Category: Older kids

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Lenore: Pink Bellies


By Roman Dirge (Titan Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-78276-131-0

Lenore is a sweet little girl who has cute, if somewhat surreal, little adventures. Did I mention that she is also dead and has been for quite some time? Well she is, and her friends are just as outré…

Wittily weird, aggressively eccentric and darkly hilarious comic strips featuring this edgy little charmer and her fluctuating coterie of arcane acquaintances have been entertaining audiences since 1992 when she first appeared in San Diego’s alternative arts magazine Xenophobe.

Slave Labor Graphics picked up “the Cute Little Dead Girl” and featured her eerie escapades in a proper comicbook from February 1998 to July 2007, which led to a series of 26 Flash-animation shorts on Sony’s ScreenBlast website in 2002. There’s toys, game merchandising stuff and a movie in the works…

In 2009 Titan Comics took up the publishing option on Lenore’s uniquely unreal print excursions and have subsequently repackaged and remastered her entire career in a series of hardcover chronicles.

This sixth collection (re-presenting issues #8-11 of the second volume) offers more mercurial madness and even an origin of sorts which all begins after an elucidatory Introduction from current editor David Leach, describing the author’s creative process. ‘Some Things Are Best Left Unseen’ highlights a big change in status for Lenore and her most enduring associates. Former vampire and current not-so-cuddly toy Ragamuffin, bucket-headed demon/on-sabbatical bounty hunter Pooty Applewater and indescribably enigmatic arms-length protector Taxidermy have been with the beguiling tot for ages now…

Lenore died a hundred years ago in the little town of Nevermore but Taxidermy’s story begins much earlier: either in 1880 when a very foolish French archaeologist opened the wrongest tomb in Egypt or else millennia before that when the almighty gods locked one of their own exalted pantheon within it.

Taxen-Ra was a small god dedicated to avenging small wrongs done to children. Over centuries he became busier redressing balances and grew mightier with each punishment, but eventually he was forgotten until a plague wiped out so many young ones that he snapped…

Determined to wreak bloody vengeance on everyone who had allowed children to suffer he attacked his fellow deities and had to be put away forever…

Once fame-hungry modern historians freed him, however, he resumed his task: an impossibly efficient serial killer dubbed “Orphanage” who slaughtered the parents and guardians of abused kids all over the world…

Now TV ghost-hunting show Ghosty Toasty has tracked Orphanage to Nevermore, and a dilapidated old house which none of the crew can see is occupied by a little dead girl and her friends.

Well, cameraman Big Joe can, but nobody will listen to him so he’s staying safely locked in the van whilst his butt-hole bosses all endure their well-deserved fates…

Always happy to indulge in a few high-spirited pranks and japes, the kids are blithely unaware that thanks to modern technology their antics as well as Taxidermy’s highly imaginative dispatch of the intruders has been streaming live to the entire planet…

More long-sought-for revelations are forthcoming in the three-chapter ‘Downfall’, beginning with ‘Part #1′ as the true circumstances of Lenore’s tragic demise are revisited.

The little miss quickly returned to her happy home after she passed and she has never accepted her beloved mama’s horrified rejection of her. All this time the frequently forgetful waif has been waiting for Mother’s inevitable return, unaware that Orphanage long ago ensured that it could never happen…

In the present – but over in France – a mysterious woman sends an army of well-equipped agents to capture Lenore and her chums but sadly the best that science and money can provide is less than effective against the unquiet – and rather mischievous – dead. The worst that happens is the pals experiencing the trippiest hallucination imaginable, before Lenore finds herself at the Rainbow Bridge explaining herself to every pet she’s ever accidentally killed (and in a century that’s a lot)…

The super-soldiers are just unleashing their next level of technological ingenuity when Taxidermy shows up, but before he can get going there’s a big bang and a couple of very annoyed Egyptian gods materialise…

‘Downfall Part #2: Downfall…ier’ escalates the craziness as Nevermore turns into a thaumaturgical ground zero impossible to describe, with outrageous gags trumping appalling supernatural carnage whilst Ragamuffin and Pooty argue over who’s going to tell Lenore the shocking secret they’ve just uncovered about her revenant rebirth…

Acting as grotesquely bad-taste scatological palate cleansers, short tales ‘Lenore in Old Mother Hubbard’ and ‘Lenore in Goldilocks and the 3 Bears’ gives those of us who still need oxygen a breathing space before everything comes to a spectacular conclusion in ‘Downfall Part #3: DownfalliestAlottaBunches’ with the warring gods ending their millennial duel in the only way they can before little Lenore reaches her own unique accommodation with all those unhappy inconvenient truths…

To Be Continued…

There’s still plenty of fun to be had however and ‘Bonus Section’ holds more variant and unused covers – 11 in total throughout this tome of terror – plus ‘inside cover-art’ from #8-11 and the death-affirming scene ‘Mr. Gosh Sucks’.

Also included is ‘Guest Art’ by Maxwell Vex, a crafty ‘Lenore Puppet Tutorial by Bonnie Burton’ (never run with scissors and be careful not to prick your fingers – you never knows who’s watching or hungry) and a selection of ‘Cover Concepts for #11’ closes out our Easter Eggs Incubated in Hell section…

Impossible to fairly describe but so absolutely necessary to read, these stories are richly dipped in the traditions of Charles Addams: scary, poignant, grossly frat-boy funny and appealing to the same skewed and twisted audiences who adore Jhonen Vasquez’s Squee! and Johnny the Homicidal Maniac or goth-inspired series such as Gloom Cookie or Giffen & Roman’s i Luv Halloween – not to mention the animated films of Tim Burton.

These weird and wonderful fables are an unwholesome treat for those kids of all ages with a taste for the richer, darker and less wholesome flavours of life – and its inevitable end, if not cessation. Ever so much better for you than giving poisoned candy to kids who bang on your door.
Lenore is ™ & © 2015 Roman Dirge. All rights reserved.

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Sweatshop


By Peter Bagge with Stephen DeStefano, Bill Wray, Stephanie Gladden, Jim Blanchard, Johnny Ryan & Joanne Bagge (Fantagraphics Books)
ISBN: 978-1-60699-812-0

More generally known for his compulsively challenging (I so loathe that word “alternative”) strip material for mature audiences, cartooning legend Peter Bagge (Neat Stuff, Hate, Buddy Bradley, Everybody is Stupid Except for Me and Other Astute Observations) once found himself courted by the highest echelons of the comicbook mainstream and it resulted in two extremely different but delightfully enjoyable comedy ventures.

As he explains in his trenchant Afterword ‘Sweatshop: The Whys and What Fors’, forward-looking DC editor Joey Cavalieri accidentally oversaw the release of two overwhelmingly successful graphic novels – Bizarro Comics and Bizarro World – crafted by a host of Indie cartoonists and was asked/allowed to follow up the venture with something else in the same vein.

Bagge and Gilbert Hernandez had previously put together an intriguing and manically enticing, all-ages cartoon romp for the grievously underserved juvenile girls market (see Yeah!) for mainstream industry leader DC under their WildStorm imprint, and the company wanted to have another go.

Unable to commit to the punishing deadlines of a monthly comicbook solo, the cartoonist created his own sweatshop team to equitably distribute the workload and – after more dithering, ducking and diving – the saga of aging and indolent strip veteran Mel Bowling was born…

Naturally the feature was not what DC expected and the series was cancelled after #2, but due to the time lag involved, by then a full half dozen issues were completed. As with Yeah!, the compiled tales have now found their true spiritual home in these more enlightened graphic times as a sparky, spunky full-colour paperback collection from Fantagraphics, so you can at last profit from DC’s errors…

The premise is wickedly simple: Mel is the creator of successful family strip Freddy Ferret and officially has been for decades. However, with such an icon securely established, the crusty curmudgeon no longer does anything himself but “oversees” a studio of pathetic young hopefuls, doing their time and paying their dues before fame inevitably catches up with them all.

Acting as office manager and long-suffering interface between the modern world and the reactionary living fossil is Mel’s beleaguered spinster sister Millie who tries to keep the ship steady whilst the “creator” sits on his duff dreaming up increasingly more awful catch phrases and commissioning merchandising tat…

Scripted throughout by Bagge and coloured by his long-time collaborator and wife Joanne, the wryly seditious insider hilarity commences with the news that Mel has at last been nominated for a prestigious industry award. Pencil artist and closet superhero fanboy Alfred Post, creepily abrasive loner inker Nick Calamari and shy, quirky letterer Carrie cannot believe the trash they’ve been generating has garnered enough support for a Ham Fisher Prize but Millie is harbouring a secret.

Fed up with her brother’s annual carping and bitching, she’s pulled a few duplicitous strings to get him on the shortlist, but as far as the kids are concerned it’s a disaster: Mel was always appallingly mean when he wasn’t nominated, but now that he could actually lose something he’s never won and always wanted, they communally dread the next month…

Mel is gloating in advance, convinced he’s finally going to get one over on cartoon competitor and golf rival Wayne Goodman but the night of the ‘The “Hammies”’ (illustrated by Bagge) proves to be the train-wreck everybody – except Mel – expected… ‘The New Recruit’ (drawn by Stephen DeStefano) then introduces freshly hired gag writer Elliot: a hip ‘n’ cool, radical lefty wannabe who’s only killing time until his dope new strip Word Up! hits big.

