The connections begin to come together.
Creative Staff:
Story: Curt Pires
Art: Andrew MacLean
What They Say:
Aldous Ellis is dying. The past and the future are colliding. The truth is revealing itself.
See how it all began in a mind-altering look into the yesterday of the Tomorrows, from Curt Pires (The Fiction, POP, Mayday) and Andrew MacLean (Head Lopper)!
Content: (please note that content portions of a review may contain spoilers):
The Tomorrows has been an intriguing series in general with the structure of it, the rotating artists and the stories themselves. Each can be taken on its own to be sure and you can draw some larger thematic ideas from it as well. But there are pieces of it weaving in and out that connect in small ways to draw it all together. This installment starts to do that as we dip to the past, talk of the future and look a little sideways at things. But in the end it really comes down to the basic principles that are very, very hard for people to enact. With a world of possibilities that are infinite, it just requires one to actually act in order for it to become reality. It just requires oh so very much.
This installment largely focuses on Aldous Ellis, a prophet of a man of sorts that has gained attention around the world for his self published The Tomorrow Manifesto. While we get almost nothing about what the manifesto is about, it’s intriguing through the magazines pieces inside to see how the media is portraying it to the public, talking about it as being akin to Scientology. That will throw up a lot of perceptions from the start, but that’s the intent and it’s what Aldous is fighting against. Everything is broken in favor of one side and it’s become a global element now, which means it requires acting in a bigger, stronger and bolder way in order to change reality. These touches while also digging into one event with Atlas alongside bringing in both Edie and Claudius definitely works well to expand its net.
Where a lot of it also focuses is on the life of Aldous Ellis himself, taking us back to his childhood and his discovery of what consequences were. It’s an intriguing journey that’s not told in true linear fashion as we get different periods of his life mixed with “the present” where he has his encounter with the fifth dimensional beings that warned him years ago of the danger coming. There’s a fatalistic element about it when they talk about how every reality they observe seems to end the same way and watching as this creeping sensation of finality touches across the book works beautifully. It feels like it’s all sliding down into an abyss and Aldous and his group are the only ones to realize it and they’re not even able to hang onto a ledge.
In Summary:
A book like The Tomorrows is open to a love of interpretive reading and that’s always fascinating to see what each reader brings to it because of their own beliefs and backgrounds. I’m still not sure of the overall connective storyline here and feel like I’m on uncertain ground. Each installment certainly stands on its own as an intriguing short form story and each artist brings something magical to it. Andrew MacLean deals with this kind of near future storyline with pitch perfect artwork for it, reminding me of some of my favorite indie books from the 80’s during the first waves of the black and white boom where styles really expanded and exploded. His work here is just striking and full of expression that drew me in all the more. This chapter feels like we’re at the tipping point and about to look into the abyss – and that’s both exciting and frightening.
Grade: A-
Age Rating: 13+
Released By: Dark Horse Comics
Release Date: October 28th, 2015
MSRP: $3.99
