Eternals (2007)
by Neil Gaiman, Art by John Romita Jr.
collects Gaiman’s Eternals mini-series (1-7)
Gaiman’s take on Kirby’s Eternals is sadly less than what I expected. It’s accompanied by excellent artwork by John Romita Jr. and on par with other Gaiman work, the writing is well done. But the major drawback is that the whole thing is nothing more than a prologue, a set-up for things to come. It’s a nice read, but at the end I felt like: That is all? It has just started! Other writers can tells a whole story that actually feels like one in four issues and while there’s actually a plot that get’s finished, it never feels like a complete product. If there had been a follow-up by Gaiman or someone equally competent, this had might been better, but as a stand-alone that tries to establish a new starting point for the Eternals and tell a whole story, it just doesn’t work so well.
Rating: 3/5
Atmospherics (2002)
by Warren Ellis, Art by Ken Meyer, Jr.
This reminds me of one issue of Fell that is structured similarly: a dialog between two characters and that’s it. The whole thing is relatively short and only there to illustrate an idea by Ellis, one of many possible reason for aliens coming to Earth. As such it’s only a one-note story, you might read and, depending on your taste, snicker about it or wondering whether this was worth your money, but won’t look at it a second time.
What I really liked was Ellis’s afterword, which explained how he came up with the idea and connected stuff. It’s a hilarious read and much more interesting than the rest of the comic. And it reminded me how well UFO: Enemy Unknown used cattle mutilations and other UFO-stupidity to make a tremendously fun game.
Rating: 3/5
Ultimate Human (2008)
by Warren Ellis, Art by Cary Nord
Ultimate Human 1-4
Ultimate Human starts with two very strong issues, pure, vintage Ellis excellency, only to close with two rather weak issues. I like the reinterpretation of superheroes or superhumans as the first step toward post-humanity, a trend seen first in Wildstorm’s superhero universe, which makes me check it out occasionally over DC and Marvel stuff. Back to Ultimate Human, which shows some interesting talk between Banner and Stark and delves into the mechanisms that make the Hulk work. This is all Ellis’s stuff and quite fascinating, especially the pieces about adapting to the environment on other worlds and then…
Ellis includes a full issue detailing the background of Ultimate Pete Wisdom who became the Ultimate Leader and has head issues (and other issues as well). Then we have a final issue that closes the whole conflict between the Leader and Stark/Banner in a rather abrupt manner. It’s not that it’s not entertaining, but the first two issues made me expect something more meaty and interesting than what it turned out to be.
Rating: 3/5
Boku no Futatsu no Tsubasa (2003-2005)
by Toshiki Yui
fan-translated by various Groups
If a known hentai creator makes a manga about a young hermaphrodite who is slowly discovering his sexuality, most people wouldn’t really expect a serious coming-of-age story that gives the theme a serious treatment. And as far as BnFnT is concerned, they are mostly right. While the sex is most of the time off-screen, it’s there and how the character in BnFnT jump onto each other has nothing to do with realistic human behavior and more with how people in porn go at it. Still, at least it’s entertaining in the typically lighthearted manner of Toshiki and not really offensive. The science fiction tag is for the reason that later it turns out that the main character is the offspring of a human-alien liaison (the aliens are all hermaphrodites (but still look like humans)) and with that fact revealed the story completely leaves any pretension of seriousness behind. The ending also leaves something to be desired in it’s rather terse attempt to close the story.
Rating: 3/5
The Punisher: The End (2004)
by Garth Ennis, Art by Richard Corben
I’m on the fence about the regular MAX Punisher series. On one hand we have a interesting depiction of Frank that makes him even more relentless than in most other takes on him, but it also makes him a bland character, since Frank is more machine than human. But in this one-shot this characterization works much, much better. The End one-shots have been, IMHO, a rather stupid stunt, since everyone who reads comics knows that their relevance to the canon version of the depicted characters is nil. The only way that those one-shots could have any meaning is by telling a really good story that makes them worthwhile on their own, and so far most haven’t.
This one, on the other hand, is the exception to the rule. A nuclear conflict snuffs out most of humanity and the Punisher only survives by having been in a prison where a shelter to survive such an attack exists. One year after the attack he and one other guy leave the shelter to emerge to a devastated surface. Ennis’s depiction of the post-apocalyptic Earth is very realistic, there are no survivors slowly beginning to rebuild civilization, no mutants wandering around. Radiation has become the ultimate equalizer, killing everything. There’s no hope for rebuilding, for survival, only death. But even now the Punisher has a mission, slowly working his way toward another shelter in New York.
This one-shot stands out by not shying away from following its setup to the inevitable conclusion. As can be expected, this one doesn’t end happy. This is really a “The End” story in every way, giving a conclusion the Punisher’s life and closing the book on humanity. Interestingly, for such a bleak and grim tale, it’s never gets boring and bogged down in details of survival and lamenting about the end of the world, one failure of many post-apocalyptic stories.