Sadly the vegan newcomer’s ideals and stomach take a major hit after Mel treats his team to lunch at The King’s Trough – the nastiest old-school burger bar in town – where Mel’s effusive views on race and youth kill what’s left of Elliot’s appetite…

The tale is complemented by a trio of shorts illustrated from Bill Wray disclosing the efforts of the unsung juniors in ‘The New Guy’ (by Nick),‘Carrie’s Comic Diary 6/10’ and Alfred’s costumed crusader ‘The Peerless Penciller’…

Bagge & Wray then collaborate on ‘A Traitor in Our Midst’ as Nick starts disseminating cruel spoofs of Freddy Ferret and blames Elliot when Mel finds them. Typically, the fallout is not at all what the creepy inker anticipated…

DeStefano & Wray then delineate ‘Carrie’s Time’ as the letterer’s Indie diary strip is optioned for an animation show. Mel’s jealous interference at first seems selfish but there’s a few surprises in store for everybody concerned, after which Wray solos on ‘Carrie’s Comic Diary Storyboards’, detailing why this particular show was never going to fly…

‘Behold, the Peerless Penciller’ (DeStefano art) then focuses on shy, retiring Alfred as Millie encourages him to follow his superhero dreams: even self-publishing his comicbook for him. Following a hilarious cameo from Charles Burns the depressed kid listens to the wrong advice and tries to change his beloved Fights ‘n’ Tights style to chase the Manga comics dragon…

‘Millie the Enabler’ (drawn by Stephanie Gladden and inked by Jim Blanchard) then reveals the pressure the unappreciated sister is under as a romantic interest enters her life. Mel’s constant neediness almost scuppers the relationship until Carrie offers to pinch hit for her…

This chapter is accompanied by a page of “Alfred’s” manga doodles courtesy of that man Wray…

Johnny Ryan joins the team to illustrate ‘The Wrong Dates’ after Elliot correctly assesses his male co-workers as virgins and Carrie decides to help the unlovely – and possibly unlovable – comic geeks out by arranging meetings with some of her unattached female friends.

‘Freddy Gets “Edgy”’ (Gladden & Blanchard) finds Elliot at last a published strip cartoonist, prompting Mel to consider updating the ever-unchanging Ferret. First though he’s going to hire a focus group to evaluate the proposed changes…

‘A Convention to Remember’ is an all-Bagge affair as Mel is gulled into attending a Comics Expo. He was told he was to be Guest of Honour, but the organisers never said he would be the only one…

Drowning amidst a sea of nerds, pimples, body-odour, desperation and fanaticism, the sweatshop team individually experience their private hells (meek Alfred adopted by a sexy fan chick, Carrie finding her very own stalker and Nick having to talk to people) until somebody suggests setting Neil Gaiman’s pants on fire…

In ‘I Have No Son!’ (illustrated by Ryan), the salutary glimpses into our magic universe come to a close when the kids discover the grotesque bum regularly dumpster-diving outside the studio has a personal connection to Mel. However, there’s far more going on than meets the eye – or the nostrils – and a distressing reunion leads to soft-hearted Carrie befriending the bum’s mum in ‘The Ex’ (Gladden & Blanchard).

Before too long she knows why Mel divorced her…

A wicked cruel “Nick Calamari” sidebar (by Wray again) details ‘It’s the Adventures of… The Meddler starring Miss Carrie Big Buttinsky’ and the gloriously baroque carton Commedia dell’arte concludes with ‘Mel + Irene’s First Date’ (Gladden & Blanchard) which harks back to Spring 1973 when a shy, aspiring cartoonist made the rather rash move that started his little empire going…

Barbed, raucous and superbly outrageous, this marvellous warts-and-all comedic comics-industry expose is an ideal object and object lesson for everyone who ever considered indulging in the funniest of funny businesses.
© 2015 Peter Bagge. This edition © 2015 Fantagraphics Books Inc.

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A Treasury of Victorian Murder Compendium II


By Rick Geary (NBM/ComicsLit)
ISBN: 978-1-56163-907-6

Master cartoonist Rick Geary is a unique presence in both comics and true crime literature. His compelling dissections – in the form of graphic novel reconstructions – of some of the most infamous and groundbreaking murder mysteries since policing began never fail to beguile or entertain.

His unblinking eye has, of late, been examining the last hundred years or so in his Treasury of XXth Century Murder series, but Geary first began his graphic assignations with Mankind’s darker aspects in a delicious anthologised tome entitled A Treasury of Victorian Murder in 1987. That initial volume and three of the eight that succeeded it (Jack the Ripper, The Fatal Bullet and The Beast of Chicago) were re-issued in 2012 as a splendidly morbid monochrome deluxe hardback – because, after all, bloody murder is always a black and white affair…

At last, more of his most compelling past triumphs have been gathered into a second blockbusting 400 page black-&-white hardback to delight fans of the genre and, without a shadow of a doubt, make new converts out of the as yet unconvinced…

Combining a superlative talent for laconic prose, incisive observation and meticulously detailed pictorial extrapolation with his fascination with the ruthless propensities of humans throughout history, Geary’s forensic eye has scoured police blotters, newspaper archives and even history books to compile more irresistibly infectious social sins and felonious infractions.

Moreover, his unique cartooning style is the perfect medium to convey the starkly factual narratives in a memorable, mordant and undeniably enjoyable manner. Each epic endeavour is accompanied by an Introduction and scholarly Bibliography, with most adaptations also offering splendidly informative maps and diagrams to set the stories firmly in place.

Starting off this catalogue of crime is The Borden Tragedy, dissecting the wealth of details surrounding one of the most infamous – if not mythic – crimes ever perpetrated.

In Fall River, Massachusetts on August 4th 1892, prosperous self-made man Andrew Borden and his second wife Abby were found slain inside their own home. Death in both cases was caused by multiple axe blows.

Rather than his later neutral narrative stance, here Geary illustrates the “first-hand account” of an acquaintance of youngest daughter Lizzie Borden who, after much inept investigation and public speculation, was settled upon by the authorities as the likeliest suspect.

The various suppositions, theories, scandals and gossip-points are scrupulously examined as she stands trial for the crimes – a case muddled by a subsequent axe-murder whilst Lizzie was in custody – and follows her through the much-protracted case, past her acquittal to her eventual death in 1927…

The graphic re-enactment is accompanied by a copious photo and text section featuring a wealth of ‘Press Clippings of the Time’ as well as a reproduction of ‘Borden’s Indictment’ and The Boston Advertiser article on her eventual “Not Guilty” verdict. The Mystery of Mary Rogers concerns the assault and murder of a New York City cigar shop girl which mesmerised the citizenry in 1841. Such was the furore that author Edgar Allen Poe appropriated the events for his C. Auguste Lupin tale The Mystery of Marie Roget: a rather unwise move since he knew the deceased and opened himself up to loudly-voiced suspicions of complicity…

The facts are that on the 28th July 1841, a number of well-to do citizens left stifling Manhattan Island for the Jersey Shore and discovered the body of the “Segar Girl” floating in the Hudson; battered, strangled and with her hands tied across her chest.

A hasty autopsy and even quicker inquest, held under insultingly cavalier circumstances, produced no culprits or suspects but somehow managed to throw suspicion on everyone from the men who pulled her out of the water to her drunken suicidal fiancé and even her own mother…

A talking point for all and sundry from the highest society paragon to the lowliest street trash, her death produced ever-more scandalous revelations and groundless lewd rumours – all scrupulously explored by Geary – over the next few years but the case remains unsolved still…

The Saga of the Bloody Benders began in largely unsettled Kansas, in the period immediately following the American Civil War, after a family of German-speaking immigrants settled near the Osage Trail. There they built a General Store-&-Hotel equidistant between the nascent townships of Cherry Vale, Parsons and Thayer.

By the time they vanished four years later, provably ten but probably many, many more travellers and settlers had been robbed and murdered. Thereafter, the insalubrious Benders simply vanished from the sight of man…

Geary, with supreme style and dry wit, presents the facts and the best of the rumours in his inimitable cartoon style to create yet another unforgettable masterpiece of Gothic whimsy.

The Case of Madeleine Smith focused on the true and scandalous secret affair between Emile L’Anglier, a low-born French clerk, and prim, proper, eminently respectable Miss Madeleine Smith, daughter of a wealthy Scottish merchant.

The slow poisoning of the Gallic Romeo led to a notorious trial in the 19th century and the eventual verdict shocked everyone and satisfied nobody….

