Press Release

What if the children of the .0001% rejected their family legacies of global brutality and tore down the billionaire patriarchy? That's the concept behind BILLIONAIRE KILLERS, a new comic book series created by writer Matteo Pizzolo and artist Soo Lee about corruption, conspiracy, and what happens when the next generation vows to burn it all down. On sale this March, BILLIONAIRE KILLERS is the latest comic book series from Black Mask Studios, the progressive, Los Angeles-based indie publisher of acclaimed titles including BLACK, THE DREGS, KIM & KIM and 4 KIDS WALK INTO A BANK.

“BILLIONAIRE KILLERS is about a new generation assessing the terrible things done by the previous generation,” said writer Matteo Pizzolo. “In simplest terms, BILLIONAIRE KILLERS asks: what if someone like Ivanka Trump became radicalized?”  

In BILLIONAIRE KILLERS, the CEO of ExxonMobil is America’s Secretary Of State, a hedge fund manager worth $300 million is the Secretary Of The Treasury and a lawyer who sued the EPA 14 times is head of the EPA. It’s a world where the President stops even bothering to hide the fact that America is ruled by corporations; a world where the next generation declares: enough. The series follows two young women, Sera and Pru, heiresses to their industrialist fathers’ empires, who come to learn the patriarchs of their families earned their fortunes by causing global suffering, and then decide to go to war against their own parents.

BILLIONAIRE KILLERS is a standalone, ongoing comic book series that expands on YOUNG TERRORISTS, the acclaimed comic by Pizzolo and artist Amancay Nahuelpan. "You can think of BILLIONAIRE KILLERS as YOUNG TERRORISTS: YEAR ONE, but it also completely works as an altogether new narrative. If there’s one thing we’ve learned in the past 5 years at Black Mask it’s that readers love wild, fearless, passionate comics, and that’s what Soo Lee and I are aiming for here.”

In addition to the debut of BILLIONAIRE KILLERS, 2018 will also see the return of CALEXIT, the acclaimed comic book series by Pizzolo and artist Amancay Nahuelpan, which sparked international headlines and acclaim in 2017. Following a hiatus, CALEXIT returns on February 14 with the release of the much anticipated second issue as well as a new, third printing of the debut issue which features a cover by Ashley A. Woods. “Issue 2 is our Valentine’s Day love letter to Trump just when he's declaring war on California,” said Pizzolo. “And then, in March, with issue three, we will bring the first CALEXIT storyline to an explosive close.”

In CALEXIT, the citizens of California struggle to seize power back from an autocratic government after a fascistic President takes over the United States. "From its history as a breakaway state with the Bear Flag Revolt to becoming the home of rebel fiction like Star Wars and NWA, California has represented the spirit of resistance for almost two hundred years. The first arc of CALEXIT tells the tale of a U.S. President going to war against the Golden State, and, with California being the fifth largest economy on Earth, things escalate pretty quick. Although we conceived this story back before the 2016 election, California's defiance of Trump's policies and the Trump Administration's new policy war against California has us scrambling to keep our speculative adventure a step ahead of the real world.”