Ignition City Volume 1

by Warren Ellis, Gianluca Pagliarani

Where did the space heroes go to die? From Warren Ellis, the writer who reinvented science fiction in comics, in the alternate-world style of the award-winning Ministry Of Space and Aetheric Mechanics, comes a retropunk future of the past where spaceships still belched smoke and arguments were still settled with laser pistols. Grounded space pilot Mary Raven has come to the interzone settlement in the middle of Ignition City, Earth's last spaceport, to recover the effects of her dead father or so people think. Mary really wants to know how he died, and who did it. Mary Raven is out to spoil a great many people's days. Today might be her last day on Earth, trapped on the last spaceport where no-one cares about murder and the only real currency is fear. She has her dead father's raygun, and that's enough for space hero turned arms dealer Lightning Bowman to want her dead. But she also has her dead father's diary. And when she finds out something no-one else in the settlement knows... they'll want her dead for that, too! Featuring the art of Aetheric Mechanics' Gianluca Pagliarani, this full-color volume collects all five issues of the sci-fi epic with a gorgeous cover gallery full of design sketches, ray-gun fights and giant metal machines!

Grounded space pilot Mary Raven has come to the interzone settlement in the middle of Ignition City, Earth's last spaceport, to recover the effects of her dead father -- or so people think. Mary really wants to know how he died, and who did it. Mary Raven is out to spoil a great many people's days.

Today might be her last day on Earth, trapped on the last spaceport where no-one cares about murder and the only real currency is fear. She has her dead father's raygun, and that's enough for space hero turned arms dealer Lightning Bowman to want her dead. But she also has her dead father's diary. And when she finds out something no-one else in the settlement knows... they'll want her dead for that, too.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Science Fiction, Fiction, Steampunk, Graphic Novels Comics, Alternate History

144 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2009

About the author

Warren Ellis is the award-winning writer of graphic novels like TRANSMETROPOLITAN, FELL, MINISTRY OF SPACE and PLANETARY, and the author of the NYT-bestselling GUN MACHINE and the “underground classic” novel CROOKED LITTLE VEIN, as well as the digital short-story single DEAD PIG COLLECTOR. His newest book is the novella NORMAL, from FSG Originals, listed as one of Amazon’s Best 100 Books Of 2016.

The movie RED is based on his graphic novel of the same name, its sequel having been released in summer 2013. IRON MAN 3 is based on his Marvel Comics graphic novel IRON MAN: EXTREMIS. He is currently developing his graphic novel sequence with Jason Howard, TREES, for television, in concert with HardySonBaker and NBCU, and continues to work as a screenwriter and producer in film and television, represented by Angela Cheng Caplan and Cheng Caplan Company. He is the creator, writer and co-producer of the Netflix series CASTLEVANIA, recently renewed for its third season, and of the recently-announced Netflix series HEAVEN’S FOREST.

He’s written extensively for VICE, WIRED UK and Reuters on technological and cultural matters, and given keynote speeches and lectures at events like dConstruct, ThingsCon, Improving Reality, SxSW, How The Light Gets In, Haunted Machines and Cognitive Cities.

Warren Ellis has recently developed and curated the revival of the Wildstorm creative library for DC Entertainment with the series THE WILD STORM, and is currently working on the serialising of new graphic novel works TREES: THREE FATES and INJECTION at Image Comics, and the serialised graphic novel THE BATMAN’S GRAVE for DC Comics, while working as a Consulting Producer on another television series.

A documentary about his work, CAPTURED GHOSTS, was released in 2012.

Recognitions include the NUIG Literary and Debating Society’s President’s Medal for service to freedom of speech, the EAGLE AWARDS Roll Of Honour for lifetime achievement in the field of comics & graphic novels, the Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire 2010, the Sidewise Award for Alternate History and the International Horror Guild Award for illustrated narrative. He is a Patron of Humanists UK. He holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Essex.

Warren Ellis lives outside London, on the south-east coast of England, in case he needs to make a quick getaway.

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mary Raven travels to backwater Ignition City to retrieve her late father’s possessions. What she finds is a corrupt town that has plenty of secrets, which include who killed her father and why.

Taking the basic plot points at face value, they could be window dressing for a variety of settings: western, noir, mystery. Here, Warren Ellis takes the steampunk route and creates a compelling story with an assortment of quirky characters, some ugly aliens and a sprinkling of humor. Ignition City is the last space port on planet Earth. Mary and her father were both space pilots. Mary’s tough and resourceful and knows her way around a laser gun.

This is a great volume with one caveat – there’s loads of dialogue. Conversations go on for pages. It’s very well written, but seems to be more at home in less visual medium – a short story or a book. Still, highly recommended.

