FISCHER: Court is finally back in session

By Travis Fischer, tkfischer@charlescitypress.com

Once upon a time, in about 2010 or so, I happened upon a quirky little webcomic called “Gunnerkrigg Court.”

Written and illustrated by Tomas Siddell, the story centers on a young girl thrust into a hyperbolic world where she unravels mysteries behind magic and technology. That sentence doesn’t really do the story justice, but be assured that it has a very clever story and that the art, eventually, became very good.

Though the comic can be read for free online, my preferred method has always been the physical collections. It could be slow-going sometimes, often more than a year between releases, but I still spent most of the decade waiting for the next volume to arrive so I could continue the story.

Such was the case in 2021 when, instead of finding out when the next volume would be coming, it was announced that publisher Archaia Entertainment would no longer be printing the collections at all.

Siddell said at the time that he was looking for a new publisher for the next volume and I held out hope that it wouldn’t be long to get my Gunnerkrigg fix.

After all, “Gunnerkrigg Court” is great. A publisher would be crazy to pass up such a cool project. Right!?

In 2022 when Bob Iger announced his return as the CEO of Disney — which at that point had absorbed a stake in Archaia through its purchase of 21st Century Fox — I sent him a tweet suggesting that it was time to bring “Gunnerkrigg Court” back to print.

I assume he saw my tweet and deeply considered my wisdom, but got distracted by other more pressing issues to attend to.

Instead, the long wait continued until earlier this year when it was announced that a new publisher had finally been found.

The good news: Dark Horse is now publishing hardcover print editions of “Gunnerkrigg Court.” The new hardcover books are bigger than the previous releases and feature some updated art to bring the early chapters more in line with the comic’s eventual established style. Upon hearing this news I immediately pre-ordered the limited edition release, which finally arrived last week. My copy was #70 out of 1000.

The bad news: The new release is starting from the beginning, which means not only will it be 2026 before it reaches the point where they are publishing story I haven’t already read, but I now need to re-purchase the previous volumes I already own if I want my collection to remain uniform.

And I do want my collection to remain uniform.

Also, it’s a small price to pay to support an artist whose work I enjoy. If that means buying new versions of books I already own, or using this platform as a thinly veiled advertisement for the newly released Volume 1 which can also be purchased in paperback at a quite reasonable price, then so be it.

On the plus side, Dark Horse has so much material to work through that I should be getting two releases a year for the foreseeable future rather than waiting two years between books. Now let’s hope that this publisher sticks around for the long run.

— Travis Fischer is a news writer for the Charles City Press and has already pre-ordered Volume 2.