Oni Press: passionate comics by passionate people

Bob Schreck, founder of Oni Press, had previously worked as an art director at Comico and an editor at Dark Horse Comics. Along with co-founder Joe Nozemack, he started Oni Press in order to publish works that contrasted with regular superhero titles and embraced genres like the thriller and the romance. This skewed mentality (in the eyes of the traditional comic book industry) garnered it the slogan “the real mainstream,” since its works were theoretically more in line with the genres of other popular media.Bob Schreck left in 1999, two years after the founding, to work as an editor at DC Comics. Other creators who have been published by the press also often move on to the big leagues. Through the years, though, Oni has established itself as a press where creators can write their most personal projects, while also becoming one of the most diverse and well-received indie publishers in the industry.Here are some names you may recognize from the big leagues:

• Judd Winick: Now writing Batman for DC Comics, Winnick published two miniseries of The Adventures of Barry Ween, Boy Genius (after a three issue series at Image Comics). The series follows a 10-year-old boy who is the smartest person on Earthhowever, this profanity-laden series is not intended for children. Winick’s Frumpy the Clown strip was also collected by Oni.
• Brian Michael Bendis: Although Bendis has been largely responsible for the direction of the Marvel Universe for the last several years, he has also had extensive experience with indie publishers. Oni was the original publisher of Bendis’s Fortune and Glory, in which Bendis described trying to break into Hollywoodand his subsequent frustrations. In 2010, Marvel published a “Deluxe Anniversary Edition” of this work.
• Paul Dini: Dini has worked on critically-acclaimed DC animated projects and comics for over 20 years, and is now helping Marvel launch their Ultimate Spider Man animated feature. Dini created several characters and properties at Oni, including Jingle Belle (Santa’s spoiled teen-age daughter) and Mutant,Texas: Tales of Sheriff Ida Red (about a Texas teen who develops mutant powers along with other members of her town).
• Greg Rucka: The popular novelist and comic writer has also written several works with Oni. These include the critically-acclaimed Queen & Country espionage series and the crime thriller Stumptown (set in the same continuity as his Atticus Kodiak novels).

Oni Press has also been in the spotlight recently thanks to the success of Bryan Lee O’Malley’s Scott Pilgrim series, recently turned into a film that was well-received by critics, although it was relatively ignored by the mainstream media. Unlike traditional comics, but in line with much of Oni Press’s other output, Scott Pilgrim was released as a series of original graphic novels rather than single issues.