Ashcan Press

The impetus behind Rooftop Films is to show great stories by emerging artists, and to combine art forms (film, music, performance) and genres (documentary, fiction, comedy, drama, animation, abstract) in a single program. Our buddies at the emerging Ashcan Press are churning out new comic books that are smart, funny, and visually compelling. Writers Patrick Kindlon and Matthew Rosenberg (my brother) have an array of stories that include superheroes and everyday people, apocalyptic scenarios and quotidian struggles, but the key link between all their work is the moral exploration of pressing modern issues and deeply personal stories.

They cover the war in Iraq through the story of a one-man-weapon-of-destruction (The Insurgent), touch on contemporary domestic abuse in a story about teenage shapeshifters on the road (We Can Never Go Home), investigate contemporary religious fanatics by way of discovering a millennia-old Hudson River monster (Newt), and—one of my personal favorites—they address love, regret, and the meaning of life in Last Days Again, in which a punk NYC bike messenger becomes a militia leader in the post-zombie apocalypse.

Check out previews of many of their books online.

Ashcan are currently looking for publishers for some of their many wonderful books, so if you know anyone who could help, get in touch. Either way, keep an eye out for their enticing comics in the near future. And hey look . . . they’re on Facebook!