In Bloom #[nn]

History

The concept for In Bloom originated with writer Michael W. Conrad reading about the human microbiome years before publication — a fact that, by his own account in BOOM!'s Take 10! interview series, haunted him long enough to become the spine of an entirely new fictional world. Conrad — Portland-based and known at DC for Wonder Woman, Batgirls, and Nightwing, as well as creator-owned work including Tremor Dose and Double Walker — brought the project to BOOM! Studios, where it was paired with Leeds-based Eisner Award-winning artist John J. Pearson, previously co-creator of The Infernals (Image) and Mindset (Vault). Pearson has noted that the visual challenge was deliberately finding imagery for fungal transformation that did not echo already-familiar 'mushroom people' iconography already saturating pop culture. The series was announced in September 2024, solicited for a December 11, 2024 on-sale date, and ran for five issues through June 25, 2025, with colorist Lola Bonato and letterer Pat Brosseau completing the core creative team.

Trivia · 8 facts

• In Bloom #1 (of 5) went on sale December 11, 2024, published under BOOM! Studios' eponymous flagship imprint; the five-issue limited series concluded with #5 on June 25, 2025.
• The series introduces the post-'Bloom' world and its protagonist, Detective Agent Spears, who investigates a chain of murders in a civilization permanently altered by symbiotic fungal megasystems — the first appearances of both character and setting.
• Writer Michael W. Conrad (Wonder Woman, Batgirls, Nightwing at DC; Tremor Dose creator-owned) conceived the series from reading about the real scientific fact that roughly 43% of a healthy human body's cells are non-human in origin.
• Artist John J. Pearson is an Eisner Award-winning illustrator based in Leeds, UK, and co-creator of The Infernals (Image Comics) and Mindset (Vault Comics); this is his first project at BOOM! Studios.
• The creative team also includes colorist Lola Bonato and letterer Pat Brosseau, with Grace Park as designer and Jon Moisan as editor.
• Issue #1's cover lineup featured main art by Pearson, with variant covers by Alison Sampson and a 1:25 retailer incentive by Jae Lee & June Chung (there was also a one-per-store Sampson virgin variant and a 1:10 Pearson virgin variant).
• BOOM! Studios' own marketing positioned the series in conversation with The Last of Us, Blade Runner, and Annihilation — three touchstones that together signal the series' intent to blend body-horror, noir detective fiction, and ecological science fiction.
• The antagonist organization introduced across the series is 'The Lotus,' an ambiguous movement — part cult, part religion, part political force — that becomes the structural threat Spears pursues through the run.