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29th April 2024

Science fiction

Weavers #1 (Review)

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Weavers #1
Boom! Studios, May 2016
Writer: Simon Spurrier
Review by Neil Raymundo, May 12, 2016

The cover to the first issue of Simon Spurrier’s “Weavers” makes it easy to discern the premise of the comic book. It features a man dressed like the typical modern gangster, surrounded by silhouettes of similarly-dressed people with arachnid-like eyes. The spiders are not symbolic. The comic is about gangsters and spiders. A key issue in the premise of the story is the kind of spiders, and what role they play in the story.

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Aliens: Defiance #1: Weyland-Yutani’s Rogue

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Aliens: Defiance #1
(Dark Horse Comics, April 2016)
Writer: Brian Wood

One of the most striking characters in the movie “Alien” (Twentieth Century Fox, 1979) was the android character called Ash. The movie is set partly in deep space, and partly on a misty planet, where a face-hugging monster leaps out of eggs lurking in the ruins of a creepy spacecraft. Motivated solely by Machiavellian directives from executives at the sinister business venture called Weyland-Yutani Corporation, Ash the “synthetic”, as he is called, has a complete disregard for human life and objectifies his crewmates as either obstacles or suitable hosts for xenomorph incubation. Ash’s secret mission is to secure an asset capable of being potentially weaponised, the horrific alien spawned from the facehugger which has horrifyingly started to prey upon the crew of the freighter Nostromo. Ash’s betrayal of his fellow crew members is necessary to meet that objective.

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Micronauts #1 (Review)

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Micronauts #1
IDW Publishing, April 2016
Writer: Cullen Bunn
Review by DG Stewart, May 18, 2016

Comics published in support of a line of figurines are often shaky texts. The writer of such a title can at best hope to impart a monochrome backstory and characterisation to the moulded plastic toys: a solid plot to accompany this artistically bleak mission is a rarity.

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Empress #1-2: Mark Millar Delivers (again)

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Empress 1, 2
Icon Comics, June and July 2016
Writer: Mark Millar
Review by D.G. Stewart, May 17, 2016

A critique of this title involves two curious vectors.

First, at some point in many people’s lives, sadly, they can become involved in very unhappy, abusive or even violent relationships. This can occur, particularly but by no means exclusively, when a person is young and lacks judgement and experience in respect of the substance of a happy relationship.

Setting aside the nature of mis-spent relationships for a moment, and on what might seem at first blush off tangent, American comic books seem to have a steady supply of science fiction villains (featured in superhero comic books, ordinarily) with beetle-browed, monolithic features, a grim demeanour, and who are exclusively male. These include, in no particular order:

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