisner winning comic writer James Tynion IV is growing his Tiny Onion brand into a comic production company, akin to an independent film studio. Tiny Onion will handle comics development, packaging, marketing, and promotions of creator owned comics, including Tynion’s creator owned projects.

“Over the last 12 years, I’ve watched the comics industry from the inside. Now I have the chance to take everything I’ve learned and test out every way to make it work even better. Not just for me, but for the generation of creators coming up behind me,” Tynion said in a statement.

Tynion’s comics career began with a run in Batman, then he created titles like Something is Killing the Children at BOOM! Studios and The Department of Truth at Image.

As a production company, Tiny Onion will receive financial backing from Lyrical Media, a multimedia development and finance company. United Talent Agency, which represents Tynion, will handle Tiny Onion’s media rights for TV and film.

The editorial and design team includes Director of Editorial Eric Harburn (former BOOM! Executive Editor), Director of Production Courtney Menard (who previously worked with Z2 Comics), and Director of Communications Jazzlyn Stone (formerly an indie publicist).

Since Tiny Onion is not a publisher, it will work with publishing houses like Dark Horse and Image. In the future, Tynion plans to expand into publishing, film, and TV.

“We’ve had a number of conversations with other creative industries. We’re hopefully going to be making movies, being a film studio, making inroads into animation, maybe dealing with other entities interested in making an artful, beautiful comic,” Tynion said. “The creative autonomy is the core principle of what we are doing. That’s why we lean into the term ‘production house,’ because we’re covering a lot of bases here.”

“We are going to be able to bring in other creators, help them with their titles and help them navigate the system of publishers, which is really the Wild West right now,” Tynion added. “Comic book companies can be a little rough behind the scenes these days. We want to support editors by making sure deadlines get met, files are sent in the right formats, and creative teams are coordinated. Comics marketing is especially difficult right now. How do you get messages out in a fragmented social media space? We have a system that we are going to build and replicate, by bringing those skills in from the outside.”