Felipe Smith Launches Kickstarter for New Death Metal Zombie Cop Comic

Comics and manga creator Felipe Smith launched a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign on July 19 for his new comic project titled Death Metal Zombie Cop. The campaign aims to raise US$22,000 to fund the first issue of the comic. Smith noted that if the story has enough interested readers, he will continue the story. Smith noted that he has already written down two story arcs for the comic.

The campaign page describes the comic's story, which Smith conceived in Japan after finishing Peepo Choo:

A Superstar LAPD Rookie (Marco Miranda) & his disillusioned Training Officer (Rhonda Riley) discover that a corruption-plagued Justice System and the tightening stranglehold of the Drug Cartel are just the tip of the iceberg when L.A.'s deadliest Urban Legend reveals itself to be very REAL.
The backer rewards include a digital download of the comic's first issue, wallpapers, a signed print copy of the first issue, pins, mini-prints, T-shirts, an artbook, an opportunity to have the backer's likeness appear as an LAPD mugshot in the story, original ink sketches of the characters, a one-hour Skype conversation with Smith, and the opportunity for the backer to appear in the first issue's story.

The campaign runs until August 18 and has earned US$10,485 by press time.

Felipe Smith is one of the rare foreigners who has created manga in Japan for Japanese readers. His Peepo Choo manga follows Milton, a hardcore otaku from downtown Chicago who is infatuated with Japan due to his favorite manga. One day, Milton wins a trip to Japan. However, the prize is actually a staged mission for an assassin named Gil to kill a young yakuza member named Morimoto.

Peepo Choo was the first serialized manga that was created by an American. Smith launched the manga in Kodansha's Morning Two magazine in June 2008, and ended it in 2010. Kodansha published three compiled book volumes for the manga. Vertical published all three volumes in English in 2010.

Smith broke into the manga scene in 2004, when his short story was published in Tokyopop's Rising Stars of Manga, Volume 3 anthology. Tokyopop then signed him to a three-book contract, the result of which was the semi-autobiographical MBQ.​