The entrancing chronicle of carnage and venality concludes with the epic account of The Murder of Abraham Lincoln, covering the 62 days from 4th March to May 4th 1865 when actor John Wilkes Booth and a band of like-minded Confederate patriots schemed to murder the President (and other Northern politicians they held responsible for the destruction of the South), and how their wild plot came to startling, implausible fruition…

Following the Inauguration Ceremony for his second Term of Office, the normally fatalistic and security-disparaging President Lincoln was troubled by unease, disquiet and dreams of assassination, possible generated by the sack-full of death threats stored by his Secretary John Hay.

Elsewhere Secessionist sympathiser Booth was planning a blow for revenge and personal immortality but increasingly found his co-conspirators a disappointing bunch. Driven and desperate, he persevered for his cause…

All the many players are scrutinised in Geary’s careful examination and the peculiar circumstances which left Lincoln vulnerable are counterbalanced by insights and minutiae provided into his less-than-fanatical killers.

Only one of the many assassinations planned by the Secessionist cabal came to anything, and following the foul deed, grisly death-watch and post mortem, Geary’s depiction of the bold but inept manhunt which followed is capped by Booth’s satisfyingly dramatic end, leaving nothing but the artist’s masterful summing up to ask the questions nobody has answered yet and leave us all with the certain knowledge that this too is a murder still largely unsolved…

These compelling cold cases are a perfect example of how graphic narrative can be so much more than simplistic fantasy entertainment, and such merrily morbid murder masterpieces as these should be mandatory reading for every mystery addict and crime collector.

Such seductive storytelling, erudite argument and audacious drawing produce an irresistible dash and verve which makes for unforgettable reading: Geary is a unique talent in the comic industry, as much for his style as his subject matter and methodology in telling tales. Always presenting both facts and the theories – contemporary and modern – with chilling graphic precision, captivating clarity and devastating dry wit, he attacks criminology’s greatest mysteries with a force and power even Oliver Stone would envy.
© 1997-2007, 2015 Rick Geary.

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The Physics of Super Heroes – Spectacular Second Edition


By James Kakalios (Duckworth Overlook)
ISBN: 978-0-71563-911-5

I grew up in the 1960s reading a lot of comics – as well as books, papers, bubble gum cards, magazines, cereal packs and sweet wrappers. With so few other distractions, the printed word – with or without attendant illustrations – held a magic no other medium could match, no matter how much my oversized nostalgia glands tell me I still need Space Patrol, Twizzle or Champion the Wonder Horse in my rapidly decelerating life…

One thing my parents and the nuns at primary school noticed – apart from ink-stained fingers – was that I always seemed to have a fount of scientific snippets at my beck and call. That’s clearly the same experience physics professor and author James Kakalios recalls – except perhaps the nuns and Twizzle parts.

As explained in his Foreword and Preface, Silver Age comicbooks – especially those published by National/DC – were honeycombed with scientific and historical features and anecdotes whilst the stories, mostly written by jobbing pulp science fiction writers like John Broome, Gardner Fox, Alfred Bester, Edmond Hamilton, Otto Binder and others, all emphasised a world of physical rationalism – albeit one loaded with aliens, mutants, monsters and flying guys in capes and perpetually suspended disbelief…

Thus our topic for today is the splendid second edition of his oddly captivating text using extracts from comicbooks to highlight and explain the basic principles of how reality works. Sadly he also tells us where – and exactly why – superpowers and Fights ‘n’ Tights shenanigans are strictly hot air, wishful thinking and pure Balonium…

Working from a genuinely funny script (remember when teachers were allowed to be funny in class?) and utilising forthright and not at all forced comparisons, examples and illustrations, Kakalios translates his copious knowledge of comics continuity to detail everything you – and most importantly your kids – need to know. It begins, following a Foreword by Lawrence M. Krauss and brace of Prefaces (to the First and Second Editions), with Introduction: Secret Origins: How Science Saved Superhero Comic Books recounting the most important facts of all: how comics were created and evolved…

After that it’s a spectacularly engaging tumble through the discipline (each with an appropriate – and suitably summarised – comics event whether your background and major is primarily Science or Costumed Drama) beginning with Section 1 and all you need to understand about Mechanics…

Subsection 1. Up, Up and Away: Forces and Motion features Superman, whilst 2. Deconstructing Krypton: Newton’s Law of Gravity moves off-planet to glean the truth about his vaporised home before 3. The Day Gwen Stacy Died: Impulse and Momentum at last explains Spider-Man’s big mistake on that tragic night.

Running up walls and across water gets a thumbs-up in 4. Flash Facts: Friction, Drag and Sound, Ant-Man‘s shrinking comes under a microscope in 5. If This Be My Density: Properties of Matter and 6. So He Talks to Fishes. Want to Make Something of It?: Fluid Mechanics considers Aquaman and Sub-Mariner‘s surprisingly difficult trick of breathing underwater as well the pressures of the job…

Although he makes it look easy, 7. Can He Swing from a Thread?: Centripetal Acceleration examines the forces in play when Spidey goes web-wandering whilst 8. Can Ant-Man Punch his way Out of a Paper Bag?: Torque and Rotation handles the problems of sustained strength and diminished height as well as how Spidey can jump so far whereas 9. The Human Top Goes Out for a Spin: Angular Momentum reveals why Whirlwind and the Top should be the most powerful bad guys in town…

10. Is Ant-Man Deaf, Dumb and Blind?: Simple Harmonic Motion covers how a host of shrinking super-folk could communicate with the larger world after which 11. Like a Flash of Lightning: Special Relativity wraps up the easy stuff with a round-up of the Scarlet Speedsters top tricks…

Section 2 – Energy – Heat and Light concentrates on scalar physical quantities (look at me showing off!) with 12. The Central City Diet Plan: Conservation of Energy as the sources of Flash’s vivid vitality are divined, whilst Ant-Man and the Atom are thoroughly quizzed on 13. The Case of the Missing Work: The Three Laws of Thermodynamics before Iceman and Storm are drafted in to discuss 14. Mutant Meteorology: Conduction and Convection.

15. How the Monstrous Menace of the Mysterious Melter Makes Dinner Preparation a Breeze: Phase Transitions is a quick briefing on how materials can be made to change states, after which the most visually iconic powers in comics are called up for 16. Electro’s Clinging Way’s: Electrostatics, 17. Superman Schools Spider-Man: Electrical Currents, 18. How Electro becomes Magneto when he Runs: Ampere’s Law, 19. How Magneto becomes Electro when he Runs: Magnetism and Faraday’s Law and 20. Electro and Magneto do the Wave: Electromagnetism and Light

The lesson endeth by bringing us cosmologically up-to-date with Section 3 РModern Physics and the inevitable team-up of Doctor Doom and Max Planck for 21. Journey into the Microverse: Atomic Physics, whilst Erwin Schr̦dinger does or does not lend his weight to theories of parallel Earths and time travel in 22. Not a Dream! Not a Hoax! Not an Imaginary Tale!: Quantum Mechanics, before Kitty Pride and the Golden Age Flash go through a helpful phase in 23. Through a Wall Lightly: Tunneling Phenomena.

It only remains to take a look at the stuff we build – and build with – in 24. Sock it to Shellhead: Solid-State Physics and 25. The Costumes are Super, Too: Materials Science to bring this foundation course in physically measurable existence to a satisfactory conclusion…

Nonetheless education never ends and Section 4 – What Have We Learned? brings us what we’ve all really been waiting for in 26. Me Am Bizarro!: Superhero Bloopers. This is where you can find out if the things you think of as the daftest in comics can be compared to what an accredited thinkologist can prove, and I’m personally pleased to find that two of my all-time “yeah, buts…” and “oh, come ons…” have at last been countersigned by an expert. Of course there were a whole bunch more that I missed…

Kakalios winningly wraps up his delicious brain-expanding exercise with the Afterword: Lo, There Shall Be An Ending! but can’t resist giving further opportunities to get smarter and more rounded with Recommended Reading – happily that’s a list of great comics as well as key texts – and, just like hair product commercials there’s even a genuine “science bit” as Key Equations list the fundamental magic formulas you need to conquer the world or pass a test. There’s even a section of Notes, Acknowledgements and an Index to make this seem more like a proper book but they can’t diminish the glee and wonderment one iota…

Filled with penetrating insights and explanations of how this universe really works with illustrations from a pantheon of America’s greatest comics-makers (yes, there is a little bit of maths – but not enough to trouble even a bright 7-year old) this a brilliantly accessible tome no comics-loving kid should be without. Tell them teacher said so.
© 2009 James Kakalios. All rights reserved.

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Valerian and Laureline book 8: Heroes of the Equinox


By Méziéres & Christin, with colours by E. Tranlé; translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-213-3

Valérian and Laureline is the most influential science fiction comics series ever created; an innovation-packed, Big-Ideas bonanza stuffed with wry observation, knowing humour, intoxicating action and underpinned throughout by sardonic sideswipes at contemporary mores and prejudices.

Val̩rian: Spatio-Temporal Agent debuted in weekly Pilote #420 (November 9th 1967) and was an instant hit. It swiftly evolved into its current designation as his feisty, fire-headed female sidekick developed into the equal partner Рand eventually scene-stealing star Рof light-hearted, fantastically imaginative, visually stunning, time-travelling, space-warping fantasies.

