Jordan Morris: Keep the Youth Group away from the Chock’lit Shoppe [Interview]

Jordan Morris: Keep the Youth Group away from the Chock’lit Shoppe [Interview]

Jordan Morris is an extremely talented writer, producer, podcaster, comedian, and all-around awesome guy!  He’s one-half of the long-running podcast Jordan, Jesse, Go!.  He also helped create the award-winning podcast Bubble, and has many writing and producing credits to his name including several TV and animated shows like Earth to Ned, TrollsTopia, and Unikitty.

He has also made contributions to the long-running web comedy series Good Mythical Morning, which include writing, producing, and character work like the mechanic that has a love/hate relationship with the Transformers, and the extremely popular Cotton Candy Randy!  

Now, Jordan is making his way into the world of writing for comic books!  He’s now written the graphic novel adaptation of his podcast Bubble, he’s written stories for Archie Comics, and now, his first original graphic novel, the upcoming Youth Group!

I got the chance to sit down with Jordan and talk about which two animals he would have swap sounds, we talked about the different things that fuel his weird, including a recent interest in a series that is known for boldly going where no man has gone before, whether or not he is a Marvel guy or if he is a DC guy,  what it was that inspired him to become a writer in the first place, where he gets his ideas from, and tons more!  

We also chat about how his podcast Jordan, Jesse, Go! got started, how a back-and-forth conversation on Twitter led to him writing for Archie Comics, the entirely not-so-secret origins of my favorite character Cotton Candy Randy (and yes, I asked him to give me a sweet nothing), what we can see from him in the future, and where we can keep up to date on the stuff he is doing!

Jordan’s newest graphic novel Youth Group which he made with the very talented Bowen McCurdy, is a young adult horror comedy about teenage exorcists and will be out July 16th, 2024 from publisher First Second Books.

Here’s the premise:

When Kay reluctantly agreed to join the youth group at Stone Mission Church in Orange County California, she expected the Jesus talk and the dorky singalongs and the colorful posters about dodging temptation. What she didn’t expect was to stumble on her youth group leaders, Meg and Cortland, in the middle of a read-deal exorcism.

Turns out they’re both soldiers in a secret organization of demon hunters in a war that’s heating up, and even if Kay wanted to stay on the sidelines, she doesn’t have a choice – she’s a “Blight,” a human who demons can’t possess, and apparently that’s made her a target.

Will Kay find her place in a world that’s so much more God-fearing and monster-fighting than what she’s used to? Will the Stone Mission youth group find common cause with their badass peers of other faiths? Or will a pack of small-time demons use Blights like Kay as the key to starting some real big trouble?

You can pre-order it right now from Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Bookshop.org, or your favorite local indie bookstore!