Cover illustration for O Ninja.
Micaías Ramos is a Brazilian cartoonist, illustrator, multi-instrumentalist musician, poet, martial artist and businessman, founder of Blue Comics e Entretenimento and several other ventures in the field of pop culture. Through his comics imprint, he was the creator of the first shared universe of superhero comic books in Brazil, starring characters like O Ninja, Justiça, Projeto Zero and Billi Jones.
Early life
Micaías Ramos was born in the city of Escada in the state of Pernambuco, located in the northeast region of Brazil. He spent part of his childhood in the city of Primavera, which is little over 20 kilometers from Escada. Through a family friend, he was introduced to the comics published by Editora Ebal and Editora Globo, including the work of Mauricio de Sousa. Back in Escada, he attended the Escola Municipal Barão de Suassuna, where a classmate introduced him to the world of Japanese manga. Although mostly self-taught, Ramos tried to study traditional drawing in a local studio as an adolescent, but ended up frustrated and quickly abandoned the course. Heavily influenced by the adult-themed comics of publisher Grafipar, he produced fanzines with similar content to sell to school friends, leading to several expulsions.
Early comics
From an early age, Ramos won several local art and painting competitions, and quickly became a driving force in the Escada comics scene. In 2000, he released his first solo comic 'Óxi', in which he parodied his family. In 2001, he released his first character in the superhero genre, the manga-flavored 'O Ninja'. According to the artist, the inspiration for this character came from films from such 1980s and 1990s films as 'American Ninja: American Warrior' and 'Bloodsport', among other titles.
During the 2000s, Ramos also ventured into publishing. With his friend Arthur Mauro, he initially launched the AM Produções imprint, but this didn't get off the ground. In 2006, Ramos created Tacape Editora with the intention of publishing novels and comic books (including manga) by local authors. With his imprint, Ramos continued working in the superhero genre, and launched his own shared universe, where his characters could interact and instigate crossovers. Among the early Tacape publications were a reprint of 'O Ninja' and the new manga series 'Heiichiro', created by Ramos himself. Among the subsequent characters launched under the Tacape banner were the vigilante security guard 'Justiça' (2012), the superhero 'Zero' (2013) and the team-up 'Esquadrão Terror'.
Digital Blue Comics releases.
Blue Comics
In 2015, Micaías decided to change the name of his publishing house from Tacape to Blue Comics, only to discover that the name was already being used by an artist collective of artists in São Paulo. After some negotiations, the author acquired the rights, not only to the name, but also to all the zine material produced by the collective. Starting in August 2015, the merged assets continued under the company name Blue Comics e Entretenimento and focused on digital comics. To reboot its shared universe, Blue Comics started with the mini-series 'Prelúdios Esquadrão Terror' (2016), written by Ramos and drawn by Bruna Abdias, which served as a prologue to upcoming stories. With Ramos as writer, several titles and characters were either relaunched or introduced, including 'Justiça' (drawn by Felipe de Lima), 'Heiichiro' (drawn by Paulo Sampaio), 'Billi Jones' (drawn by Bruno Abdias), 'Psycho' (drawn by Nícolas Santos) and 'Projeto Zero' (drawn by Bruno Tyler). The 2022 anthology title 'Raízes Do Horror' ("Roots of Horror") presented the origin stories of some of the villains from the Blue Comics universe.
In 2021, Micaías Ramos was part of the pre-production of the comic book 'Mamonas Assassinas: A Graphic Novel Oficial' by Editora Estética Torta, before the comic creator Thiago Ossostortos was assigned to the project. For the same publisher, Ramos wrote the scripts for a comic book about the singer André Matos.
Importance for Brazilian indie comics
By putting national superhero comics back on the map in Brazil, Ramos became a notable player in the underground comics scene of Pernambuco. In addition, his articles about comics and their creators have been used on websites (under a variety of pseudonyms), as well as in magazines and textbooks. A notable spokesperson and advocate for the medium, he has also been a voting and jury member for the biggest comic awards in Brazil. In 2017, he reported a "flaw", which had been exploited by some malicious authors during the third ABRAHQ Comics Award, It resulted in the cancellation of the event. In the same period, Ramos harshly criticized and denounced a platform of digital comic books, and exposed a fake cinema/television production company that deceived several authors with false promises.
In 2020, Ramos started the "Força HQB" movement, which aimed to unite, support and promote comic book stores, publishers and independent artists during the COVID-19 pandemic. Some channels, websites and newspapers were also invited to participate in the movement, launching special articles about the national market. This instigated the independent comic book market to a chain of new solidarity initiatives. One of them was the establishment of the Movimento Editoras Unidas (2022), of which Ramos was a founding member together with Alexandre Pauli, Igor Casanova and other comic publishers. Originating from this union of comic publishers came the new imprint Editora UCQ (founded by Igor Casanova, Leandro Visotto, Christyan Stussi and Fábio Marmitt) and the graphic company Criativa Publicações (originally launched by Igor Casanova and Alexandre Pauli).
Accompanied by a few other initiatives, the team contributed to the growth of the independent comics market in Brazil, which also resulted in new collaborations. Together with Alexandre Pauli and other artists, Ramos launched the crossover comic 'Necrópolis'. Also with Pauli, he created the character 'Condutor' for Pauli's Editora Spitter Dragon. For the international market, Ramos worked with scriptwriter John M. Helmer and artist Bruno Abdias on 'La Sombra vs Flame Girl', a crossover collaboration of Blue Comics in Brazil with Lucky Comics in the USA.
Music
Besides comics, Ramos has also had a notable career in music. Inspired by his older brother, he started playing the guitar at age fourteen, followed shortly afterwards by the double bass. Early in life, Ramos briefly played in the evangelical group Passaporte, then joined the band Night Speed, before in 2010 starting his own group, Alta Voltagem, with some friends at the Obreiros de Cristo Baptist Church. As a multi-instrumentalist musician, Micaías Ramos has released solo singles like 'Abstract Thoughts' (2024), 'Aquela do Tempo' (2024), 'The Last' (2024) and '1991' (2025).
The Blue Comics characters.