What's so cool about sci-fi comics?
Science fiction is a genre in which the power of imagination is given free reign... Nothing is impossible, anything can happen. Because of this, any theme can be explored without limits.
The comic format is an art form that likewise has few limitations; if you can imagine it, and you can draw it, you can create it and share it with others.
It makes perfect sense, in light of this, that the two are an excellent match. Your story has a highly improbable premise? Great! It will make for a wonderful exploration of what might happen in a scenario way beyond the mundane, everyday reality.
Your characters are freakishly bizarre and look like something out of a fever dream? Brilliant! It gives you chance to let your artistic flair shine. Alien planets, monsters, spaceships and high-energy particle beam weapons of interplanetary strife? Fantastic! The more out of this world, the better!
What, at its heart, is fiction? The transportation of your reader out of their familiar surroundings and into a new dimension of your creation. An escape from reality, an adventure for the mind.
What is art? A form of expression that goes beyond words. A language that speaks to a deeper layer of consciousness, that connects us as emotional, reflective, imaginative, hopeful, "visionary" beings...
This is what makes science fiction comics so particularly special. All the shackles are off, not only in terms of what you can conceive but also in terms of its creation. Anyone with ideas, a pen and some paper, can create a masterpiece. It is the ultimate in low-budget, high-return entertainment. Throw in access to a computer, free modern software tools and it all kicks into even higher gear. Access to the internet allows you access to an unlimited readership.
So, yes, it's pure fun, but is it anything more than a valuable diversion? I believe it is. By being free to explore and express pretty much any idea in such exhaustive breadth and depth we are able to put the reality of the world around us in a broader context. Art can be a mirror that shows us what we would not otherwise see and learn about ourselves.
Science fiction opens windows that give us unique perspectives. Dystopian nightmares throw the shortcomings of our present into sharp relief: Orwell's 'doublethink' is today's hypocrisies and false news.
The comics format makes this even more accessible and no less relevant to our world: Marvel's X-Men had a subtext concerning issues of bigotry and social control. Also, the visual format has a power that is striking in a very simple way: children are empowered by seeing depictions of heroes who resemble themselves, which is what made the Black Panther so important.
Ultimately, art is an essential form of communication that shows us what is possible beyond our routine expectations, but also keeps us in touch with each other and ourselves in a very real way. Sci-fi opens up the borders of our imagination (in the immortal words of one valiant fictitious astronaut) "to infinity and beyond", and comics bring it all together in the perfect combination of images, words and ideas.
Put the two together and not only are you expanding people's horizons, you are bringing new vistas directly to them. The sci-fi comic is a window to whole universes of new possibilities...
So keep reading, keep imagining, and keep creating. By doing so, we make the future a reality, of our design.
Zak Webber
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