Nevertheless the so-sophisticated series always found room to propound a satirical, humanist ideology and agenda, launching telling fusillades of political commentary and social satire to underpin the astounding imagination of the space opera.

At first the tough, bluff, taciturn affably, capable – if unimaginative – by-the-book space cop just did his job: tasked with protecting official universal chronology (at least as per Terran Empire standards) by intercepting or counteracting paradoxes caused by incautious time-travellers.

When Valérian landed in 11th century France during debut tale ‘Les Mauvais Rêves (‘Bad Dreams’ and infuriatingly still not translated into English), he was rescued from doom by a capable young woman named Laureline. He brought her back to the 28th century super-citadel and administrative capital, Galaxity, where the indomitable firebrand took a crash course in spatiotemporal operations and began accompanying him on his missions.

Heroes of the Equinox was originally serialised in the monthly Pilote (issues #M47 to M50 from 21st March to June 27th 1978) before being collected later that year as eighth album Les héros de l’équinoxe: a sparkling, over-the-top spoof of superheroes and political ideologies which also found time and space to take a good-natured, gentle poke at the eternal battle of the sexes.

Spectacularly visual and imaginatively designed, the story starts as a quartet of vastly disparate planetary champions depart for the distant and distressed world of Simlane, where an ancient and cultivated civilisation is experiencing a uniquely tragic crisis…

The heroes comprise three dedicated – almost fanatical – supermen whilst Galaxity – far more concerned with courting public opinion than actually helping – have packed off a handy and presently unoccupied Spatio-Temporal agent named Valerian, just to show willing…

With Laureline mocking him for the entire trip, Earth’s Prime Champion touches down on Simlane to be greeted by a crowd of effusive oldsters from a glorious city of once magnificent but now crumbling edifices with an incredible story to tell.

The inhabitants of the derelict tourist trap are uniformly old and sterile and desperately need a new generation of children to repopulate the world, but their manner of achieving their goal is unique. For the lifetime of their civilisation, every hundred equinoxes the best and bravest males of Simlane venture to isolated Filine, Island of Children in a fierce and often deadly competition. The winner then somehow spawns a whole new generation who sail back on little boats to re-people the world.

That didn’t go entirely according to plan last time so the planetary leaders have invited four prime specimens from other worlds to do the necessary this time – much to the anger and dismay of a creaky host of crotchety, doddering indigenous old would-be sire-heroes…

At the packed but painfully weathered Great Theatre the assembled geriatrics are treated to a destructive floor show as the brazen alien warriors display their prowess. Bombastic Irmgaal of Krahan is a godlike superman wielding a flaming sword whilst proletarian technological wonder Ortzog of worker’s paradise Boorny reveals the power of a united people through his blazing, flailing chains. Mystic nature boy Blimflim of elysian, arcadian Malamum calmly displays the gentle irresistibility of the spirit harnessed to willpower. Each couldn’t be more different yet the result of each display is catastrophic destruction.

When eager eyes turn to Galaxity’s representative, Valerian simply shoots a chip off a distant stone cornice with his blaster… to tumultuous disinterest…

Dwarfed by the Herculean alien supermen, he shambles off to prepare for the great contest and dawn finds him with his fellow contestants ready to brave the stormy skies for the grand prize and glory…

This is one of the most visually extravagant and exuberant of all the albums, with a huge proportion of the book dedicated to the fantastic foursome overcoming their particular challenges and monstrous foes in astounding demonstrations of bravura puissance and awesome might… well, three of them anyway. The earthman’s travails are generally nasty, dirty smelly and ingloriously dangerous…

Eventually however all the warriors prove themselves a credit to their particular lineage and system before facing one final test. It’s in the form of a simple question: “If you sired the next generation how do you envision their future?”

Each strange visitor propounds a glorious agenda of expansion according to the customs and principles of his own culture but it’s the rather diffident and lacklustre vision of the Terran slacker that wins the approval of the incredible being who is the eternal mother of Simlane’s repopulation…

When the trio of failed supermen wash up on the shores of the city, the people realise who has fathered their soon-to-arrive new sons and daughters and patiently wait for the equinox tide to bring them over.

Laureline, horrified to discover that each successful father is never seen again, quickly sails to the Island of Children and navigates the trials which so tested the wonder men with comparative ease. She arrives at the misty citadel atop Filine in time to see an army of disturbingly familiar-looking toddlers tumble into little sailboats…

Broaching the idyllic paradise further she finally meets the Great Mother and sees what the breeding process has made of her reprehensible, sleazy, typically male partner…

Reaching an accommodation with the gargantuan progenitor, Laureline negotiates the release of her partner and they are soon winging home to Terra, with him having to listen to just what she thinks of him whilst praying Galaxity’s medical experts can make him again the man he so recently was…

Sharp, witty and deliciously over-the-top, this tale is a wry delight, spoofing with equanimity human drives, notions of heroism and political and philosophical trendiness with devastating effect. Whether super-heroic fascism, totalitarian socialism or even the woolly mis-educated, miscomprehendings of new age eco-fundamentalists who think aromatherapy cures broken legs or that their kids are too precious to be vaccinated and too special to share herd immunity, no sacred cow is left soundly unkicked…

However, no matter how trenchant, barbed, culturally aware and ethically crusading, Valerian and Laureline stories never allow message to overshadow fun and wonder and Heroes of the Equinox is one of the most entertaining sagas Méziéres & Christin ever concocted, complete with a superb sting in the tale…

Between 1981 and 1985, Dargaud-Canada and Dargaud-USA published a number of selected albums in English (with a limited UK imprint from Hodder-Dargaud) under the umbrella title Valerian: Spatiotemporal Agent and this was the fourth, translated then by L. Mitchell.

Although this modern Cinebook release boasts far better print and colour values plus a more fluid translation, total completists might also be interested in tracking down the 1983 edition too…
© Dargaud Paris, 1978 Christin, Méziéres & Tran-Lệ. All rights reserved. English translation © 2014 Cinebook Ltd.

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Usagi Yojimbo book 10: The Brink of Life and Death


By Stan Sakai (Dark Horse Comics)
ISBN: 978-1-56971-259-7

Usagi Yojimbo (“rabbit bodyguard”) first appeared as a background character in Stan Sakai’s The Adventures of Nilson Groundthumper and Hermy, which premiered in 1984 amongst assorted furry ‘n’ fuzzy folk Albedo Anthropomorphics #1. He subsequently graduated to a solo act in Critters, Amazing Heroes, Furrlough and the Munden’s Bar back-up series in Grimjack.

In 1955, when Sakai was two years old, the family moved from Kyoto, Japan to Hawaii. Growing up in a cross-cultural paradise he graduated from the University of Hawaii with a BA in Fine Arts, before leaving the state to pursue further studies at Pasadena’s Art Center College of Design in California.

His early forays into comics were as a letterer – most famously for the inimitable Groo the Wanderer – before his nimble pens and brushes found a way to express his passion for Japanese history, legend and the filmic works of Akira Kurosawa and his peers, inspirationally transforming a proposed story about a human historical hero into one of the most enticing and impressive fantasy sagas of all time.

And it’s still more educational, informative and authentic than any dozen Samurai sagas you can name…

Although the deliriously peripatetic and expansive period epic stars sentient animals and details the life of a peripatetic Lord-less Samurai eking out as honourable a living as possible by selling his sword as a Yojimbo (bodyguard-for-hire), the milieu and scenarios all scrupulously mirror the Feudal Edo Period of Japan (roughly 16th – 17th century AD by our reckoning) whilst simultaneously referencing other cultural icons from sources as varied as Zatoichi to Godzilla.

Miyamoto Usagi is brave, noble, industrious, honest, sentimental, gentle, artistic, empathetic, long-suffering and conscientious: a rabbit devoted to the tenets of Bushido, he is simply unable to turn down any request for help or ignore the slightest evidence of injustice. As such, his destiny is to be perpetually drawn into an unending panorama of incredible situations.

This evocative and enticing tenth black-&-white blockbuster collects yarns from Dark Horse Comics’ Usagi Yojimbo series (volume 3), #1-6 plus additional tales from issues #13, 15 and 16 from the previous Mirage iteration, aligning epic sagas of intrigue with brief vignettes attending to more plebeian dramas and even the occasional supernatural thriller, all tantalisingly tinged with astounding martial arts action and drenched in wit, irony, pathos and even true tragedy…

Following a heartfelt and enthusiastic Introduction from comics author Kurt Busiek, the ever-unfolding yarn resumes with a handy recap in ‘Origin Tale’ summarising the valiant wanderer’s fraught life to date before ‘Kaisō’ finds Miyamoto Usagi befriending a seaweed farmer who’s experiencing a spot of bother with his neighbours…

At peace with himself amongst hard-toiling peasants, Usagi becomes embroiled in their escalating battle with a village of rival seaweed sellers – previously considered helpful and friendly – and soon realises scurrilous merchant Yamanaka is fomenting unrest between his suppliers to make extra profit…

‘A Meeting of Strangers’ in a roadside hostelry introduces a formidable female warrior to the constantly expanding cast as the Lepine Legend graciously offers a fellow weary mendicant the price of a drink. A professional informer then sells Usagi out to the still-smarting Yamanaka and the lethally capable Inazuma has ample opportunity to repay her slight debt to the Rabbit Ronin when he’s ambushed by an army of hired brigands…

Far away a portentous interlude occurs as a simple peasant and his granddaughter are attacked by a band of bandits. The belligerent scum are about to compound extortion and murder with even more heinous crimes when a stranger with a ‘Black Soul’ stops them…

Jei is a veritable devil in mortal form, believing himself a “Blade of the Gods”, chosen by the Lords of Heaven to kill the wicked. The maniac makes a convincing case: when he stalked Usagi the manic monster was struck by a fortuitous – or possibly divinely sent – lightning bolt and still survived.

Still keen to continue his crusade, the monster deals most emphatically with the criminals before allowing orphaned granddaughter Keiko to join him…

Despite – or perhaps because – it is usually one of the funniest comics on the market, occasionally Usagi Yojimbo can brilliantly twist readers’ expectations with tales that rip your heart apart.

Such is the case with ‘Noodles’ as the nomadic Ronin meets again street performer, shady entertainer and charismatic pickpocket Kitsune who has begun plying all her antisocial trades in a new town just as eternally-wandering Usagi turns up.

The little metropolis is in uproar at a plague of daring robberies and when the inept men employed by Yoriki (Assistant Commander) Masuda try – and painfully fail – to arrest the long-eared stranger as a probable accomplice, the ferociously resistant ronin earns the instant enmity of the pompous official.

Following the confrontation, a hulking, mute soba (buckwheat noodle) vendor begins to pester the still-annoyed rabbit and eventually reveals he’s carrying the elegant Kitsune in his baskets…

Astounded the Yojimbo renews his acquaintance with her before the affable thieves go on their way, but trouble and tragedy are just around the corner…

The town magistrate is leaning heavily on his Yoriki to end the crime wave but has no conception that Masuda is actually in the pay of a vicious gang carrying out most of the thefts. What they all need a convincing scapegoat to pin the blame on and poor dumb peasant Noodles is ideal – after all, he can’t even deny his guilt…

With a little sacrificed loot planted, he becomes the perfect patsy and before Usagi and Kitsune even know he’s been taken, the simple fool has been tried and horrifically executed…

‘Noodles Part 2’ opens as they frantically dash for the public trial and almost immediate crucifixion but pickpocket and ronin can do nothing to save the innocent victim. All they can do is swear to secure appropriate vengeance and justice…

In sober mien the rabbit roves on, stumbling into a house of horror and case of possession as ‘The Wrath of the Tangled Skein’ finds Usagi returning to a region plagued by demon-infested forests. Offered hospitality at a merchant’s house he subsequently saves the daughter from doom at the claws of a demonic Nue (tiger/fox/pig/snake devil).

He is almost too late however and only alerted to a double dose of danger when a Bonze (Buddhist Priest) arrives to exorcise the poor child… just like the one already praying over the afflicted waif upstairs…

This duel with the forces of hell leads into ‘The Bonze’s Story’ as Usagi strikes up a friendship with the true priest and learns how misfortune and devotion to honour compelled elite samurai Sanshobo to put aside weapons and war in search of greater truths and inner peace…

Political intrigue and explosive espionage resurface in ‘Bats, the Cat, & the Rabbit’ as Neko ninja chief Chizu re-enters Usagi’s life, fleeing a flight of rival Komori (bat) ninjas. The winged horrors are determined to take a scroll containing the secrets of making gunpowder and after a tremendous, extended struggle the exhausted she-cat cannot believe her rabbit companion is willing to hand it over. She soon shrugs it off. After all the Komori have fallen into her trap and quickly regret testing the purloined formula …

The peripatetic Yojimbo then walks into a plot to murder Great Lord Miyagi involving infallible unseen assassin Kuroshi at ‘The Chrysanthemum Pass’. He is simply aiding karma to a just outcome despite overwhelming odds and a most subtle opponent… This chronicle then sees a return engagement with the lethally adept Inazuma when ‘Lightning Strikes Twice’…

The hunted woman is always at the heart of a storm of hired blades trying to kill her, but during one peaceful moment she finds a little time to share with a fellow swordsmaster the instructive tale of a dutiful daughter who married the wrong samurai and, by exacting rightful vengeance upon his killer, won the undying hatred of a powerful lord…

Despite changing publishers a number of times, the Roaming Rabbit has been in continuous publication since 1987, with more than 30 collections and books to date. He has guest-starred in many other series (most notably Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and its TV incarnation) and nearly made it into his own small-screen show.

There are high-end collectibles, art prints, computer games and RPGs, a spin-off sci-fi comics serial and lots of toys. Sakai and his creation have won numerous awards both within the Comics community and amongst the greater reading public.

Fast-paced yet lyrical, informative and funny, the saga alternately bristles with tension and thrills and frequently crushes your heart with astounding tales of pride and tragedy, evil and duty.

Bursting with veracity and verve, Usagi Yojimbo is the perfect comics epic: a monolithic magical saga irresistibly appealing that will delight devotees and make converts of the most hardened haters of “funny animal” stories.
© 1998 Stan Sakai. Usagi Yojimbo is a registered trademark of Stan Sakai. All rights reserved.

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Twin Spica volume 6


By Kou Yaginuma (Vertical)
ISBN: 978-1-935654-03-2

This beguilingly intimate paean to the unyielding allure of the stars came out of Kou Yaginuma’s poignant vignette ‘2015 Nen no Uchiage Hanabi’ (‘2015: Fireworks’), published in Gekkan Comic Flapper magazine in June 2000.

Subsequently expanded and enhanced, the themes and characters grew into a spellbinding coming-of-age epic which wedded hard science and humanist fiction with lyrical mysticism wrapped up in traditional tales of school-days friendships and growing up.

Small, unassuming Asumi Kamogawa has always dreamed of going into space. From her earliest moments the lonely child gazed with intense longing up at the stars, her constant companion and confidante an imaginary friend dubbed Mr. Lion.

When Asumi was a year old, the first Japanese space launch had ended in catastrophe after rocket-ship Shishigō (“The Lion”) exploded: crashing back to earth on the city of Yuigahama where the Kamogawas lived. Hundreds were killed and many more injured.

Among the cruellest casualties was Asumi’s own mother. Maimed and comatose, the matron took years to die and the long, drawn-out tragedy deeply traumatised her tiny, uncomprehending daughter. The shock also crushed her grieving husband who had worked as a designer on the rockets for Japan’s fledgling Space Program.

In the wake of the disaster, Tomoro Kamogawa was assigned by the corporation who had built the ship to head the reparations committee. Guilt-wracked and personally bereaved, the devastated technologist visited and formally apologised to each and every survivor or victim’s grieving family. The experience harrowed and crushed him.

He is certainly no fan of the space program now; having lost his wife, his beloved engineering career and his pride to the race for the heavens. He raised his daughter alone, working two – and often three – menial jobs at a time for over a decade and cannot countenance losing the very last of his loved ones to the cold black heavens…

In response to the Lion disaster, Japan set up an Astronautics and Space Sciences Academy. After years of passionate struggle and in defiance of her father’s wishes, in 2024 Asumi – an isolated, solitary, serious but determined teenager – was accepted to the Tokyo National Space School. Without her father’s blessing, she reluctantly left Yuigahama and joined the new class.

Amongst the year’s fresh intake were surly, abrasive Shinnosuke Fuchuya (an elementary school classmate who used to bully her as a child back in Yuigahama), jolly Kei Oumi, chilly Marika Ukita and spooky, ultra-cool style-icon and fashion victim Shu Suzuki who all gradually became the shy introvert’s closest acquaintances.

Every day Asumi closed inexorably upon her stellar goal. Ever since the crashing rocket had shattered her family, she had drawn comfort from the firmament, with Mr. Lion staring up at the heavens by her side; both especially drawn to the twinkling glow of Virgo and the alluring binary star Spica.

And now she was so tantalisingly close…

Small, poor, physically weak but resolutely capable, Asumi endures and triumphs over every obstacle and she still talks with Mr. Lion – who is very probably the ghost of a Shishigō crewman…

All any student at the Academy can think of is going to space, but they are harshly and constantly reminded that most of them won’t even finish their schooling. At just four feet, eight inches tall Asumi constantly struggles to meet the arduous physical requirements but has already survived far greater problems. She is still adjusting to the busy life of Tokyo, sleeps in tawdry communal women’s dorm “The Seagull”, struggles with many of her classes and subsists on meagre funds, supplemented by part-time jobs…

Individual stories are divided into “Missions” with volume six covering numbers 25-29, and also including a mesmerising sidebar tale of Asumi’s childhood as well as another entrancing autobiographical vignette from the author’s own teenage years.

‘Mission: 25’ begins with standoffish Ukita in big trouble in the deep woods. Asumi’s entire class are enduring a brutal survival exercise in the wilds but the former rich girl – who has recently escaped her overbearing father’s domination – also suffers from some secret mystery malady. Moreover she has recently decided to go off her meds.

Now she is weak and bleeding, lost where no one can help her…

As the carefully monitoring teachers move in to save Ukita, Asumi reaches her classmates at the designated target zone. They are astounded to find that she has made her way to them without the compass they all had in their survival kits…

With only Ukita a no-show, Asumi abandons her own position of safety to go back into the woods and search for her, unaware that the object of her concern is slowly recovering at the teachers’ monitoring post.

As previously seen in a sequence of flashbacks, the enigmatic girl has an ancient and unexplained connection to the boy who became Mr. Lion…

Long ago in Yuigahama, a lad obsessed with rockets met a frail and sickly rich girl, stuck in isolation in a big house. Her name was Marika Ukita and they became friends despite her condition and the constant angry intervention of her father.

She was beguiled by his tales of space flight and the history of exploration, and shared the only joyous moment in her tragic life, when her over-protective dad took her to see a play called Beauty and the Beast…

During the big annual Fireworks Festival the boy made a lion-mask of the Beast to wear, but she never came. He had to break into the mansion to show her. She was very sick but wanted to dance with him…

Later the dying daughter had quietly rebelled when told she was being packed off to a Swiss sanatorium. She slipped out of the house when no-one was watching and vanished. The boy knew where she had gone and rushed off to save her…

In the Now as slowly recovering Cadet Ukita see her classmates all head back into danger for her, she experiences awful memories: visions of a man wealthy enough to replace a lost daughter through money and science but not show her any love. Furious yet inexplicably delighted, Ukita begins to realise that she has friends who will risk everything for her…

‘Mission: 26’ finds the exhausted little astronaut-to-be back home safely at the Seagull hostel, blithely unaware that romantically interested party Kiriu and his fellow orphan Akane have been missing their Asumi.

Instead she is busy teaching Ukita – still plagued with memories of her father’s draconian efforts to keep her healthy but never caring if she was happy – how to be sociable. Soon they realise how much they share in respect to love of the stars…

Asumi’s joy soon dissipates when she learns of Kiriu’s latest crisis and that little sister Akane has been hospitalised with sunstroke. The determined tyke was sitting outside waiting for her astronaut friend to visit…

Returning to the orphanage that night Kiriu is astounded to find Asumi there, and even more astonished when she invites him to come see the stars with her…

‘Mission: 27’ offers more insight into Mr. Lion’s past as a special guest lecturer visits the Space School. Astronaut Ryohei Haijima is a god to the star-struck kids but he seems almost apologetic and embarrassed to be there, with no pride in his achievements.

Mr. Lion knows his story. As boys they were at school together and worked on rocketry projects that gave them both ineffable pleasure. They both became astronauts, and if Haijima hadn’t artfully relinquished his position to the desperately eager Lion, he would have died in the Shishigō disaster.

On hearing this, Asumi decides to reintroduce the despondent victim of Survivor’s Guilt to his boyhood friend…

Focus shifts to ultra-cool Shu Suzuki with ‘Mission: 28’ as the laconic rich kid goes missing for a week whilst his classmates suffer the next devilish practical course devised by their tutors to separate potential space explorers from ordinary mortals. Concerned, they all begin searching for him and learn an extraordinary story.

Suzuki too has problems with parents. As the first son of a wealthy business and political dynasty he was groomed from birth to inherit the mantles of duty and government, but when he refused and chose the stars he was disowned. As his friends converge on the lost boy he invites them all to sit with him and fold origami stars, wryly revealing he’s been working for the past week to pay for his tuition…

The ongoing saga pauses here after ‘Mission: 28’ finds the class practising in a space shuttle trainer. As usual the tests are rigged, unfair and a complete surprise but as she bitterly complains – as always – Oumi realises that a strange calmness and complacency has become Ukita’s new emotional state.

Stressed to their limits the students look forward to the imminent summer vacation and when Oumi stridently suggests they all head for the beach together, Fuchuya states he has to go home. Undaunted, Oumi points out that Yuigahama is a seaside town – and must have a beach – whilst Asumi reminds them that the town’s annual Fireworks Festival is forthcoming…

With the holiday plans a fait accompli, the kids separate and Ukita finds the irrepressible Suzuki moving his meagre belongings into the library. Soon all of them are helping him kit out the attic he intends to squat in, astounded at the beautiful book-crammed annexe, filled floor to ceiling with tomes about space…

And then it’s time for the holidays and Asumi heads back to Yuigahama, looking forward to the Festival and seeing Fuchuya’s wonderful grandfather again. She’s going to be very disappointed…

To Be Continued…

Although the main event goes into a holding pattern here, further insights into Asumi’s childhood are forthcoming as ‘Tiny, Tiny Aqua Star’ reveals how the little outcast was ostracised and bullied by her fellows for claiming she had an astronaut lion ghost for a friend. The unflaggingly honest waif never knew her shy classmate Shinnosuke Fuchuya was quietly keeping the worst of the class’s abuse away from her…

Life was still pretty unpleasant, however, but took a sweet upturn when old Mr. Fuchuya (the lad’s granddad) gave her one of his handmade sparklers to light at the Fireworks Festival.

More disturbing was the urgent and savage demand of one of her tormentors. Following the death of her mother, Yuzo wanted Asumi to show her the place where you see ghosts, even if it cost both their lives…

The manga miracles then conclude with ‘Another Spica’ which sees author Yaginuma in autobiographical mode once more, harking back to his ambition-free teens, chopping pineapples in his crappy job and enduring the self-castigating hell of a first date…

These unforgettable tales originally appeared in 2004 as Futatsu no Supika 6 in Seinen manga magazine Gekkan Comic Flapper, aimed at male readers aged 18-30, but this ongoing, unfolding saga is perfect for any older kid with stars in their eyes…

Twin Spica filled sixteen collected volumes from September 2001 to August 2009, tracing the trajectories of Asumi and friends from callow students to accomplished astronauts and has spawned both anime and live action TV series.

This sublime serial has everything: plenty of hard science to back up the informed extrapolation, an engaging cast, mystery, frustrated passion, alienation, angst, enduring friendships and just the right blend of spiritual engagement with wild-eyed wonder; all welded seamlessly into an evocative, addictive drama.

Rekindling the magical spark of the Wild Black Yonder for a new generation, this is a treat no imagineer with head firmly in the clouds can afford to miss…

© 2011 by Kou Yaginuma. Translation © 2011 Vertical, Inc. All rights reserved.
This book is printed in the Japanese right to left, back to front format.

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Orbital book 4: Ravages


By Serge Pellé & Sylvain Runberg, translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-088-7

Serge Pellé & Sylvain Runberg’s mismatched pair of Diplomatic Peacekeeper agents return in the conclusion of the sinister saga begun in Orbital: Nomads, subtly tweaking and deftly twisting that cunning epic of far-flung, futuristic political intrigue into a full-on horror story of relentless alien terror…

What you need to know: After decades of pariah-status and exclusion, 23rd century Earth finally joined a vast Confederation of interstellar civilisations, despite grave and abiding concerns about humanity’s aggressive nature and xenophobic tendencies shared by many of the member species. On Earth the feeling was largely mutual…

Prior to the humanity’s induction a militant “Isolationist” faction had graduated from politics to horrific terrorism: committing atrocities both on Earth and distant worlds where mankind had already developed colonies and bases. Ultimately they failed to prevent humanity’s inclusion in the pan-galactic union and were sidelined in global politics.

Neither they nor the ill-will they fostered really went away…

One particular Confederation worry was the way humans had treated the alien civilisation of the Sandjarrs, whose world was invaded in Earth’s all-consuming drive for territory and exploitable resources. The subsequent atrocities almost exterminated the stoic desert dwellers…

The vast bureaucracy of the Interworld Diplomatic Office works through operatives assigned in pairs to troubleshoot throughout the galaxy, defusing crises before they can become flashpoints of violence, and recently IDO’s first human recruit Caleb Swany had been surprisingly teamed with Sandjarr Mezoke Izzua: a situation clearly designed as a high-profile political stunt.

So was their initial mission: convincing an Earth mining colony on the moon Senestem to peacefully surrender a profitable planetary industry to the aliens who actually own the satellite it was situated on. Overcoming outrageous odds and problems, the unlikely team of rookies resolved the issue in true diplomatic manner with a minimum of casualties and nobody really happy or satisfied…

Released in France in 2010, Orbital: Ravages is the fourth album released by Cinebook and picks up as Caleb and Mezoke find a simple state function is rapidly devolving into an interspecies crisis…

The Galactic Great-and-Good are on Earth to confirm the end of Human/Sandjarr hostilities in a series of spectacular Reconciliation Ceremonies, but the political glad-handing is in danger of imploding after Kuala Lumpur’s human fisherman clash with a hitherto unsuspected enclave of star-spanning cannibalistic alien gypsies known as the Rapakhun…

One of the greatest benefits of induction into The Confederation has been the infusion of alien technologies which have cleansed and reinvigorated the gravely wounded ecosystem of long-abused and much-polluted Earth. Now, however, the newly restocked, abundant seas and mangrove swamps around Malaysia are blighted by the mass extinction of millions of valuable fish. The humans blame the uninvited aliens, requiring Swany and Mezoke – accompanied by Caleb’s old mentor Hector Ulrich (instrumental in brokering Earth into the Confederation) – to forcefully intervene; promising all aggrieved parties that the truth will be found and shared.

