Kickstart This: ‘The Monkey King’ Graphic Novel by Jerry Ma

What better way to celebrate AAPI Heritage Month than to help fund a new graphic novel project by one of Secret Identities partners, Jerry Ma?

Described as Stranger Things meets Cowboy Bebop, The Monkey King: A Chinatown Odyssey shows a New York City falling apart since the Empress of Chinatown has turned her back on the City.

Tripitaka the monk must locate Monkey, Pigsy, and Sandy to help her make the journey west to Chinatown San Francisco in hopes of finding enlightenment to then go back and save New York from itself!

“Every year we see multiple reboots of the Monkey King. Each one more action oriented than the next. But, the actual story was meant to find enlightenment through Buddhism, which would be discovered through their journey West to India,” said Ma in a press release. “I’d like to rediscover the adventure and magic that the story was supposed to be about. And rather than making their armor shinier, I’m giving them sneakers that will match their hoodies better, I’ll have them dive into Chinatown New York in a way I don’t think we’ve seen done before.“

Unlike other crowd-funded comics projects, many of the stretch goals for Jerry’s Kickstarter will actually go towards helping to donate money to small businesses in New York’s Chinatown in the wake of not only the pandemic, but the rise in anti-Asian sentiment throughout the country.

“I’ll quite literally be walking into small businesses and handing over $250 in cash… based off of the success of this Kickstarter campaign to small businesses myself,” he said. “I know it isn’t much, but at least this way, I know these businesses will be receiving the money directly from me.”

Full disclosure, I’m actually one of the rewards you can sign up for since a special “Zoom Cocktail Hour with the creators of Secret Identities” is one of the “prizes.”