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Comics

Brass Sun: The Wheel Of Worlds mini-series # 1 by Ian Edginton and I.N.J. Culbard (comic review).

‘Praise be to the cog!’ ‘The Brass Sun’ mini-series is here! The setting is certainly original. The Orrery is a huge clockwork star system where planets rotate on gigantic metal arms and the sun of cogs is worshipped as a god. Unfortunately, the sun is dying, the planets are freezing one by one and cults like the Orthodoxy burn as heretics those who warn of the danger.

BrasSunTheWheelOfWorldsMS

The story opens with Orthodoxy Speaker Eusabius and Lord Arcimandrite worried about the increase in cases of heresy as the weather grows ever cooler on their world, Hind Leg. Winters are longer, summers shorter and the dissenters say that the power of the cog is diminishing and the wheel of worlds is slowing. Maybe burning heretics will warm things up. That seems to be the plan anyway.

Meanwhile, the astronomer, Cadwallader, has been carefully observing the heavens and knows the heretics are right. He has seen the lights go out on Back Of Beyond and Afterthought, two other worlds, as ice consumed them. He allows himself to be captured by the priests of the Orthodoxy so that his granddaughter Wren can escape with his notes which contain all he knows about the Wheel Of Worlds and the legend of the Blind Watchmaker. She has a mission and that’s all the plot I’m going to give away.

As ever with these things, the inevitable model for the blinkered, stupid, oppressive religion is the Roman Catholic Church. With its hierarchy, robes, ceremonies and historical opposition to science, it provides a template for fictional faiths to fit. In a way, the fictional copies are a kind of homage to its success, as well as a useful reminder of mistakes it has made. It will probably survive the implied criticism.

The concept is original and the first issue had a great story. Hats off to Ian Edginton. I’m not an absolute fan of the artwork by I.N.J. Culbard but it has a certain charm. He’s good at architecture and backgrounds and his storytelling is fluent but the figures and faces are odd. It’s quite pleasing to the eye, just not classically correct in the manner of John Buscema or Neal Adams. As my favourite comic artist is the classically incorrect Jack Kirby, I can easily forgive that.

A very promising start to an interesting series. I look forward to more.

Eamonn Murphy

April 2014

Brass Sun: The Wheel Of Worlds mini-series # 1 by Ian Edginton and I.N.J. Culbard

(pub: 2000AD. 30 page comic Price: £2.99 (UK))

check out website: www.200adonline.com

Eamonn Murphy

Eamonn Murphy reviews books for sfcrowsnest and writes short stories for small press magazines. His eBooks are available at all good retailers or see his website: https://eamonnmurphywriter298729969.wordpress.com/

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