This might be tricky: much of mankind is still anti-alien, and local economies are fragile, whilst the Rapakhun are apparently no innocent angels. Many space civilisations despise them. The stellar nomads are flighty wanderers who go where they please and refuse to be represented in or on Confederation Councils.

Moreover, all the cosmic bigwigs on Earth are only concerned with their precious Reconciliation Ceremonies, looking good and validating their controversial decision to admit Earth to the Civilised Worlds of the galaxy…

Whilst Caleb and Mezoke are fully occupied with the freshly-arrived delegation of Sandjarr dignitaries, fish are still dying and when human fisherman get too close to the agreed-upon neutral zone they are suddenly exterminated, outraging many watching members of the Malaysian Navy.

Although Caleb attempts to downplay and even suppress the concatenation of bad news in hope of keeping the Ceremonies alive the slaughter of fishermen provokes a “patriotic” clique in the Navy peacekeeping force to look the other way when the locals decide to deal with the nomads once and for all…

The riots and bloodshed are appalling and the IDO agents realise they need to know more about the Rapakhun: someone needs to visit their last port of call and see what the nomads are really capable of…

The story resumes in the grimily cosmopolitan Shah Alam district of Kuala Lumpur where impoverished human and alien scrap-merchants work, salvaging materials and tech from defunct starships. As tensions rise everywhere, one of the greedy toilers makes a grisly discovery and dies horribly in exactly the same manner as the fishermen in the swamps…

Caleb meanwhile, over Mezoke’s protests, is in full-spin-control mode; weaving a pack of placatory lies to the journalists of uncounted watching worlds. Unable to leave Earth mid-crisis, the IDO agents have recruited enigmatic human star-pilot Nina and her secretly-sentient Neuronome ship Angus to canvas the distant world of Dehadato, last port of call of the nomadic Rapakhun, but before they can report anything a vast riot breaks out in the Shah Alam.

The Fishermen’s Quarter is ablaze, a war-zone rife with scared and angry humans and aliens, but when Caleb, Mezoke and Hector fly over the scene of destruction and looting they are brought down by rioters and have to fight their way out…

Thanks to IDO intervention, canny bargaining, judicious bribery by city officials and an unlikely detente between the extraterrestrial scrap merchants and ambitious new spokesman of the Fisherman’s Federation, the situation is soon damped down and all sides again tensely wait for answers…

On Dehadato Nina and Angus are exploring the Rapakhun’s last campsite and uncover scenes of horrific devastation, even as in Kuala Lumpur Confederation leaders are thinking about cutting their losses and cancelling the Reconciliation Ceremonies, terrified that the situation is fast becoming politically untenable.

It takes all of Caleb’s strident persuasiveness to convince them – and Mezoke – to continue the itinerary of events. However he only gets his first inkling that they might be right when he’s informed that a body as been found in the city, butchered in the same extreme and inexplicable manner as the fishermen in the swamp…

Back on Dehadato, Nina and Angus have rescued a poacher from the folly of his actions in pursuing monstrous, colossal and protected Nargovals. As the Sülfir recovers he imparts snippets of information about the stellar nomads and an incredible beast which was here before the Rapakhun left.

The doughty hunter only tried for the unstoppable leviathans which killed his entire poaching team after first ensuring there were no more Varosash on the planet. They had apparently departed with the gypsy cannibals…

Caleb has already concluded that the Rapakhun are behind all his problems, but as he stalks them in the Mangrove swamps, word comes from Nina that stops him in his tracks. It may already be too late though. At the biggest sports arena in the city, thousands of avid Speedball fans – human and not – are packed together and reaching a fever pitch of excitement, unaware that a hideous invisible killer, the very essence of all mankind’s fear of alien monsters, is about to consume them all…

Can the disunited Caleb and Mezoke with the pitifully few allies they can call upon end the invisible and rapacious threat before it ends humanity?

Nina and the Sülfir think they have a plan. Risky and probably fatal, but a plan nonetheless…

Fast-paced, action-packed, gritty and spectacular, Ravages is pure space-opera, with delightfully complex sub-plots fuelled by political intrigue and a vast unexplored canvas tantalising readers at very moment.

One of the most beguiling sci fi strips of all time, Orbital is a delight every fan of the future should indulge in…
Original edition © Dupuis 2010 by Runberg & Pellé. All rights reserved. English translation © 2011 by Cinebook Ltd.

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Orbital volume 3: Nomads


By Serge Pellé & Sylvain Runberg, translated by Jerome Saincantin (Cinebook)
ISBN: 978-1-84918-080-1

The truest thing that can be said about French science fiction is that it always delivers amazing style and panache even when the underlying premise might be less than original. In Serge Pellé & Sylvain Runberg’s beautiful Orbital series a seemingly-mismatched pair of Diplomatic Peacekeeper agents are deployed to quell incipient brushfire wars and mediate internal pressures within a vast pan-species intergalactic alliance, but the hoary “buddy-movie” format is a mere skeleton for eye-popping missions, star-spanning intrigue and intense personal interactions which are always are handled with deft wit and great imagination, never failing to carry the reader along in a blaze of fantastic fun…

What you need to know: after decades of pariah-status galactic exclusion, Earth in the 23rd century has finally been allowed to join a vast Confederation of interstellar civilisations, despite grave and abiding concerns about humanity’s aggressive nature and xenophobic tendencies.

A militant “Isolationist” faction on Earth had moved from politics to horrific terrorism in the immediate run-up to formal induction, committing atrocities both on Earth and distant worlds where mankind had developed colonies and mining bases, but ultimately they failed to prevent humanity’s inclusion in the pan-galactic union.

One particular Confederation worry was the way humans had treated the alien civilisation of the Sandjarrs, whose world was invaded in Earth’s all-consuming drive for territory and exploitable resources. The subsequent atrocities almost exterminated the stoic, pacifistic desert creatures…

Interworld Diplomatic Office operatives are assigned in pairs to troubleshoot throughout the galaxy, defusing crises before they can become flashpoints of violence. IDO’s first human recruit Caleb Swany had been surprisingly teamed with Sandjarr Mezoke Izzua, a situation clearly designed as a high-profile political stunt, as was their initial mission: convincing an Earth mining colony to surrender a profitable planetary mining industry back to the aliens who actually own the moon Senestem it was situated on…

Moreover, even though Earth is a now a member of the Confederation, with humans well placed in all branches of interstellar service, the Isolationist cause is still deeply cherished by many, needing only the slightest spark to reignite…

Orbital: Nomads is the third epic album published by Cinebook (originally released in 2009 as ‘Nomades’), and picks up soon after Caleb and Mezoke’s hard-won solution was implemented.

The Galactic Great-and-Good have arrived on Earth to very publicly celebrate and affirm the end of Human/Sandjarr hostilities in a series of spectacular Reconciliation Ceremonies, but the political glad-handing looks to be upstaged by another interspecies crisis…

One of the greatest benefits of induction into The Confederation has been the infusion of alien technologies which have cleansed and reinvigorated the ecosystem of long-abused and much-polluted Earth.

Now however an incident has occurred in the newly restocked, abundant seas and mangrove swamps around Malaysia, with the sudden death of millions of fish leading to a bloody clash between local fishermen and an unsuspected enclave of a race of nomadic space-gypsies called The Rapakhun…

In Kuala Lumpur Caleb is reminiscing with his old mentor Hector Ulrich – instrumental in brokering Earth into the Confederation and Swany into the Interworld Diplomatic Office – when news arrives of the trouble.

This will be tricky: much of mankind is still anti-alien, and locale economies are fragile, whilst the Rapakhun are no innocent angels. Many space civilisations despise them: the stellar nomads are flighty wanderers who go where they please, refuse to be represented in or on Confederation Councils and worst of all, practice cannibalism…

Many Confederation races despise them and by the time Caleb and Mezoke arrive on scene events have escalated and tensions heightened to fever pitch as a committee of human fishermen face off against Rapakhun spokeswoman Alkuun.

The ancient tries to explain that the problem was an escaped Elokarn. The wanderers’ gigantic domesticated aquatic beasts have all been excessively agitated since arriving on Earth…

With the Diplomatic Agents assuring all parties that tests are being undertaken to ascertain not only why the Elokarn went crazy but also why the fish are dying off again, the situation seems contained, but when Alkuun invites the human guests to join in their holy consumption of a still-living and eager Rapakhun male they are physically revolted.

No amount of explanation that the willing, deeply spiritual and hugely prestigious sacrifice is meant to strengthen and invigorate the gods of Earth can offset the grisly sight…

Returning to Kuala Lumpur, Mezoke and Caleb are anxious. Although the Malaysian Navy are policing the area, the IDO agents know full well the tenuous trust humans place in any alien species, but their attention is unfortunately diverted by the sudden arrival of Caleb’s old friend Lukas Vesely.

The scrawny teen of his youth has become a hulking, good-natured member of Ulrich’s security force and seems very keen to relive the good old days. Caleb, of course, has no idea of Lukas’ usual duties, which include brutally and mercilessly dealing with any isolationist protests which might give visiting aliens the wrong impression about Confederate Earth…

In the mangrove swamps fish are still dying and when another group of fisherman get too close to the agreed-upon neutral zone Ulrich’s forces overreact and vaporise them, outraging many watching members of the Malaysian Navy…

Caleb and Mezoke are otherwise fully occupied as the delegation of Sandjarr dignitaries have arrived. The aloof and stand-offish nature of the guests of honour provoke Mezoke to surly silence, and reports from Senestem take the shine off their supposed triumphant solution whilst test results from the mangrove swamps all prove inconclusive. No contamination of any sort has killed the fish: the culprit is some unknown form of energy…

Caleb attempts to downplay and even suppress the concatenation of bad news in hope of keeping the Reconciliation Ceremonies alive over Mezuke’s objections until she reveals a shocking truth about her life before joining IDO…

The death of the fishermen meanwhile has reached the populace and a “patriotic” clique in the Navy peacekeeping force has colluded to look the other way if the fishermen want to deal with the nomads once and for all…

By the time the IDO agents learn of the incursion the appalling bloodshed has ceased and, wading through a site of unspeakable carnage, Caleb and Mezuke decide to split up. The rapidly destabilising situation on Earth must be carefully managed but most crucial is to send an urgent investigation team to the last world the Rapakhun visited and find out exactly what the wanderers are really capable of…

To Be Continued…

Fast-paced, action-packed, gritty space-opera with delightfully complex sub-plots fuelled by political intrigue and infighting elevates this tale to lofty and exotic heights, proving Orbital to be a series well worth watching…
Original edition © Dupuis 2009 by Runberg & Pellé. All rights reserved. This edition published 2011 by Cinebook Ltd.

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Dirty Pair: Dangerous Acquaintances


By Toren Smith & Adam Warren (Manga Books)
ISBN: 978-1-900097-06-0 (UK edition)

In the fast and furious future of 2141AD, intergalactic proliferation of human civilisation has led to a monumental bureaucracy, greater corruption and more deadly criminals preying upon the citizens of the United Galactica.

Thus the constant need for extra-special Trouble Consultants: pan-planetary private paramilitary police employed by the 3WA (or Worlds Welfare Work Association) to maintain order in hotspots across the (sort-of) civilised universe…

Kei and Yuri are team #234, officially designated “The Lovely Angels” after their sleek and efficient starship. They are lethal, capable and infallible. Whenever they are deployed, they strike fast and hard and never fail…

However, the collateral damage they inevitably cause is utterly unimaginable and usually makes client worlds regret ever asking for their aid in the first place….

Much to the crisis agents’ disgust and chagrin, the ever-present media have dubbed them “The Dirty Pair” and any planetary government unlucky enough to need them generally regards them less as first choice and more a last resort …

The concept was originated for light novels by Japanese author Haruka (Crusher Joe) Takachiho in 1985 before making the jump to TV, movie and OVA anime. Oddly there was no comics iteration until over a decade later. This situation prompted Adam Warren and Toren Smith of manga translation company Studio Proteus to approach independent publisher Eclipse Comics with an idea for a US comicbook miniseries…

The result was Biohazards; a riot of light-hearted, manic murder and monstrous mayhem which was then swiftly collected in a brash and breezy graphic album. The reprintings from US franchise inheritor Dark Horse (and Manga Books in the UK) heralded a blistering run of wry and raucous adventures that still read as well today as they did when the Japanese comics experience was seen as a rare, quaint and exotic oddity…

In the follow-up Dangerous Acquaintances – originally released as a 5-issue miniseries from Eclipse between June 1989 and March 1990, before first being gathered into a trade paperback in 1991 – the catastrophically unlucky private sector peacekeepers are enjoying a spot of well-deserved downtime on planet Rocinante – a world riotously celebrating its 25th year of independence – when soused-to-the-gorgeous-gills Kei spots an unwelcome but very familiar face…

‘Things Past’ explains that although free, single and over 21, the planet is in turmoil due to the imminent arrival of a host of dignitaries on experimental super liner “The Lyra” (one of only three vessels capable of jumping to warp within a planet’s gravity-well) and the increasingly desperate outrages of terrorist cell United Galactica/Free Rocinate.

None of that means anything to the drunken danger girl: all she can think about is getting her hands on a woman who once betrayed and nearly killed her…

Back when she and Yuri were mere trainee cadets they were constantly and humiliatingly surpassed in every discipline by Shasti. Their rival was a bioroid built by 3WA to be the ultimate Trouble Agent: a tetrad possessing a perfectly designed body and, thanks to multiple uploaded personalities, able to shift instantly between being the ideal warrior, detective, spy or social specialist, amongst others.

She never failed on any mission but there were worries that her schizoid mind-menu might have made her crazy…

Back in the present Kei refuses to calm down and chaotically pursues her target through massing crowds with the constantly complaining Yuri hot on her heels. As ‘Dangerous Acquaintances’ opens, they track Shasti across town and Yuri casts her mind back to their last mission with her, when they were all assigned to bring in a deadly sociopath named Lacombe…

On present-day Rocinante the totally-tanked pursuers catch up with the oblivious target at a shopping plaza in time to see her trading a briefcase with a suspicious-looking bearded stranger. Unfortunately, when they confront her, Shasti has lost none of her combat advantages…

As the bioroid orders her accomplice to flee, Yuri’s mind flashes back to the mission when Shasti’s instability kicked in and she inexplicably proclaimed her love for the lethally compelling Lacombe…

The reverie is shattered as the planet’s Special Police storm in, brutally arresting the Trouble Agents whilst letting their meek-seeming “victim” go, and ‘Unquiet Zone’ finds the furious, sober and mortally hung-over operatives sprung simply because the cops need their cell for more provably-crazy UG/FR fanatics.

As Kei and Yuri hit the streets their fragile ears are bombarded with a public broadcast announcing the imminent arrival of the dignitary-stuffed, treasure-laden “Lyra” and, horrified, they realise where Shasti will strike, even if not what exactly she’s after…

Whilst the determined pair are planning to sneak aboard the wonder-ship, in an opulent hotel room their despised foe is giving her band of revolutionaries a final inspirational pep-talk, but her minds are focused on the moment long ago when she and her team of Trouble Agents cornered Lacombe.

The mission was going perfectly until she switched sides, joining the insanely seductive terrorist and murdering all her comrades. Or so she thought…

On the Lyra, Yuri and Kei have endured all manner of hell, (barely) dressed as hospitality hostesses constantly groped by the great and good of many civilisations. The ruse has however allowed them to find Shasti’s inside man and after a little “enhanced interrogation” he reveals his freedom-loving leader’s plan.

Except, of course, Shasti has been lying to the UG/FR all along. Now in control of the prototype ship, the bioroid activates the lockdown protocols and sealing everybody in. Whilst the still oblivious rebel cadres carve a bloody swathe through the imprisoned plutocrats, she undertakes her true goal: stealing the entire experimental warp section right out of the super-liner…

Locked cabins and robotic security lasers are no match for angry Angels and in ‘One of My Turns’ the apparently unkillable agents bust out and, tooling up with ballistic ordinance from the Lyra’s museum exhibit of ancient weapons, go hunting…

As the suddenly engine-less Lyra plunges to fiery doom at the ‘Ground Zero’ of Rocinante’s capital city, in deep space the engine section module reappears and Shasti waits for a rendezvous with her murderous beloved. She has no idea that the women she betrayed, almost murdered and unforgettably humiliated have made the jump with her and are hungrily approaching to take a decade’s-worth of bloody vengeance…

At once incredibly information-dense and astonishingly addictive, these deliciously daft yet cool, light-hearted cyber-punk space operas offer a solidly satisfying slice of futuristic fantasy to delight all fans of tech-heavy blockbusters. Also included is a pastiche-packed, behind-the-scenes farcical feature as Adam Warren shockingly reveals ‘Just How the Dirty Pair Gets Done!!’ to leaven all that savage comedy with some outrageous silliness…

The digest-sized (210x150mm) UK editions have the tag line “in the tradition of Red Dwarf” and that assessment is not a million miles from the truth – as long as you factor in sexy death-dealing ingénues, sharp socio-political commentary, incomprehensibly skimpy costumes and utter oodles of cartoon carnage.

Brutally wry, explosively funny, hilariously action-packed and extremely spectacular, this is a truly stellar romp to get every sci fi aficionado panting for more.
The Dirty Pair © 1994 Haruka Takachiho. English language version © 1994 Adam Warren and Studio Proteus. All rights reserved.