Science fiction 33 - World Comic Book Review

Rapid Eye #1 (review)

October 30, 2016October 30, 2016 by DG Stewart

Rapid Eye #1 (review) Tenacious Comics, 2016 Writer: Bobby Torres There is a memorable sequence in the beginning of this comic which best describes the title’s worth. An audience member asks a question of a speaker: “What risks or side effects does dream invasion technology present? The answer, from Dr Krupke, the man responsible for … Read more

Eclipse #1 (review)

October 22, 2016 by DG Stewart

Eclipse #1 (review)
Image Comics/ Top Cow, October 2016
Writer: Zack Kaplan

The premise of a catastrophic solar event has roots in reality. In 1859, a massive solar flare called the Carrington Event caused telegraph poles to burst into flames and covered the Earth in beautiful auroras. Should such an enormous radiation pulse occur in the digital age, the consequences would be disastrous.

Writer Zack Kaplan takes this concept further. In this first issue of “Eclipse”, Mr Kaplan paints us a dire picture of the Sun as a scourge of life. Billions died when the Sun inexplicably brightened, burning all living things. Surviving humans are nocturnal. As the sun rises, police officers in New York’s Time Square assist to round up citizens and get them undercover before the morning sun can strike them down. This planet-changing event is called “the Flare” by the community of survivors, an inaccurate term for an ongoing and unrelenting solar radiation particle cloud.

William Gibson’s Archangel #1-2 (review)

October 21, 2016October 3, 2016 by DG Stewart

“William Gibson’s Archangel” #1-2 (review)
IDW Publishing, May-June 2016
Writer: William Gibson

William Gibson made his fame with the enormously successful novel “Neuromancer” (1984, Doubleday Press). In this novel and its sequels, each helping define the science fiction genre known as “cyberpunk”, Mr Gibson predicts many moments of what was then his future and what is now our present: the Internet, virtual reality, the cashless society, the rise of global conglomerates, the paramount status of big pharma, drug culture where users have the knowledge of chemists, automated cars, and private space travel.

Having explored the future in a variety of novels, Mr Gibson seemed to recognise at one point that he was now living in the future, and turned to writing about it. The first point in that transition was a novel called “Pattern Recognition” (2003), concerned with esoteric contemporary themes such as the inescapability of consumer brands, the ease and alienation of international travel, the cutting edge value of cool-hunters, the ice lake world of Russian oligarchs, and America post 9/11. The novel has the fingerprints of science fiction all over it. Through the prism of the strangeness of someone’s future, “Pattern Recognition” is one of the 2010s most piercing novels.

In this comic, Mr Gibson takes some of today’s “almost-but-not-quite” scientific developments and lands them in late World War Two England. This is not the first time Me Gibson has visited the past – with writer Bruce Sterling, Mr Gibson co-authored the classic, “The Difference Engine” (1990).

Doctor Who: The Eleventh Doctor Year Two #12 (review)

October 21, 2016September 21, 2016 by DG Stewart

Doctor Who: The Eleventh Doctor Year Two #12 (review)
(Titan Comics, September 2016)
Writer: Rob Williams

Doctor Who is a United Kingdom science fiction television show which has, rather than consistent commercial success, at the very least established a solid obsessive fan base. These fans collect Doctor Who-related paraphernalia which includes this comic book series.

The premise of the show is that the lead character, the Doctor, an alien called a Time Lord, travels about in a vehicle called the TARDIS through both space and time. The Doctor thereby engages in various adventures with a variety of mostly human and female sidekicks. Whenever an actor playing the character leaves the show, the Doctor undergoes a dizzying metamorphosis whereby the previous actor is replaced by the new actor. It is a somewhat odd mechanism for replacing the lead cast member but which has become an exciting feature of the series: fans indulge in speculation as to the temperament of the new incarnation of the Doctor, and have their favourite versions. As a consequence of the inherent mechanism of time travel, some of these incarnations occasionally meet but act as if they are different people.