When I hear Monsters and love in the same sentence, I am in there like swimwear. I love monsters. But I love that monsters are such a powerful storytelling tool to discuss the other, identity, and queerness. In the Tiny Onion and Dark Horse Pride anthology Monsters in Love, we see a cavalcade of some of the best creators in comics telling stories of love, loss, and so much more using every type of monster imaginable. This year, we were lucky enough to get together with 11 of the creatives who worked on the book to talk about it. We all talked about sandwiches first before diving into conversations about queerness, storytelling, bears, and so much more.

We speak with:

Jadzia Axelrod

Vita Ayala

Zoe Tunnell

Aditya Bidikar

Bradley Clayton

Sina Grace

Jacoby Salcedo

Lee Knox Ostertag

Ed Luce

Josh Trujillo

Vash Taylor

About Monsters in Love

We need love and monsters now more than ever!!!

Beloved anthology Monsters In Love turns romance comics on their ogre-sized head with 10 swoon-worthy stories by fan-favorite LGBTQIA+ creators, including James Tynion IV, Jadzia Axelrod, Vita Ayala, Zoe Tunnell, Sina Grace, Josh Trujillo, Claudia Aguirre, Tench, and many others, just in time for Pride Month.

This super-sized special also includes a framing story by the creative team from The Oddly Pedestrian Life of Christopher Chaos!

It's an 80-page one-shot for less than 10 bucks!

From the New York Times and multi-Eisner award-winning best-selling author James Tynion IV and Tate Brombal.

About Dark Horse:

Dark Horse Comics is a publisher based in Milwaukie, Oregon, in the Portland metro area. Founded in 1986 by Mike Richardson, Dark Horse publishes creator-owned and licensed comics and art books, manga and other international titles, prose books, and products such as statues, figures, and accessories. These items are available through retailers, including comic shops and bookstores worldwide.

About Tiny Onion:

Tiny Onion is an independent production house from the mind of James Tynion IV, co-creator of critically acclaimed comic book bestsellers Something is Killing the Children, The Department of Truth, The Nice House on the Lake, and many more. Learn more and reach out on the home site below.

On this episode, we chat with Margo's Got Money Troubles star Michael Angarano! Michael plays the show's "villain" Mark, who's Margo's baby daddy. We talked in depth with Michael about the character, how he approaches him, and how he isn't actually a villain. We spoke about Mark's empathetic approach to the character and his growth through the first season of the show. We also tapped into Mark's relationship with his mother in the series. Angrano also spoke about how his work as a director has sharpened his instincts as an actor. He's learned to use both and says he still loves that the emotional disconnect of performance is something no amount of technical knowledge can fully replace. Michael brings a strong performance in a show that I can promise you is worth your time.

"Margo's Got Money Troubles" is a bold, heartwarming, and comedic family drama following recent college dropout and aspiring writer, Margo (Fanning), the daughter of an ex-Hooters waitress (Pfeiffer) and ex-pro wrestler (Offerman), as she's forced to make her way with a new baby, a mounting pile of bills, and a dwindling amount of ways to pay them. The series also stars Academy Award winner Marcia Gay Harden, Academy Award nominee and Emmy Award-winner Greg Kinnear, Michael Angarano, Rico Nasty and Lindsey Normington.

Michael Anthony Angarano is an American actor with a career spanning film and television since the mid-1990s. He's known for roles like Young William in Almost Famous and Will Stronghold in Sky High. He also played Nick Pearson in NBC's This Is Us, earning an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Guest Actor. Angarano's other credits include Music of the Heart, Cover Me, I'm Dying Up Here, Gentlemen Broncos, and Oppenheimer (2023).

I have never reviewed or even written about a memoir before. For me, the question has always been how I can critique a view of someone's life and history. It's not a genre I have even grazed near because I just didn't know how to handle it. That was until The Problem Drinker, which offered me a unique approach. I had access to the subject and pitched that we have a drink to have a real conversation instead of a typical interview.

Describing The Problem Drinker isn't an easy task because it feels like a snapshot of who a human being is. Kyle is brutally honest about himself, his world, and everything in it. There is a level of authenticity to how he writes this debut. Kyle is a problem drinker, not someone who is struggling with drinking. In the book, it's treated like a pastime or just a natural part of his life. But all around it is turmoil, heartache, and life itself. Between large life events, Kyle opens up his own rib cage to let the reader understand him a bit better.

I have been lucky enough to befriend Kyle after being introduced to him by his girlfriend, CJ Leede, who is a character in the book. I have interviewed and spoken to CJ many times, so going from her book Headlights straight into this was a unique experience. You can feel Kyle, as a character in her book, in the most loving homage to her partner. But in The Problem Drinker, you get a real look at what love is. How love is formed in ordinary and everyday life, while never feeling mundane. The way Kyle writes about the people he loves is why this book is going to stick with me for some time.

This conversation ranges from music to food to drinking stories, and everything in between that makes us human. It is an open and honest conversation that works as a companion piece to the incredible book. Make sure you check out the short film as well!

About The Problem Drinker

Kyle Kouri's debut non-fiction collection is full of 'whiskey courage' staring at the abyss of family, writing rejection, relationships, and his own drinking. From hijinks at AWP to hustling in the movie business, Kouri bridges the gap in drama between indie and horror.

At turns hilarious and heartbreaking, The Problem Drinker is the story of an artist living with another artist, yearning to move the needle in his career, amidst a sea of personal tragedies and comedies. If F. Scott Fitzgerald had one foot in the 2020s horror scene, that's the spirit of Kouri's caustic and big-hearted, lush and refreshingly candid debut.

About Kyle Kouri

Kyle Kouri is an award-winning actor, writer, filmmaker, and producer. He received his MFA in Fiction from Columbia University, where he served as the online arts editor for the Columbia Journal. He is the co-founder of Slashtag Cinema, a film production company.