Rating: 5/5
The Ballad Of Halo Jones (1991)
by Alan Moore, Art by Ian Gibson
This seems to be hailed by some people as a classic of science fiction comics, but I have to doubt those peoples sanity. The art isn’t bad per se, but it makes every panel look crammed and disrupts a fluid reading. The SF setting seems to try much more to mirror some present day elements (which is now the past) than to be a serious look at the future, which makes this look now, over twenty years later, very dated and quaint. The so called elements of social commentary are far too docile to make it worth reading through it just for that. For example the last parts that deal with Halo Jones as a soldier look ridiculous compared to something like Haldeman’s Forever War. Then there are the story elements that are just plain bonkers and don’t the fit the SF setting, like the rat king or the girl/boy that faded into the background.
But the worst thing: it’s utterly boring.
Rating: 1/5
Space Usagi (1998)
by Stan Sakai
The Space Usagi TPB from Dark Horse collects, as far as I’m aware of, all the published Space Usagi comics from Stan Sakai, a “Science-Fiction”-alized version of his long running series Usagi Yojimbo. The most similar thing that comes to my mind is Star Wars, but instead of a fantasy story and setting that gets the science fiction treatment, here it’s the world of the japanese ronin Miyamoto Usagi that gets transported to space. It’s pure adventure stuff, having no pretensions to include more ambitious themes like the source material, Usagi Yojimbo, but the adventure stuff is really fun. Action, space princesses, space samurai and even a meeting between the original and the future Miyamoto Usagi.
Rating: 4/5
Yokohama Kaidashi Kiko (1994-2006)
by Hitoshi Ashinano
YKK has no real plot and yet it’s completely engrossing. YKK takes place in an undefined future, where the human race is slowly fading out. Something big must have happened, because the sea levels have risen significantly and most places seem slightly depopulated. The main difference to other post-apocalyptic stories is that neither have humans lost all technology and reverted back to some tribal societies, nor is there any evidence for widespread war and mayhem. It seems, people have just gone back to simpler ways of living (without giving up their technological knowledge) and accepted that humanity is at an end.
The main character is actually a robot, mentally and physically a young girl, who is slowly growing up and exploring the world around her. That’s actually the whole plot and while that may seem very simple (which it is), it’s actually very well done. There are no big twists, nothing more than Alpha, the robot girl, going around, meeting people and watching the world. And yet, very much helped by the excellent art, it’s this simplicity that allows the manga to concentrate on evoking a solemn mood, celebrating the simple life, the beauty of nature and the beauty of living throughoutly in peace with your environment.
There are also very small touches of sadness, the people around Alpha growing up and becoming older, while she remains the same. I must admit that I also don’t like the idea of humanity slowly and peacefully fading out, but just this time I think it worked so well and was done with so much care, that it didn’t bother much at all. And it’s neat to see a post-apocalyptic future where humanity seems to have matured and not gone wholly Mad Max. Above all, what we see is just one viewpoint, and the behavior of humans displayed in YKK seems a much better fit to recover from whatever disaster has struck Earth and the human civilization, than the more commonly displayed behavior of humans in other post-apocalyptic outings.
Rating: 5/5
Children of Earth (1986)
by Yukinobu Hoshino
3rd 2001 Nights volume
The third and last volume of 2001 Nights reminds us that just because something is doable doesn’t mean it gets done. Today we have the level of technology to reach Mars or build a station on the Moon, but no answer for why we should do it. Similarly here the age of space exploration comes to an end, with colonies failing one after another, often because of human arrogance to think that other worlds are just like Earth, only to discover this deadly mistake too late. Humanity has the technology to go out into the galaxy, to explore and colonize, but the human spirit has taken one blow too much, and people are tired of space, not ready to sacrifice more of their own.
CoE is far more pessimistic that the first two volumes of 2001 Nights (even if this outcome was foreshadowed in the second one), the grand experiment of space exploration seems to have largely failed. Not completely, since the spaceborn generation leaves human space on a mission of exploration that is unprecedented, and there are still the children of the human race seeding project.
In the end 2001 Nights doesn’t let the reader off with an easy lesson, like space exploration is useless, or space exploration is he one thing we all need to strive for. It’s a sometimes seemingly emotionless look at all the failure modes of it, that never forgets the lives of those who get crushed in all these ambitious plans. And yet it’s also full of this sense of wonder emotion that some of the best SF can evoke. The ending is ambiguous, a lesson that human nature hasn’t changed much, and yet there is hope.
Rating: 5/5
Journey Beyond Tomorrow (1985)
by Yukinobu Hoshino
2nd 2001 Nights volume
While humanity was limited to STL drives in the first volume, in the second FTL drives are gained. Through this humanity’s reach has spread beyond the solar system, and the exploration and colonization of other worlds has began in earnest. Like the first volume this is another collection of tales depicting small and big events in the lives of people who take part in this endeavor. Some have happy, or at least hopeful endings. Some don’t. Underlying everything is the hope that humanity, despite being foolish and often prone to err, might learn and grow. But this is not a given thing. And death is just a short step away, in space and on alien worlds.
Rating: 5/5
