Review: Neon Future - Volume 1
"We must all choose between the blade and the butterfly."
Thirty years into the future the world is in the grip of a global recession. Artificial intelligence and mass automation has caused widespread unemployment. In the US an authoritarian government has come to power and has enacted Article 10 ( 'the Return') to eliminate the technology that has displaced so many workers. This creates a huge divide between 'the Augmented' who have chosen to integrate technology into their bodies and 'the Authentic', who have not.
In response to the oppression of the techno-class, the resistance movement Neon Future was born, led by the mysterious Kita Sovee.
Clay Campbell works for the government security services, rounding up illegal cyborgs, his escapades televised for the entertainment of the masses. He is the people's hero ... until one day he dies in a car crash. It's game over.
Then he wakes up in a Neon Future laboratory. His body has been repaired with highly advanced implants. His enemies have resurrected him, and he is now part of their movement...
In Neon Future by writers Jim Krueger and Tom Bilyeu, artists Neil Edwards and Jheremy Raapack (produced by DJ Steve Aoki) we are introduced to a world in which being special is dangerous. Campbell is given the choice to join Neon Future, or to just walk away... but, of course, he truly has no options. As a newly Augmented cyborg, he is hunted by those he used to work alongside. Rejected even by his own mother, he is driven further into the fold of the resistance.
The story follows Campbell as he gets to know the members of Neon Future, some of whom are Authentic and sympathise with the plight of the Augmented. The leader Kita Sovee is a visionary who believes that the future of humanity lies in a harmonious blending of biology with technology; a synthesis symbolised by the image of the butterfly.
Then there is Dee, sword-wielding warrior who trains Campbell how to fight and how to use his implants to control any electronic devices around him. Their relationship deepens, further cementing him to the cause he once battled against.
This is a high-tech action thriller with a great deal of fighting and surreal imagery (our characters' trips into virtual reality environments are beautifully rendered with elements of Asian mythology). The neon theme is exploited in full by the artists; bright, colourful lights set against a dark background, projections and mirages in the cyberpunk spirit of Blade Runner. Here the future is dazzling and enticing like a midnight cityscape; vibrant and exciting; the word neon means new, as it was a notable discovery when it was first isolated. The future can also be dangerous, of course. These are no festive fairy lights on display: here, the exotic can be deadly.
Our hero's journey is a symbolic transformation as he finds himself suddenly switched from the role of oppressor to oppressed. In a society in which the new is regarded with fear, progression of any kind is seen as the worst of all possible crimes.
The war between the conservative old ways and the revolutionary future has begun and Campbell must choose a side. The blade divides, separating humanity into different classes; the masters and the servants. The butterfly represents transformation; emerging from its chrysalis as something more highly developed; beautiful and capable of flight like the spirit of imagination and possibility itself.
Campbell must decide the course of his own destiny, and he must decide quickly, before others decide it for him.
NEON FUTURE on Amazon
Zak Webber
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