Check, Please!, the popular webcomic and crowdfunded graphic novel series created by Ngozi Ukazu, will kick off its fourth year online on June 11, in addition to celebrating the release of Check, Please! Book One: #Hockey!, a trade book collection of the series that will be published by First Second in September.
Check, Please! Is the story of Eric “Bitty” Bittle, a gay, pie-baking, vlogging, figure-skating champion who gets recruited to play college hockey at the fictional Samwell University in Massachusetts. The series is funny and praised for its action-packed hockey sequences and for its LGBTQ themes. Check, Please! is written and drawn by Ukazu, who launched the series as a webcomic before raising nearly $500,000 in 2015-2016 on Kickstarter to fund the publication of the print series.
Year 4 of the webcomic is Bitty’s senior year and is the final year of the online series. It will feature new adventures (and relationships) on and off the ice between Bitty and his friends and teammates.
The series has a large and enthusiastic audience online and in print. In September First Second will release a trade book collection, Check, Please! Book One: #Hockey!, that combines book one and book two of the Kickstarter editions. Ukazu has also launched a new kickstarter compaign that will fund a new self-published edition of Check, Please! Year 3, that has already raised over $203,000 (the goal was $22,400). The Year 3 campaign ends June 21.
Ukazu said the series has grown from six characters to 20 across multiple storylines and that everything in the series is coming to a head in Bitty’s final year at Samwell. “It’s a challenge finding screen time for the main members of SMH, but I think readers will be happy with some cameos and storylines,” she said,
Below is a preview of Check, Please! Year 4.
