By: Ken Garing (writer/artist/letters)
The Story: Silas tries to rally various nomadic groups together to escape the “planetoid”.
Review: This is a pretty easy review to write. If you like sci-fi, post-apocalypse themed adventures…you’ll love Planetoid. Even though the setting isn’t a post-apocalyptic Earth, the set-up is pretty much the same: loner survivor in the barren wasteland. It just so happens that this barren wasteland is another planet, but that is irrelevant to the basic vibe of the story. It could just as easily be Snake Pliskin trying to escape Manhattan.
What makes Planetoid so cool is the sense of unknown. Little by little, Garing is showing us the rules of this setting. First, Silas (the protagonist) met a couple of other survivors and befriended them. They’ve taught him what little they know about the environment and it’s not pretty stuff: The wasteland is ruled by nasty, sadistic machines. But, we don’t really know a whole lot about the machines or their motives and while we know a little about Silas’ new friends, there’s still a lot of white space. Basically, the whole world is wide open and each issue we’re learning about one or two little elements of it. That’s neat.
This issue is pretty nifty as it shows Silas pulling a band of wasteland nomads together to form a functioning society. What makes it works so well is that Garing totally makes you believe that Silas is someone that these self-centered bandits would follow by virtue of his competence (he always has a plan and skills), charisma (no one doubts him) and general-bad-assedness (when he kills the machines that approach the compound). Surely, in the future, we’ll start to see some of his flaws, but for now he’s the kind of leader we wish we had in real life. It’s really kinda inspiring….
The art is also tremendous. For starters, it has passed the “have I searched the internet to see if I could find/buy any original art from the series” test. Actually, I couldn’t find original art and I suspect that’s because the art has a bit of a digital look about it. Often I don’t enjoy digital art because I find it is too clean, but this has a nice amount of roughness to it. That roughness gives the characters a lot more energy and it also better suits the wasteland setting of the story. I mentioned above that the reader can totally buy Silas leading this rowdy band of nomads and much of that is down to the art. Silas just LOOKS like the kind of guy who can stand in front of these guys and offer proclamations and not have anyone shoot him in the middle of the monolog. Part of it is how Garing draws Silas and part is down to how he frames the picture. He just looks regal standing there. But, everything else looks great too: the nomads look suitably grimy, the eroded technology of the wasteland looks appropriately messy and immense, the mech-enemies look threatening…..and Garing tops it all off by drawing a super sexy (and competent) lady lieutenant for Silas in Onica. She’s a great character….
Conclusion: I can’t recommend this series and issue more. In just three oversized issues, Ken Garing has created a very believable and functioning world and some interesting characters. Must read…
Grade: A-
– Dean Stell
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Conclusion