Heavy Metal Magazine has announced that it will be bringing Pepe Moreno’s graphic novella, Gene Kong, to its pages in two parts in issues #278 and #279.

Set in NYC in the 1980’s, Gene Kong is the tale of Eugene Wong, a biogenetics engineer, whose secret backroom experiments have out him far ahead of his colleagues.  Sick of the crime and degenerates who have taken over New York , Gene dreams of the day he can clean up his city. Gene, being of small stature and no fighting skills, decides to take things into his own hands and begins injecting himself with the altered DNA of a gorilla.  Nothing seems to be happening until one fateful night on a subway train when Gene is accosted by a bunch of hoodlums, his anger somehow ignites his Frankenstein chemicals into action.  Let the underworld of NYC beware!

Pepe was living in the East Village in the 1980’s and would just take a subway ride and his sketchbook if he needed a character for his story.  Many of the background extras and speaking characters are based on real people from his neighborhood.

Part 1 of Gene Kong will be in Heavy Metal #278 which ships Dec. 2015 and part 2 will be in Heavy Metal #279 which ships Feb. 2016.

Heavy Metal #279 will also have a special limited edition Gene Kong two-sided cover that will be available exclusively at heavymetal.com in Feb. 2016.