Richland, Washington — a place where history’s most dangerous secrets are buried along with radioactive waste — serves as the chilling foundation for Tim Mulligan’s World of Witchland graphic novel series. Set against the backdrop of the Hanford nuclear site, a real location infamous for its environmental hazards, the series blends horror, dark humor, and unsettling truths into tales that linger long after the last page.
The newest installment, Twitchland, expands the eerie mythology Mulligan has been building. This time, the horror takes wing—literally—as radioactive bats emerge from buried waste tanks. Their bites, far from ordinary, leave victims not just infected, but addicted to the toxins now coursing through their veins. As the strange epidemic spreads, the story morphs into a grotesque exploration of mutation, dependency, and a community living in the shadow of disaster.
“Twitchland is what happens when you mix a culture of addiction with a forgotten nuclear disaster and a town that’s already cursed,” Mulligan said. The result is an unnerving narrative where every shadow hides danger and every bite could be a sentence to a slow, strange doom.
The World of Witchland series began with Witchland, which introduced readers to a family unknowingly drawn into a haunted town’s toxic embrace, facing both literal and figurative ghosts. The follow-up, Snitchland, tackled whistleblowers, cover-ups, and the mysterious collapse of a tunnel at the nuclear site. Together, these works established Mulligan’s distinctive style—anchoring supernatural horrors in very real environmental and political histories.
With Twitchland, Mulligan draws a sharp parallel between his fictional epidemic and real-world crises facing rural communities. The bats’ toxic bite becomes an allegory for the spread of addiction in places where industry has collapsed, jobs have vanished, and environmental degradation has left both land and people poisoned.
“Throw together a drug addiction culture with toxic waste in the haunted town of Richland, and you have the makings for a terrifying and wholly unique graphic novel unlike anything you’ve ever expected,” Mulligan noted. “Think Trainspotting meets The Lost Boys meets The Toxic Avenger.”
From radioactive sludge to restless spirits, Mulligan’s Witchland universe is a reminder that some nightmares are all too real — and that in places like Richland, the past never stays buried.