Other Dystopian Comics You Need To Read

With the recent cinematic release of Watchmen, it is a good time to look at some of the best examples of dystopian comics by other authors, which take the genre in completely different directions. Here are my top three suggestions:

The Walking Dead

 

The Walking Dead is a stylised black and white post-zombie apocalypse comic, written by Robert Kirkman and drawn by Charlie Adlard. Walking Dead feels like an extended George Romero film, dealing with the characters lives even after the action has ended, and with zombies, inevitably keeps returning. With the subject matter, naturally it is very grisly with little humour, but the strong characterisation is what makes the comic so successful. Zombie films tend to focus purely on confrontation driven by a weak story, but the crux of this comic is survival and how it has changed the people by the actions they are forced to take. It largely follows the life of Officer Rick Grimes, in his quest to find his family, and the other survivors he meets on the way, but naturally it’s a very changing cast. If you have ever watched a zombie flick, and found yourself wanting more, wanting to know what happened next, this is the comic for you.

Y: The Last Man

 

Y: The Last Man is the Eisner Award winning series written by Brian K. Vaughan, about Yorick Brown and his monkey Ampersand, who are the only male survivors to a unknown cataclysm referred to as the ‘plague’ which wiped out all other instances of the Y chromosome, including embryos and sperm. Naturally, society descends into chaos as the women try to cope with the loss of men, and knowledge that humanity is doomed to extinction. This creates some interesting subcultures, such as the extreme feminist Daughters of the Amazon, who believe that the Earth cleansed itself, or to the women who become male impersonators to attempt to fill the gap left by the men both romantically and professionally. This comic has an interesting balance between serious subject matter and humour, as more often than not the women when meeting Yorick, only want him for sex. The one disappointment with this comic is that the ending never quite clears up certain mysteries, including the source of the ‘plague’ but the debate between fans as to the true cause gives the comic a bit more life.

Transmetropolitan

 

Transmetropolitan is a cyberpunk series written by Warren Ellis, with art by Darick Robertson. It focuses on the journalist Spider Jerusalem, who at the start of the series, is a slightly crazy bearded hermit living in the mountains, who is forced back into The City to finish his former book deal. After forcing his way back to his old editor, an accident with the machines in his new run down apartment reveal his extensive tattoos, and provide him with his signature red and green glasses. The series has a distinctly dark sense of humour, and dealing with Spider’s interesting quirks and moral values leads him into the strangest, and often dangerous situations, which he always ends out on top of through seemingly part luck and part sheer balls. The sleaze of The City will remind you of Watchmen, but the politics are less poignant. If you’re a fan of black comedies, you will be sure to enjoy Transmetropolitan.

Other notable mentions to the genre, are V for Vendetta (Alan Moore), Batman: The Dark Knight Returns (Frank Miller), Wanted (Mark Millar) and Marvel 2099. In manga, good dystopian titles are Akira (Katsuhiro Otomo), Appleseed and Ghost in the Shell (Masamune Shirow), and Fist of the North Star (Tetsuo Hara).