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Hectic Planet #1
Hectic Planet Vol. 1: Dim Future
This book collects the first solo work by Evan Dorkin, described by the man himself as Star Wars meets It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World, with a ska/punk soundtrack and a cheap beer buzz. Featuring the original Eternity Pirate Corp$! issues one through four, plus new pages, pinups, rare art and promo material.
- GenresComicsGraphic Novels
120 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1998
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37 people want to read
About the author
Evan Dorkin
276 books143 followersEvan Dorkin is an American comics artist and writer.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
June 15, 2012
Who doesn't love early 90's comics featuring alien Ska kids? People who suck, that's who.
March 28, 2011
I've been starting and re-starting this book for over a week, getting through sections of it, forgetting where I left off and starting again. But finally tonight I got through the whole thing in one uber-focused sitting. And YAY! I liked it (I better, since I throw most books at the wall if I don't like the first page.)
Why all the special attention on this, a somewhat spotty first volume of an admittedly rough-around-the-edges series in the early career of Evan Dorkin, a writer who straddles mainstream and indie comics without making huge splashes in either? I dunno; I've always thought that at his best, Dorkin is one of the most capable renaissance men in the biz, able to draw and write his way around most of his peers and make it look easy. He has a style whose specificity exists in complete opposition with his scattered body of work, and while I haven't made it my mission to track down everything he's done, Hectic Planet has been "one of those comics I'd like to get to someday" for probably a decade.
In its original incarnation, the series was published under the name Pirate Corp$!, and as such it follows a young hip crew of intergalactic thieves-for-hire on their rock 'n roll sci-fi adventures in the year 2074. It's a heavy dose of Hitchhiker's Guide with a splash of Millennium Falcon coolness thrown in, juxtaposed against a specific backdrop of underground punk and ska music from the 1980's.
And once Dorkin gets the balance on these disparate elements, it works -- the whole thing is basically a hipster comedy space opera, with different crews of pirates, bounty hunters, mob enforcers and government ne'er do wells chasing each other around the galaxy, blowing stuff up, whining about their exes and occasionally getting in fights at rock shows. But it takes awhile to get the balance sorted, and as I understand it Dorkin works the kinks out up until book 3 (the last in the series).
The main thing is that this is one of the visually densest black and white books I've ever read, heavily overdrawn with an enormous cast of characters who rarely stop to identify themselves for the audience. So it's a lot to process on the first read, even though the whole thing is relatively straightforward once you get both the story and art details straight.
I've really enjoyed the experience of reading this and putting the pieces together as a reader, and I look forward to reading the rest of it. I have no idea who I would recommend it to, however -- so this one may have to simply live as an oddity on my bookshelf.
Why all the special attention on this, a somewhat spotty first volume of an admittedly rough-around-the-edges series in the early career of Evan Dorkin, a writer who straddles mainstream and indie comics without making huge splashes in either? I dunno; I've always thought that at his best, Dorkin is one of the most capable renaissance men in the biz, able to draw and write his way around most of his peers and make it look easy. He has a style whose specificity exists in complete opposition with his scattered body of work, and while I haven't made it my mission to track down everything he's done, Hectic Planet has been "one of those comics I'd like to get to someday" for probably a decade.
In its original incarnation, the series was published under the name Pirate Corp$!, and as such it follows a young hip crew of intergalactic thieves-for-hire on their rock 'n roll sci-fi adventures in the year 2074. It's a heavy dose of Hitchhiker's Guide with a splash of Millennium Falcon coolness thrown in, juxtaposed against a specific backdrop of underground punk and ska music from the 1980's.
And once Dorkin gets the balance on these disparate elements, it works -- the whole thing is basically a hipster comedy space opera, with different crews of pirates, bounty hunters, mob enforcers and government ne'er do wells chasing each other around the galaxy, blowing stuff up, whining about their exes and occasionally getting in fights at rock shows. But it takes awhile to get the balance sorted, and as I understand it Dorkin works the kinks out up until book 3 (the last in the series).
The main thing is that this is one of the visually densest black and white books I've ever read, heavily overdrawn with an enormous cast of characters who rarely stop to identify themselves for the audience. So it's a lot to process on the first read, even though the whole thing is relatively straightforward once you get both the story and art details straight.
I've really enjoyed the experience of reading this and putting the pieces together as a reader, and I look forward to reading the rest of it. I have no idea who I would recommend it to, however -- so this one may have to simply live as an oddity on my bookshelf.
July 17, 2016
This is an old favorite. It's about space pirates who love ska. This is the kind of series that makes me say "god bless comic books" with a little tear in my eye.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews