John Steele Layman was born on November 13, 1967, and has built a reputation as one of comics' more inventive writer-letterers, working across both independent and mainstream publishing. He is perhaps best recognized for *Chew*, his long-running Image Comics series following a food-crime investigator with psychometric abilities tied to anything he eats — an absurdist premise executed with remarkable consistency and wit. That universe expanded further through the spin-off *Chu*, centered on Saffron Chu, and the crossover event *Outer Darkness/Chew*, which connected *Chew* to his cosmic horror series *Outer Darkness*.
Titans #32 (2026)
Beyond Image, Layman contributed meaningfully to Marvel's library with *Marvel Zombies vs. The Army of Darkness*, as well as runs on *Gambit* and *Cyclops: A Pirate's Life for Me*. His DC work spans a broad range, including the ambitious weekly series *Batman Eternal* and runs on *Detective Comics* and *Titans*. He has also worked on *Thundercats*, demonstrating a comfortable range across genres and tones.
Active in comics from around 2000 through at least 2026 and credited on more than 300 issues, Layman is notable for functioning as both writer and letterer — an uncommon dual role that gives him unusual control over the final reading experience of his work.