[Baba · Rating 3 out of 5]

Warren Ellis's space-opera western where space girl Mary Raven ventures to investigate the death of her father in Ignition City. A nice alternate history reality that crosses over the HBO Deadwood TV show with the likes of Buck Rogers and 2004 Battlestar Galactica TV shows. 7 out of 12.

[Sesana · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sort of science fictiony, wild westish thing that gets by with the absolute minimum in explanations. There's really quite an interesting world here, one that I feel like Ellis put a lot of thought into. But he just sort of throws the reader in and we get by on what we pick up as we go. It would be annoying, if the world didn't feel so cohesive and well-thought out. Otherwise, it's basically a dime-a-dozen action movie. Fun, but nothing particularly novel or that will make it stand out from the crowd. With one minor exception, early in the book: a few panels where the main character, an adult woman with many adventures behind her and some serious badassery ahead of her, finds out that her father has died and, alone, cries for her daddy. It's the one moment in this book where I felt any emotional connection to the characters, and it's just long enough to be convincing without being long enough to become uncomfortable.

[Niranjan Dalaya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good stuff, was searching for a Vol. 2 and realized there isn't a continuation to the plot.

[Patrick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazingly fun book. I bought a dozen copies to give away to friends....

[Juho Pohjalainen · Rating 3 out of 5]

Space opera without the space, I guess. Take all of the good bits of a genre, all the things you'd read it for, then have those things crash and burn and have some bitter people mope at the remains. It could be a disappointing bait-and-switch, or it could work for some good poignant drama. Happily enough, Ignition City leans more towards the latter.

[Stacey · Rating 3 out of 5]

I loves me some steampunkalicious space spaghetti western. Yessir. (I learned how to spell spaghetti in the 7th grade when it lost me a damn spell-off. I always get a little conflicted when I use it correctly in a sentence.)

Mary Raven is tough, take-no-prisoners, and trying to find out who killed her daddy. There's only one problem – Warren Ellis apparently gets bored.

I love W.E., love his stories, his big ideas (although I wish he'd spend a little more energy on story, and a little less on creative swearing,) the terrific artists he pairs with... but why oh why does he drop fantastic stories just when they hit their stride? Like Doktor Sleepless, which I adored, he just drops the storyline. At least this one is “finished.”

I'll keep reading Ellis' stories, I'm a sucker like that, even if I have to cross my fingers everytime, that I'll get a complete story.

[Alan · Rating 5 out of 5]

The rating might be a little high for this book, but Warren Ellis does his best work when he goes to his secret pleasure space oriented science fiction (see Ocean, Orbiter, Switchblade Honey and Ministry of Space). Yes, he falls into some of his bad speech habits here, but the concept works. Take all of the old space heroes (thinly disguised versions of Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers, Dale Arden, Dr. Zarkov, Commando Cody, etc.) mix in one real life cosmonaut, and banish them to Earth's only operating spaceport. Toss in a murder and things get fun. As with the other works mentioned above I would read more set in this universe.

[Joel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Vintage Warren Ellis: strong female protagonists, washed up astronauts, alien invasions, laser guns, and poop jokes, all wrapped up in superb visuals from Gianluca Pagliarani and tied together by a plot that, if not brilliantly twisty, is at least not completely by the numbers.

Fantastic story, but make sure to take the time to admire the inventiveness of the art design and colors as well.

[Keith [on semi hiatus] · Rating 5 out of 5]

February 1956; in an alternate-world between Berlin and Earth's last remaining spaceport, Ignition City, Kharg The Killer is held beyond the fieldfence in a compound in the north for crimes as a Nazi weapon. This is the shadow lingering over the city while Mary Raven comes to avenge her father with Volume 1 bringing us to the point of Mary resetting the city.

[47Time · Rating 4 out of 5]

The atmosphere and character behavior in Ignition City is similar to what you would see in the Wild West: poverty, guns, death and little concern for life. The action is during an alternate 50's timeline where space travel is common, so maybe the steampunk genre is more fitting. The main character loved her father who died in Ignition City and she wants to find out who is responsible. She discovers more than she bargained for and starts a new phase in her life.

The beginning just throws you into the story, which takes a bit of getting used to. Everything is different from our history, including alien creatures, futuristic tech and the human society as a whole. Poverty and ruin are commonplace, so progress was replaced with survival a while ago. The world is headed toward self-destruction, but a few individuals refuse to take it sitting down.

