9th Art

It is a ‘hundred years from today’. People take ‘ferry’ rides from Earth to space stations above in order to work – much like we take the metro. Space exploration has taken large strides. We can travel at the speed of light. We have at least one city on the Moon. We have space stations orbiting planets and moons that are being studied.  We also have hollowed-out moons which serve as space stations. Also, most people have forgotten what a ‘book’ looks like.

And if you’re working a blue collar job, then you can pretty much forget having a personality. For the duration of your contract, the corporation will put an implant in your mind that shuts down your reasoning power and essentially make you an order-obeying zombie.

But not everything has changed. Muggings still happen (even on space stations).

This is the setting for Warren Ellis’ Ocean. » Read the rest of this entry «

A few years back, I had picked up a graphic novel because it stood out boldly among others on the display shelf. A bald, cigarette-smoking tattooed man was standing on the edge of the roof of a skyscraper and looking up with a wicked smile. Even odder were the shades he wore: one lens was a circular red while the other was a rectangular green. I think, perhaps the reason I bought it was the title – which it shared with Irving Stone’s biography of Van Gogh – Lust for Life.

The very same day, I read it and made a mental note to get my hands on the entire series. Some time, after that, I did manage to get them all. Then, over a period of two days, I read 60 issues – an epic that had taken the author and artist 5 years to accomplish. That is how gripping Transmetropolitan is.

Created by Warren Ellis (author) and Darick Robertson (artist), Transmetropolitan is the story of a gonzo journalist in a dystopian liberal future where sex, drugs, violence and consumerism are rampant – ‘postcyberpunk’ to jargon lovers. » Read the rest of this entry «