The Pacific Northwest's premiere comic + pop culture show Emerald City Comic Con returns soon - March 6 through 9 to be exact. Stay tuned to Popverse for all the ECCC 2025 news, our recs for what to do at ECCC 2025, where to find Popverse, and buy tickets now to find your place at the Seattle staple.

It sounds strange, but one of my favorite parts of Emerald City Comic Con 2025 was buying a newspaper. It wasn't a 'current events' kind of newspaper (because who wants to read that); it was all about comics, written by (and for) some of today's most vocal champions of the medium. If you were in attendance for Seattle's premiere pop culture event, you might've guessed, about the second edition of Tiny Onion Presents, the newsprint offering from Tiny Onion, available exclusively at ECCC 2025. But if you weren't there and are wondering what they were doing bringing a newspaper to a comic convention, well, we're hear to tell you.

Or rather, we're here to tell you what they told us. 

"We are huge lovers of physical media," explains Courtney Menard, Tiny Onion's director of production, "We wanted to kind of tap into the DIY zine underground kind of aspect of comics that is [...] sort of flung by the wayside. We also wanted to show that we, as a company, care about more than what's happening just in our little sphere of comics. So the idea was to make a newspaper that featured our projects but also interviewed other people in other parts of the industry."

It's true - even though 'DIY zine underground' projects are a huge part of comic book history, they're often overlooked at conventions, with fans drawn to shinier (much pricier) items like signed posters or exclusive comic covers. And even though those things are admittedly fantastic, Menard says there's something that gets lost in the big-budget offerings that publishers bring to shows.

"[The newspaper is] a dollar. You know?" she continues, "It's cheap to make. It's cheap to buy. It's not some hundred-dollar exclusive, and it's also a very community-based project. Everyone at Tiny Onion has their hands in this. Everyone has made, contributed. So I don't know. I feel like it's that kind of like community aspect, the accessibility. [...] So we're just trying to spread the good word about comics."

Naturally, newspapers are a great way to spread the good word in a cheap, accessible way, but that's not entirely the reason that Tiny Onion started shelling them out. Originally the brainchild of director of communications Jazzlyn Stone, part of the inspiration for TOP was the theme of New York Comic Con 2024, was 'New York Bodegas.' And just like the classic cornerstores that inspired the con, there was a New York staple that Tiny Onion wanted to incorporate into getting the papers into fans' hands.

"When we had talked about doing a newspaper," says Stone, "I was like, 'Oh. It'd be really cool to get a newspaper stand, because I really like the pageantry of putting in quarters and then getting the newspaper.' This is something that we talked about a lot, where I was like, 'I want it to be an experience.' We talked about doing, because it's only a dollar, we talked about doing a special coin that you would buy and then give it. I was like, 'This is too much. I just want to have a newspaper stand, because the sound.'"

What sound? "Ka-Thunk," says Stone (and we hope we're spelling that correctly).

But as with every aspect of comics (and art, I guess), there's a chasm between idea and execution. And getting newspaper stands, which are bordering on the antique at this point in print media history, took a lot of chasm-crossing on Stone's part.

"I found this guy who lives out in, I want to say Alabama or something," she explains, "and he just has like a shit ton of newspaper stands. I was like, 'I want to order three of these for New York Comic Con,' and he was like, 'Okay.' I was like, 'How much would it cost?' He was like, 'Oh. I don't know,' and for six months I was trying to get this guy to send me newspaper stands."

Six months of stress is nothing to laugh at, but the way Stone tells it, they pale in comparison to the short time before NYCC '24, when it looked like the newspaper stands weren't going to make it to the city.

"I talked to this man every day for six months," she continues, "to the point that, the week of Comic Con; I had paid for them. I'd chosen the color. They were on the way, and he was like, 'I don't want to send them to New York. Just come pick them up.' [...] I called him, and I was like, 'All right. So am I getting these? Am I not? I've kind of designed the booth around them. What's the deal?' He was like, 'Yeah, yeah. Okay. I'll get them, and he did somehow. [...] This wild man got me the newspaper stands in time."

Relief is still palpable in Stone's voice as she she concludes, "We had them at New York. When I saw them, there's so many photos of me, I legitimately teared up. So many photos of me hugging them, because I didn't think it was going to happen. I spent, again, six months of my life trying to negotiate their release."

Release them she did, which is why some thousands of fans were able to pick up a copy of TOP #2, via newspaper stand, at ECCC '25 (that "ka-thunk" is just as satisfying as you might imagine). And at both that convention and its debut, Menard says the reception was well worth the effort it took to create it.

"The coolest part of having these at the conventions," she tells me, "is seeing people experience the newspaper stand, because we live in a very digital age. A lot of younger folks have not used a newspaper stand before, so it's a lot of people walking up to them and kind of smacking the side and trying to open it. Then, we'll give them quarters to open it, and it's like, 'Wow. Amazing. A tactile experience.' The reception's been really fun and cool, and just, I'm a print nerd. And so getting to design the actual newspaper and work with the printer, and packing them up, and the ink getting on your hands as you're packaging everything has just been really fun and really special."

So will we continue seeing dollar-newspapers in coin-operated stands at future conventions? Well, we don't want to speak for Tiny Onion, but we feel strongly that the answer will be yes. 

"There's two highs that I've been chasing my whole life," Stone says, "One of them is obviously tainted now, but back in the day, Harry Potter midnight release parties; going to the library and getting the copy? That high, I will chase that my whole life. The second one is going to the Scholastic Book Fair; getting the printout beforehand so you knew what was coming and you could mark off what you wanted, knowing that I could see the books, and I could think about what I wanted to get, and then I knew it was coming. Those physical experiences as a kid where you get to feel the paper, I think about a lot."

Thanks to Tiny Onion, some of the kids at ECCC '25 might get a whiff of that same high, and in my humble opinion, it's not a bad high to spend one's life chasing.

Alabaman antique deals notwithstanding.

Seattle's ECCC 2025 is coming up faster than you think! Keep up to date with our guide to all the Artist's Alley & Writer's Block celebrities, all the major panels, a grunge-themed playlist for the grunge-themed con, our personal recs for the key things to do at ECCC, where to find us at ECCC, and even what to do while you're in Seattle for the event. Reserve your passes as soon as you can!