Mary Raven is passionate about going into space, but the countries of the world are banning space travel. Her father instilled this desire in her, so her destination is Ignition City where her father was killed. She meets several people who knew her father. She tries to buy a gun from the guy who turns out killed her father, Lightning Bowman, but is refused. Bowman orders two guys working for him to kill her. Their ambush takes her by surprise and she is rescued by Dr. Vukovic, one of her father's friends. She realises that the real enemy is the marshal who isn't allowing anyone to go north where an alien enemy called Kharg is being kept in a prison camp. He was responsible for atrocities in the past and everyone thought him dead. Mary kills the marshal and the people in the city agree she should take his place.

[JL Shioshita · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you like dieselpunk style Wild West retro pulp adventure stories, then you'll probably dig this. The background art is textured, nuanced, dirty, and real, which helps ground you in the world Ellis has created. The character art is a bit spotty at times, but you don't notice it too much. There's an entire world and alternate history hiding between the panels that you wish was brought to surface more, but keeping it hidden is an interesting approach. If you ever wondered what happened to all those sci-fi pulp heroes of the 30s and 40s after they came back from space, this is it, and it's depressing as hell. Also, quite a bit of violence and gore, so if you're not into that, it'll be a shock. I will say the ray gun blasting action sequences are epic.

[Cornelia · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this dieselpunk/alternative history comic book, washed up, space heroes live in Ignition City, a rough and rowdy settlement cut off from civilization on Earth’s last spaceport. Ignition City has a strong woman for the main character, Mary Raven, a space pilot and daughter of the famous spaceman, who stopped a Martian missile plot. She heads to the spaceport to discover how her father died and who killed him. It has colorful language and a Wild West tone. There are aliens, ray guns, and the marshal flies around in a rocketeer type outfit. It’s a fun, action packed read.

[Laurel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Think back to all those pulp WWII paintings of smiling girls on the sides of airplanes. Now create an alternate timeline where we went into space, fought worlds on other planets, and met new alien races. Now make those smiling girls into just one badass space chick who has flown around the Universe, but is pulled back to a Casablanca-esque space port to investigate the death of her father. That, my friends, is Ignition City.

[Orrin Grey · Rating 2 out of 5]

Got this from a friend. I liked the concept of the setting, but beyond that the book didn't do too much for me, I'm afraid.

[RND · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wish this continued. Nice, interesting world, interesting characters. This is very Ellis: tough characters, well-thought-out world, a hint of optimism in the muck. Art's European style fits it well, and for once Avatar's coloring was good.

[Matt · Rating 4 out of 5]

Felt like vol 3 of 4 but it was fun...!

[Travis · Rating 3 out of 5]

the TV western 'Deadwood', but we replace cowboys with clones/homages/rip offs of classic pulp sci-fi heroes.

Young lady space pilot comes to the city to collect her inheritance and find out who killed her daddy. She gets mixed up in various plots, local politics and lots of gunplay.

Fun idea, bit grim, considering the characters Warren is using versions of and the near constant swearing stops being shocking by page 3 and then becomes increasingly boring.
Reads like the pilot to an interesting series, but unfortunately Warren tends to be a 'one story per idea' writer. Shame as I'd like to see what happens next to these characters, but probably never will.

Half the cast is really fun and interesting, the other half is cliche bad ass, which is which, really will depend on your point of view.

Nice sci-fi romp, full of potential.

[Ted Child · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read Ellis with some cautiousness, maybe unfairly, as he sometimes rubs me the wrong way. I find Ellis is at his genius best when he is at his least self-conscious as a writer, and maybe more importantly, least self-consciously cool. Coolness is something I have little patience for, in both my friends and my writers, but I feel that Ellis sometimes tries to be that writer and it shows in his final products. Ellis needs to let his skill and imagination dictate his stories, not his ego. I was beginning to get that same old feeling during the first few issues of this series but than Ellis moved away from his own clichés and familiar characterizations and, by the end, I felt that this was a really good SF setting and I enjoyed how the story came together.

[Ben Cameron · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you were to combine the spirit of Whedon's Firefly with the concepts Ellis built up in AEtheric Mechanics and Ministry of Space, then paint the whole thing with a steampunk veneer you'd have Ignition City, and you would be as happy about it as that sentence implies (assuming you know what all of that meant.) It's the sci-fi/western spirit of Firefly twisted through a post-victorian alternate anglophile history. It's magnificent and, in combination with the other works mentioned and Freakangels, makes me wish Mr. Ellis would write more steampunky stuff (he's obviously incredibly good at it.)

[Nathan Buchanan · Rating 4 out of 5]

Birthday TPB #1- Another one of Warren Ellis' great genre deconstructions. This time it's Golden Age serials like Buck Rogers and Flash Gordon. After great adventure in the cosmos, Earth's space heroes bring intergalactic war into World War II. The world suffers greatly and then turns its back on space... leaving the world's last spaceport a crazy, lawless place. Unexpectedly gruesome art and great nods to westerns and a lot of old sci-fi.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

An alternate history, where earth has made contact with aliens just before World War II, and most of the nations have decided they want nothing to do with space. Versions of some of the classic space opera heroes, like Buck Rodgers and Flash Gordon appear as well. And how can you not like a book that includes the lines:
"Your place smells weird."
"It smells like SCIENCE!"

