Sports stories are not my typical go-to, even as a sports fan, but a sports horror comic is a different story all together. Eisner-nominated writer Stephanie Williams and artist Pablo M. Collar take the iconic Smile franchise and brings it into the wide world of sports in Any Given Smile. With a premiere issue that embraces all the vibes from the movies and lays them out on the page to creep us the hell out.
January 1995. All eyes are on the American Arena League football championship game in St. Augustine, Florida. The Sharks gear up for the most significant event in the AAL’s 20-year history, and Maximillian Dupree — their sudden-star backup quarterback — is feeling the pressure from his teammates, his fans, and his debts to the city’s gambling underworld. A string of suicides hits the community hard, drawing a desperate sports journalist to examine their connection to the big game. No one can trust anything they see as a mind-bending entity and its frightful visions threaten their payouts, their sanity, and their lives…
Hannah Rose May and Miriana Puglia set the bar with the first series, Smile: For the Camera, but Williams and Collar may have met or even surpassed it with Any Given Smile. May and Puglia had the tough task of following the outstanding films, now Williams and Collar have to follow the outstanding comics, which they have done with ease.
The world of sports is already filled with horrors on and off the field, thats even before blending the profession with the horrors of the Smile universe. Williams takes the sense of dread we are all expecting and somehow turns it up to 11 with a bit of shadiness, but also horrifying at the same time. The eerie smiling faces are present and you really don’t know what to expect, even after seeing the films and reading the first series you should know kind of what to expect. It’s a weird uneasy feeling that made reading this story with the lights on a good choice.
The Smile universe has its own unique brand of horror and in this premiere issue of Any Given Smile, Williams nails it. She got the task and gave us a fresh story within the universe that gives off the vibes of the films, while also carving out a path of its own. There’s emotional moments weaved into frights waiting around the corner, making for a truly fantastic read. The first issue deals with mostly the stuff around the sports world, less of the physical playing, but it builds a great sports horror at the same time.
Part of what makes Smile such an uneasy horror is the smiles themselves, the unique ways of showing these characters with a smile from ear-to-ear. So, nailing the artwork is a must and Collar does just that. Collar builds on the tension and unease created by Williams and visualizes the horrors in each and every panel. The creepy smiles are perfect, the deaths are gruesome, and the horrors are real.
Any Given Smile makes sports horrifying, in just the right way. Stephanie Williams and Pablo M. Collar raise the bar on the Smile universe with a football horror filled with tension, a sense of dread, and down right creepiness that is felt on nearly every page. Williams and Collar carve out their own corner of the Smile Universe with Any Given Smile, a downright terrifying addition to the franchise.
Any Given Smile #1 hits local comic shops on September 23, 2026 (FOC: August 17) from the IDW Dark imprint at IDW Publishing.
Any Given Smile #1 Preview
