Magnus, by Kyle Higgins and Jorge Fornés
2018
I can now say I've read a Dynamite comic.
That's a neat cover |
There's a metaphor to be had about corporate IP exploiters and the slave class of AI in this book |
With this book, I bought it for its sweet clearance price of ¥441, and it was written by Kyle Higgins whose Dead Hand Image book I enjoyed. With this book, I'm confident to say: Higgins is a good writer.
I've only read the two books now, but both books had some things in common: they doled out information at a solid pace, they had a firm sense of the world they were in, and created ethical questions for the characters. And they told a complete story! There is Philip K Dick heart to both, where the artificial life in the books have human qualities, and the humans in the book have substantial difficulties empathizing with them. I don't think he's a next-level must buy writer, but the books are reliable page-turners with interesting ideas. So I know his name and will give his books a second look if they cross my path and they aren't Nightwing.
A textbook example of dishing out world-building info without feeling like an info-dump |
AI in the Cloud can appear any way they like, this character lives in shadow |
The setting is complicated: AI were used as tools in this society, but achieved sentience. To make their slave class acceptable, they were given the Cloud to live their time off in. But they still aren't respected as equal to humans in the real world, and tensions are rising. The Cloud drives human minds mad, with Magnus one of the only humans capable of extended periods of time there, and she has become not a robot fighter, but a robot therapist.
Fornés art shifts in styles. Sometimes he channels Mike Allred |
Once you have that established, things move at a brisk pace, as Magnus navigates both AI and humans. Neither side is going to see eye to eye soon, but the question becomes one of whether they'll try to meet in the middle or simply go to war.
Fornés has some Steve Lieber, Dave Aja or similarly rough artists style too. It all looks good, but it's not all aesthetically consistent |
People wouldn't really rally to hate on an underclass, would they? |
I don't mean to sound critical. It's hard to make a good comic. This is a very good comic. We're inundated with sci fi comics these days, so it's getting harder and harder to map out your own space. This book is inventive, well-constructed, and enjoyable. It's also modest. It tells a complete story, but where I would be happy to see a sequel. It's not laying the groundwork for five years of comics they hope you buy. Sometimes I just want to read a good book. This was good.
Looks like he drew it, instead of copy-pasted. Nice! |
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