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Yuri Lowenthal has spent years giving a voice to Peter Parker, and all the responsibility, loss, and perseverance that come with being Spider-Man. Now, the Marvel’s Spider-Man and Marvel Rivals actor is bringing some of his own experiences with grief and loss to a new comics project.

Lowenthal has written the foreword for Fanbase Press’ collected edition of Shrub, a middle-grade graphic medicine series about a sentient shrub accompanying a grieving brother and sister on a cross-country journey to Hollywood. Fanbase Press has launched a Kickstarter campaign to fund the expanded print collection. 

Yes, the hero at the center of the story is literally a shrub. But underneath that knowingly unusual premise is a story about the different ways grief can take root,  and how people might begin finding their way back to one another.

Lowenthal’s foreword will address his personal experiences with grief and loss, extending the book’s approach of pairing its fictional adventure with perspectives drawn from real life. The collection will also feature “Letting Grief Take Root” essays from Shrub writer Shane Portman (Tumble Leaf, Shape Island) and his family, grief doula Kat Primeau, and licensed marriage and family therapist Ariel Landrum of Geek Therapy. Shrub is illustrated by Cosmic Cadets artist Andy Alves, colored by Sophia Du and Celia FitzGerald, and lettered by Rikki letterer Oceano Ransford, with consultation from comics librarian Moni Barrette.

“In the footsteps of ET or Wall-E, Shrub and their insatiable awe for everything they come in contact with — people, birds, cows, even vending machines — are the open-hearted catalyst of this story,” Portman says in the announcement. “Their tender connection to each character is a living example of the empathy that we all need and deserve.”

The project was inspired by Portman’s experience following the death of his father. Its expanded collected edition is designed to give younger readers (and the adults reading alongside them) additional ways to discuss loss. Alongside Lowenthal’s foreword and the personal essays, the book will include a study guide from literacy advocacy organization Creators, Assemble! Inc. and an informational essay by clinical psychologist and media consultant Dr. Drea Letamendi.

Each chapter will also contain a fold-out page revealing more about the characters and how their respective experiences of grief connect.

For Lowenthal’s fans, the foreword offers something notably different from another trip through the Marvel universe. The actor may be best known for playing a superhero who keeps moving after tremendous loss, but Shrub will give him space to speak without the mask — and in his own words.

The Shrub collected edition is currently seeking support on Kickstarter.

Interested? Here's where to find your closest local comic store, courtesy of Sweet, and here's a guide to how (and where) to read comics online. If you're looking for the best comics in recent memory, check out the Eisner Awards winners and the Harvey Awards nominees. And if you like free comics, here's everything we know about Free Comic Book Day 2027.