[Adam McPhee · Rating 5 out of 5]

A loving tribute to the sci-fi pulps of the early 20th century. Think Flash Gordon, Buck Rogers and Republic Serials like Commando Cody: Sky Marshal of the Universe, with a western-ish setting thrown in for good measure. A clever twist ending offers a great critique of the genre and the careless racism that was often prevalent in it.

[Drew · Rating 4 out of 5]

a very cool wild west/space/pulp story. in the 1950s a daughter searches for her killer's father in the last open spaceport on earth. the art is detailed and excellent. ellis makes this a great start, and hopefully a sequel will be along soon.

[Espana Sheriff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dieselpunk Western with the Warren Ellis style all over it. A bit grim and gritty in spots with more fluids than I really needed to see lovingly rendered by the artist, but otherwise pretty good stuff. Looking forward to volume two.

[Vittorio Rainone · Rating 1 out of 5]

Praticamente nessuna particolarità: noioso, con una dinamica ridicola, solo un piccolo sussulto di interesse quando l'ennesimo mondo alternativo di Ellis viene mostrato al lettore. Peccato per i bellissimi disegni sprecati.

[Jeremy Large · Rating 4 out of 5]

A great little mystery thriller set in a 50s sci-fi adventure world ... that's all kind of gone to shit. Special shout out to Yuri, the greatest comic relief character of all time.

[Charles · Rating 5 out of 5]

This science fiction story has many unique and sobering characteristics. In it, humans have gone into space, but almost everyone has lost interest in what was once a great dream of humans. It is 1956 and when the story opens, France has just passed a law where there will be no more space launches from French soil. The space port in France was the last one in continental Europe and it seems certain that Britain will soon be closing their last one.
Mary is the daughter of an astronaut and an astronaut herself and she wants to get back into space. When her father dies, she travels to Ignition City, the last spaceport on Earth, in order to settle his affairs. It is an artificial island in the equatorial Atlantic and under the control of the United States. What makes this story unusual is that Ignition City is a filthy place, filled with despair. It would seem contradictory that a spaceport would be like that, but the author makes the story work.
Mary is a tough woman, facing down dangers at gunpoint. She is willing to use her weapon and she is capable of communicating with the crablike creatures that are clearly alien. Using her wits, brains, her father’s contacts and an itchy trigger finger, she manages to get a group together that might have the collective technical skills to get back into space.
The common approach to space travel in science fiction stories is to make it optimistic, a positive take on the future. Ellis does the opposite, a world is created where there is extreme indifference to space flight and how all the people that could build craft capable of going into space have fallen on hard times. Technology is a powerful force in the human world, yet we too often assume that it is here to stay. There are many possible scenarios where the human species decides to give up complicated aspirations and space programs are one of the most likely to be rejected.

[Ronald Koltnow · Rating 3 out of 5]

I recently discovered that there is a sub-genre called Dieselpunk. Just as Gibson and Sterling created Cyberpunk, which uses the technology of a new computer age, and Jeter and Powers created Steampunk, in which the technology is Victorian, writers like Harry Turtledove created Dieselpunk, alternate history tales using the milieu and technology of the WWII era. I suppose THE ROCKETEER is the ultimate Dieselpunk comic, and Warren Ellis pays tribute to it in IGNITION CITY. This is Volume one but there was never any follow-up. Somewhat reminiscent of Whedon’s FIREFLY, IC takes place in a remote setting (think Wild West), with gun-fighting Ex-Freedom fighters and ex-pilots (space flight having been banned). Mary Raven comes to town for the most classic of reasons, to kill the one who murdered her father. The artwork by Gianluca Pagliarani emphasizes Raven’s pulchritude and Ellis’s script explores new avenues of profanity and scatology. Both are excessive. The yarn had a cinematic quality but is too derivative to be noteworthy.

[Gonzalo Oyanedel · Rating 2 out of 5]

La habilidad de Warren Ellis para entrecruzar ambientes retrofuturistas, tecnología inusual y antihéroes trasnochados es una fórmula siempre atractiva para los lectores del inglés. Esta ucronía dieselpunk, sin ser la excepción, acusa su también habitual decaimiento hacia el acto final, con un desenlace anticlimático y la sensación de que la historia daba para mucho más en manos del talentoso escritor. Quizás todas estas miniseries funcionarían mejor en un universo cohesionado.