Dreadstar: The Beginning

Dreadstar: The Beginning by Jim Starlin

 

Jim Starlin’s ‘Dreadstar’ comic books and graphic novels appeared on a regular basis throughout the 1980s, and since that time, have been reprinted in a bewildering number of volumes in different color formats from different publishers…… trying to sort out the contents of each of these compilations is no small task.

This Dynamite hardbound edition (2010; 230 pp) compiles all the Dreadstar material from ‘Metamorphosis Odyssey’, ‘The Price’ graphic novel, the ‘Dreadstar’ graphic novel, and the ‘Dreadstar’ chapter that appeared as a singleton adventure in Epic Illustrated. All of these works first appeared in the interval from 1980 – 1982.

This volume from Dynamite uses a high-quality, glossy paper stock. However, it is several inches smaller than the magazines and graphic novels the stories originally appeared in, so the typeface is comparatively cramped……and sometimes difficult to read.

The whole 'Dreadstar' series started as a serial in Epic Illustrated magazine: ‘Metamorphosis Odyssey’, which appeared in the very first issue (the Spring, 1980 issue), and appeared in succeeding issues as 14 chapters, concluding with the December, 1981 issue. All of the artwork in the chapters was painted, some of it in black and white, and some in color. 

‘Metamorphosis’ dealt with adventures in a galaxy far, far, away, a long, long time ago (the entire ‘Dreadstar’ canon borrows, not surprisingly, from ‘Star Wars’). The dread Empire of the Zygoteans is enslaving all civilizations in the galaxy; only the planet of the Osirosians is able to resist, but their resources are becoming depleted as a result of the 500-year conflict. 

 

In a last, desperate effort to defeat the Zygoteans, the Osirosians dispatch their most gifted warrior and priest, a long-nosed man named Aknaton, to scour the galaxy for a team of heroes capable of joining together to wield the ultimate weapon. 

Among this team of heroes is the orphan Vanth, from the planet Byfrexia. Vanth is the equivalent of a Jedi Knight, equipped with a magic sword, superhuman strength, impressive spaceship piloting skills, and unmatched skills in hand-to-hand and ranged weapon combat.

I won’t disclose any spoilers, save to say that Vanth – soon rechristened Vanth Dreadstar – plays a key role in the struggle against the Zygotean onslaught.

In 1981 a quasi-sequel, titled ‘The Price’, was published by Marvel / Epic as a black-and-white graphic novel. ‘The Price’ was primarily concerned with the adventures of Syzygy Darklock, the man who would become Vanth Dreadstar’s mentor and ally. 

‘The Price’ moves away from sf, and more into the type of magic-based adventures that characterized the world of Marvel Comic's 'Dr. Strange'.

  

The series’ next installment was ‘Dreadstar’, a Marvel Graphic Novel published in 1982. Featuring color artwork, this volume centers on the adventures of Vanth Dreadstar as he confronts – however unwillingly – the need to deploy his martial skills in the ongoing conflict between the Monarchy and the Instrumentality, the two major political blocs fighting for control of the galaxy.

 

The 'Dreadstar: The Beginning' compilation concludes with an Epilogue, a ‘Dreadstar’ chapter that appeared in black-and-white in the December, 1982 issue (No. 15) of Epic Illustrated. This chapter relates Dreadstar’s efforts to seize a spaceship from an Instrumentality mining colony and contains a lot of flashback sequences. 

Starlin was presumably using this chapter as a teaser for the Dreadstar comic book series, which was inaugurated in November, 1982 by Epic Comics and eventually ran for 64 issues.

So, what do you get with this compilation of all the early adventures of the ‘Dreadstar’ franchise ? As I mentioned, it borrows to some degree from classic space opera and ‘Star Wars’, but it also incorporates the ‘cosmic’ perspective that Starlin routinely employed in his work during the 70s and 80s for Marvel titles like ‘Warlock’ and ‘Captain Marvel’, as well as the high-profile crossover series ‘Infinity Gauntlet’, and ‘Cosmic Odyssey’ for DC.

Dreadstar is not an action comic or a superhero comic; instead, it chooses to focus on a more wordy, cerebral approach, leading to panels that are overloaded with speech balloons and text boxes. This may turn off readers who are more accustomed to the minimalist, 'show, don't tell' formatting of contemporary comics.

 

While there are occasional bloody battles between Dreadstar and Empire troops, much of the series’ contents are devoted to lengthy dialogues between various characters on a variety of ‘deep’ topics. There is always a note of ambiguity about the seemingly ‘right’ decisions that are made in the struggles against the forces of evil, and every victory comes with its cost. At times Starlin’s prose becomes too overwrought, and unconsciously comes a bit too close to self-parody, a phenomenon that characterized his efforts for ‘Warlock’, ‘Thanos’, and ‘Captain Marvel’. 

By and large, however, if you appreciate a space opera with more depth than the genre is usually accredited, then this Dreadstar compilation is worth investigating. It’s also a welcome change from contemporary comics, in that Starlin takes pains to frame his plots using flashbacks and external narration, devices rarely present in modern comics, which often suffer from awkward lapses in visual and storytelling continuity.

As well, Starlin’s use of painted artwork, involving a canny use of different shadings of grays and whites for the black-and-white episodes, stands apart from contemporary comics and their flat, computer-assisted approach to illustration. 

New York: Year Zero issue 1

New York: Year Zero
by Ricardo Barreiro (script) and Juan Zanotto (art)
Eclipse Comics
Issue 1, August 1988

New York: Year Zero was originally published in 1984 as Nueva York: Año Cero by the Argentinian duo of Ricardo Barreiro and Juan Zanotto. 

Eclipse Comics, one of the myriad US indie comics publishers that were active in the 80s Comics Boom, reprinted translated versions of a number of Argentinian titles, including New York: Year Zero, which was released as a four-issue series in 1988. The Eclipse Comics version of the series was given color covers by Mark Johnson, which are really awful. The series deserved better.

Since defunct, in their time Eclipse published some good comics, picking the best of foreign-produced material. 

Zanotto's artwork has the gritty, 'European' stylings and draftsmanship of the classic Metal Hurlant / Heavy Metal magazine pieces from Enki Bilal, Serge Clerc, Chantal Montellier, fellow Argentinian Juan Gimenez, and, to some extent, Moebius.

Year Zero's story is set in 2015, when our hero, Brian Chester, a soldier in the bloody Venusian wars, manages to escape the conflict and return to Earth and to home: New York City. 

Needless to say, this version of New York City is the treasured one from near-future, apocalyptic sf: an overcrowded, ultra-violent hellhole. Brian Chester soon will discover that as bad as things were on Venus, they were nothing compared to the depravity and danger of the Big Apple.......!

Mixing equal parts Soylent Green and Escape from New York, some Judge Dredd ''Mega-City One' flavorings, and nice touches of sarcastic humor, NY:YZ is a great adventure comic. I'll be releasing the other three issues over the next few months here at the PorPor Books Blog.

Book Review: The Vang: The Battlemaster

Book Review: 'The Vang: The Battlemaster' by Christopher Rowley

5 / 5 Stars

‘The Vang: The Battlemaster’ (313 pp) was published by Del Rey in October, 1990, with cover artwork by Steve Hickman.

This is the third and final volume in the ‘Vang’ trilogy, with ‘Starhammer’ (1986) and ‘The Vang: The Military Form’ (1988) the preceding volumes.

The events in ‘Battlemaster’ take place two thousand years after those related in ‘The Vang: The Military Form’.

On the planet Wexel, the aristocracy lead lives of idleness and comfort in the great cities, while the lumpen proletariat make do with conditions akin to that of slaves. The hinterlands are wracked by perpetual wars of liberation: brutal, nasty affairs in which both rebels and government mercenaries commit atrocities with casual aplomb.

Luisa Chang, colonel in the ITAA Federation, is assigned to the operations center on Wexel, where she hopes to uproot entrenched corruption and malfeasance, make a name for herself, and leave with a deserved promotion. However, Chang soon discovers that the planet’s corrupt ITAA officers, who turn a blind eye to smuggling, and who enjoy profitable relations with Wexel’s corporate class, are none too pleased about a gung-ho officer upsetting their apple cart.

In the remote central highlands of Wexel, Count Karvur, whose personal fortune has been badly depleted by a business deal gone wrong, is stewing in a potent mix of frustration and depression. He has been running through one hapless get-rich-quick scheme after another, without success, and the fleshpots and gambling dens and fern bars of the coastal cities seem permanently denied him. Karvur makes do with raping the malnourished peasant girls who labor on his farm, and having their fathers tortured if they complain about the molestations. But it’s small enjoyment to one who used to cut a grand path through the apex of Wexel society.

As the novel opens, luck suddenly decides to visit Count Karvur. For a drilling operation on the grounds of his property has found something unusual, something buried in a rock strata nearly 80 million years old: an immense labyrinth of alien design, etched through the rock, coiling and twisting its way to an inner chamber. And within that inner chamber is a stasis pod……with a pink wad of protoplasm slowly pulsating within its depths.

The discovery of the alien artifact brings dollar signs to the greedy eyes of Count Karvur. Disclosing his find to only one other person – Caroline Reese, a biologist at Cowdray University – Karvur moves the alien organism to an incubator inside a cattle shed on his farm. Once Caroline Reese is sworn to secrecy, she is given her assignment: analyze the organism, and discover if it is native to Wexel. If it turns out the protoplasm is not of native origin, then Count Karvur has made the discovery of the century.

But the alien blob has plans of its own…..and within the incubator inside the dank cattle shed at Count Karvur’s farm, pink tentacles and flower-like growths are taking shape……….

‘Battlemaster’ has much the same plot as ‘The Military Form’, namely, the Vang get loose on a Terran colony planet, and before anyone really understands what’s happening, the bodies start to pile up- lots of bodies. 

But the Battlemaster is the ultimate strategist, and to it, the subjugation of single planet is by no means the ultimate goal, so the plot takes a different tack from that featured in ‘The Military Form’.

Like the previous volumes in the trilogy, ‘Battlemaster’ is straightforward, cleanly written adventure sf, with a healthy dose of horror added into the mix (Rowley isn’t shy about describing the processes by which the Vang parasites convert unwilling humans into their hosts). At times, the corruption and cowardice of the human actors is as great a hindrance to combating the Vang, as the creatures themselves.

All of the ‘Vang’ novels have been out of print for a while, but used copies can be had for reasonable prices, so if you are a fan of fast-moving, well-told sf adventure, then getting a copy of the three books is well worth the money.