GUNGNIR publishes darkly funny graphic novel The A.R.C.

GUNGNIR has released The A.R.C., a satirical adult graphic novel from Tim Disney, JC Lacek and Vincent Jolas Dubourg that turns a pandemic into a story about lying, power and collapsing trust. The book, previewed at Comic-Con in July and published Aug. 11, uses a virus that becomes fatal when a host lies to skewers elites, media spin and misinformation.

Why it matters: - The A.R.C. uses a pandemic thriller to explore how misinformation, performative politics and elite self-dealing can spread faster than accountability. - The graphic novel treats dishonesty as a literal public-health threat, making its social critique easy to grasp and hard to dismiss. - GUNGNIR is positioning the book as a cultural statement about where publishing and storytelling can go next.

What happened: - GUNGNIR published The A.R.C., a genre-bending adult graphic novel created by Tim Disney, written by JC Lacek and Tim Disney, and illustrated by Vincent Jolas Dubourg. - The book was previewed in July during Comic-Con. - The story follows a lethal virus that emerges after a climate conference attended by global elites and spreads worldwide. - The infection activates when a host lies.

The details: - The story begins at the Concordia Center in the Amazon during the Global Reinvestment For Tomorrow conference, where attendees claim they will solve climate change. - The infected elites board private jets and spread Amazonian Recombinant Cytoneuropathy, or A.R.C., around the world. - The virus is described as undetectable while dormant and 100% lethal once activated. - Most of the narrative takes place aboard The Veritas, a supposedly sustainable cruise ship. - The ensemble includes a single mother and her teenage daughter, a born-again preacher and his wife, a Norwegian ship captain, an underemployed photographer and her retired stockbroker father, business bros, and an unscrupulous payday-lending magnate with his Russian mail-order bride. - The book uses footnotes, footnotes to footnotes, fake ads, sponsored content and embedded storylines to blur fact and fiction. - The publisher says the format is meant to work for both dedicated comics readers and casual readers. - Real-world figures appear in the story and are undone by their own dishonesty. - The book targets climate-pageant optics, influencer activism, corporate righteousness, ideological tribalism and AI-accelerated misinformation. - GUNGNIR founder Matthew Medney says the book aligns with the publisher’s mission to take creative risks and lead cultural conversation.

Between the lines: - The satire lands because it treats exaggeration as a feature of modern life, not a fictional stretch. - The book’s broad target list suggests the creators want to mock dysfunction across the political spectrum, not only one side. - The footnote-heavy structure signals a meta-reading experience that rewards close attention and reinforces the blur between truth and spin. - The core question underneath the comedy is practical: how trust gets rebuilt after institutions and individuals have spent too long lying.

What’s next: - GUNGNIR is offering review copies and media interviews with Tim Disney, JC Lacek and Vincent Jolas Dubourg through publicist Nanda Dyssou at Coriolis Company. - The publisher is also using the release to reinforce its push for boundary-breaking comics and cross-media storytelling.

The bottom line: - The A.R.C. turns pandemic-era distrust into a satirical graphic novel about power, vanity and the cost of lying.