In YOUTH, Franklin and River struggle to navigate family, friends, high school, work, drugs, and all the pressures of growing up. As a queer couple, they yearn to escape their lives in a small, bigoted Midwest town. They steal River’s stepfather’s Mustang and hit the road. Their destination? California. But along the way, the car breaks down. They meet some kids who are traveling the country, partying, and attempting to find themselves. They party some more. . . . And soon everything changes.
“I wanted to make a teen superhero comic that actually felt authentic to the uncertainty and beautiful confusion that encompasses the coming-of-age experience,” says writer Curt Pires. “There are lots of teen superhero comics, but most of them are written by writers closer to 47 than 17 and feel remarkably out of touch. I wanted to make something that captured the beauty and pain of the youth culture zeitgeist.”
YOUTH reunites Pires and Diotto, the co-creators of the acclaimed comic Olympia, and features colors by Dee Cunniffe, and lettering by Micah Myers. The latest creator-owned release from the comiXology Originals program, YOUTH will be released on a weekly schedule throughout the month of May and will be available upon release at no additional cost, for members of Amazon Prime, Kindle Unlimited, and comiXology Unlimited, and for purchase on Kindle and ComiXology. YOUTH is also in development as an original series with Amazon Studios, to be adapted by Pires, with executive producer Patrick Moran.
YOUTH is the first of four comiXology Originals series coming from Pires. A second season of YOUTH is already greenlit and in the works and the other two titles will be revealed in the coming months.
“YOUTH is deeply personal storytelling for me, as it pulls from some of the real-life beauty and insanity I went through coming of age in my late teens /early twenties,” said Pires. “There’s chaos, violence, beauty, love, and everything in between.”
YOUTH is their story. YOUTH is what happened to them. YOUTH debuts Tuesday, May 12, 2020
Part of the comiXology Originals line of exclusive content, YOUTH will be available upon release, at no additional cost, for members of Amazon Prime, Kindle Unlimited, and comiXology Unlimited, and for purchase on Kindle and comiXology. Prime Reading offers all Amazon Prime members a rotating selection of over a thousand top Kindle books, magazines, short works, comic books, children’s books, and more – all at no additional cost. Kindle Unlimited offers over 1 million titles, thousands of audiobooks, and select current issues of popular magazines for just $9.99 a month with a 60-day free trial atamazon.com/kindleunlimited. ComiXology Unlimited now offers over 25,000 comics, graphic novels and manga for just $5.99 a month with a 60-day free trial at comixology.com/unlimited.
