IDW Publishing’s IDW Dark imprint is expanding the psychological horror landscape of Paramount’s acclaimed Smile film franchise with a brand-new comic book miniseries, Smile: Any Given Smile #1. Scheduled for release on September 23, 2026, the debut issue shifts the cinematic terror of the supernatural contagion away from medical wards and psychiatric facilities and onto the high-stakes, sweat-drenched turf of professional arena football.
Written by Stephanie Williams, known for her work on Nubia and Roots of Madness, and illustrated by GLAAD Media Award-winning artist Pablo Collar, whose portfolio includes Avengers Academy, the series explores what happens when a malevolent entity that feeds on trauma infiltrates high-profile athletics in 1990s America. The launch features a robust selection of variant covers by industry heavyweights, including Ashley Witter, Jock, Pablo Collar, Simmonds, and a full-art variant by Jones, establishing the title as a major publishing push for IDW Dark this autumn.
Gridiron Despair Meets Supernatural Terror
Set in January 1995, the narrative centers on the American Arena League (AAL) football championship game hosted in St. Augustine, Florida. The local franchise, the Sharks, is preparing for the most monumental game in the league’s two-decade history. However, beneath the gleaming lights and rising ticket sales, the team’s sudden-star backup quarterback, Maximillian Dupree, is buckling under immense pressure.
Dupree faces a compounding crisis: the relentless expectations of his teammates and fans, combined with crippling financial debts owed to the city’s predatory gambling underworld. As the championship approaches, a mysterious wave of violent suicides sweeps through the local community. The sudden loss of life draws the attention of a desperate sports journalist determined to uncover whether the tragedies share a hidden connection to the upcoming title game.
According to preview pages provided by IDW Publishing, the supernatural antagonist of the Smile franchise operates with its signature psychological cruelty. In one sequence, a local bookmaker calmly briefs a struggling debtor on point-shaving strategies over coffee before the character’s expression violently contorts into an unblinking, wide-eyed rictus grin. The narrative leverages the oppressive nature of 1995 sports betting, where financial ruin and public humiliation create the exact emotional vulnerability required for the entity to latch onto its hosts.
Background and Franchise Context
The Smile cinematic universe, created by Parker Finn and produced by Paramount Pictures, launched with the sleeper hit feature film Smile in 2022, followed by the successful sequel Smile 2 in 2024. The films established a distinct supernatural premise: a malevolent entity passes from person to person through witnessing a traumatic suicide. Victims experience escalating hallucinations, paranoia, and terrifying distortions of reality before suffering a final, public breakdown where they take their own life while wearing a grotesque, wide smile, transferring the curse to whoever witnessed the act.
Translating this modern cinematic property to the page in a 1990s historical sports setting represents a strategic expansion for IDW Dark. By shifting the era back three decades, the creative team taps into the analog anxieties of the mid-1990s—an era before ubiquitous digital connectivity, where underground sports gambling, regional arena football leagues, and insular community pressures operated away from modern scrutiny.
Writer Stephanie Williams brings a character-driven approach to the horror genre, focusing heavily on the internal collapse of Maximillian Dupree. Paired with Pablo Collar’s dynamic, expressive linework—which captures both the kinetic energy of professional football and the deeply unsettling body horror of the Smile entity—the creative team aims to ground the supernatural terror in authentic athletic and financial desperation.
Publication Details and Variant Cover Strategy
Smile: Any Given Smile #1 carries a mature reader rating and a standard cover price of $4.99 USD ($6.99 CAD). The 32-page comic hits comic book specialty stores and digital platforms on Wednesday, September 23, 2026.
To cater to collectors, IDW Publishing has rolled out an extensive array of variant covers alongside the standard edition:
- Cover A: Standard cover by Ashley Witter (Diamond Order Code: 82771403583400111)
- Cover B: Variant B by Jock (Diamond Order Code: 82771403583400121)
- Cover C: Trading Card Variant by Pablo Collar (Diamond Order Code: 82771403583400131)
- Variant RI (15): Incentive cover by Simmonds (Diamond Order Code: 82771403583400141)
- Variant RI (25): Full-art incentive cover by Jones (Diamond Order Code: 82771403583400151)
Physical editions can be ordered through Diamond Comic Distributors and Lunar Distribution, or located via the Comic Shop Locator service for local brick-and-mortar availability.
Industry Implications and Market Analysis
The release of Smile: Any Given Smile #1 highlights a broader publishing trend among comic book publishers: adapting successful contemporary horror cinematic universes into serialized comic books. Following the commercial viability demonstrated by horror franchises expanding into multi-platform media, IDW’s IDW Dark imprint has positioned itself as a destination for mature-readers genre fiction.
From an analytical perspective, anchoring a supernatural horror story to a high-stakes sporting event provides an effective structural framework for serial pacing. Sports narratives inherently possess built-in tension, ticking clocks, and high-pressure stakes, mirroring the relentless psychological countdown central to the Smile mythos. By fusing the pressure-cooker environment of professional sports gambling with an inescapable psychological curse, Williams and Collar offer both horror enthusiasts and sports drama readers a unique crossover appeal.
As the release date approaches, anticipation among comic book retailers and horror fans remains high. Whether Maximillian Dupree and the St. Augustine Sharks can survive the championship game with their lives and sanity intact remains to be seen, but the narrative setup guarantees that the road to the final whistle will be paved with terror.
