CALIBAN – HORROR COMIC

5 Minute read

(amazon.com single book)

AN AMAZING Collected Edition (book) by Garth Ennis an Facundo Pericio.

Spoilers ahead! Stop reading now if you want to experience this book, which I recommend you do. Even if you get the spoilers, the art work and story telling are great and it’s a fast (1-2 hours) read.

Commentary below

No I am not a critic….(NO BUTS)

SYNOPSIS (Spoilers):

Humans has discovered faster than light space travel, but have not discovered other intelligent life. This variety of space travel involves space and time displacement. During warp speed, there is a skeleton crew maintaining the ship. This journey was cut short when the ship ‘crashed’ into another space ship. This form of crash involved the complete overlapping of one space ship to another where both were trying to occupy the same space at the same time. Thus causing crew that was in the area to be sliced and merged with the hull of the alien ship, reducing the skeleton crew to less than a dozen members. The human ship called the “Caliban” must be navigated by using corridors through the alien ship. One member encounters remains of the alien ship’s members and it fragments in front of him. We switch to the other members who are navigating the wreckage to make sure they will survive, as no help will be coming for them. The member that encountered the alien remains starts isolating and murdering members of the remaining crew in gruesome ways, by what is quickly determined to be experiments.

The remaining crew, using the artificial intelligence computers, is able to communicate with the alien ship’s technology, and pull down information, such as logs and videos. The previous alien inhabitants were intergalactic zoologists, who collected and studied different species across the universe. The aliens ran into a problem on their ship where members started being killed. Turns out realized there was a ‘bodysnatcher’ entity that was killing their ship and they were too late to stop it. Using body enhancement science, the body snatcher human is able to kill all but 2 remaining members. One of the members infuses themselves with the enhancement formula, blasts the other into space on a Life Saving Capsule pod, and self-detonates the space ship, killing themselves and the body snatcher entity.

What I like about this work:

This work could be adapted into a great movie. This concept is not new, but it is great to see this concept in space (and not with supernatural entities). I really liked the artwork of the devastating effects of space displacement. This story merges the concepts of isolation, aliens, unknown forces, and biology. Great book that scratches that sci-fi itch. The artwork is awesome, and captures some real gruesome images.

Ratings:

Art work -> 10/10

Plot -> 8/10

Predictability -> Not really.

Recommend -> Most Likely