“The philosophy that leads to AI is the same philosophy as 19th Century imperialism and colonialism,” Kieron Gillen. Writer Kieron Gillen returns to reflect on the end of his time contributing to the X-Men’s First Krakoan Age and the start of The Power Fantasy, his new series with Caspar Wijngaard for Image Comics.
After the atomic bomb dropped in the 1940s, a group of six super-powered beings appeared in the world, where they each possessed the destructive power capacity of the United States nuclear arsenal. If they ever got into conflict, it would mean the end of planet Earth. Since then, the Atomics or the Nuclear Family have built a fragile series of alliances to prevent each other from causing the end of the world. Now, as the clock draws close to the new millennium of the year 2000, Earth’s future continues to stand on these superpowers from never coming into conflict with each other. Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijngaard take readers to the fragile doomsday clock as the future could disappear within the blink of an eye in The Power Fantasy #1.
With the setting being an alternate history period set in 1999, Gillen and Wijngaard expertly build the world where they give enough context clues for readers to seamlessly understand what has been going on while fleshing it out thoroughly. From slight hints in Gillen’s writing to background dressing and clothing drawn by Wijngaard, they have thought about every detail of how the Atomics’ appearance and presence impacted the world, from major to minor. Even hints of past events serve as vital elements to explaining how much their history diverged from our own and how their existence would influence everything from public opinion to government responses to pop culture. Even though The Power Fantasy #1 may not exist in the same reality as ours, certain aspects of our own can still be found, making their world a skewed version of our own.
And I appreciate Gillen presenting a more mature series where he focuses more on the characters and their relationships instead of solely on the action. With the highly destructive nature of their powers, he emphasizes how important it is for each Atomic to stay out of conflict with each other and the world itself, which could mean the death of everybody. Focusing on Etienne Lux in The Power Fantasy #1, Lux serves as a great lens into the world where Lux essentially has to keep the other five members of the Nuclear Family in balance and work as not only a peacekeeper but a deal maker and even a clean up crew whenever one of them gets into trouble or steps out of line. He concerns himself with the ethical nature of his powers and the actions of the other Atomics, where he is willing to take drastic action if he feels it would be the sole ethical action in the situation. We also learn more about the Atomic family, such as Santa Valentina and Brother Ray “Heavy” Harris, while getting glimpses into the characters of Morishita Masumi, Jacky Magus, and Eliza Hellbound and their relationships with each other. With The Power Fantasy being an ensemble book, I find the entire cast fascinating and easy to invest in.
Then comes Gillen exploring the existential horrors and fears of nuclear arsenals and how they serve no other purpose except to end all of life. With them coming into conflict, signaling the destruction of the world, all they can do is find a way to co-exist to deter the potential armageddon. Gillen examines how one false move by an Atomic could create a domino effect and destroy the planet. Even to this day, the nuclear shadow of death hangs over us, where all life as we know it will be gone due to the press of a button. And with the series set in the past, specifically in 1999, he draws attention to the fear of Y2K, where the approaching millennium would mess up computer clocks and accidentally launch warheads. Despite us being in 2024, Gillen wants to demonstrate how those weapons still hang over us and threaten us even if we do not think about them as much as we did in the twentieth century.
The art by Wijngaard is a real standout with its vibrant colors and captures a stylized fictional version of the past. And I love his character designs for the six Atomics, where they each have a distinct vibe that says everything about their character just by looking at them. The six Atomics are instantly iconic and feel different from the standard superhero fair while reflecting the various periods of history they exist in. Outside of the fantastic aesthetics, his drawing and paneling make Gillen’s already engaging script into an even more engrossing comic combined with Clayton Cowles’s seamlesslettering.
The Power Fantasy #1 by Gillen and Wijngaard is a perfect debut issue that draws readers into its compelling story and art. While the planet continues to turn, its very existence lies in the hands of six super-powered individuals whose lives impact its livelihood. All it takes is one simple conflict for all of the dominoes to fall down and kill everyone. The clock is counting down faster, and hopefully, the people of Earth and the Atomics make it to the year 2000 unscathed.
The next chapter in the almost 100 year old history of superhero comics is here, and it’s The Power Fantasy #1 by Kieron Gillen, Caspar Wijingaard, and Clayton Cowles. The basic premise of the series is that there are six beings in the world known as “superpowers” because they have the strength of a nuclear arsenal of a world power. A battle between two superpowers doesn’t lead to billing Damage Control or Wayne Enterprises, but an actual effect on the geopolitical order. So, it’s fitting that this first issue is structured around two conversations featuring Etienne Lux, the world’s most powerful psychic, and Valentina, an angelic pop music lover in 1966 and Tonya, a reporter who can make her fingers light up in 1999. Etienne sets up the theory of the world, the praxis immediately knocks it down, and readers get one of the most innovative, forward thinking superhero comics since Miracleman. But it features contemporary pacing and slick visuals plus Cowles’ colored word balloons make Etienne’s psychic chats even more engaging.
Although there are six superpowers in The Power Fantasy plus folks with lower level abilities like Tonya, Gillen and Wijingaard wisely focus on Etienne Lux in the first issue. Etienne is a public intellectual, who tries and fails to come across as humble. He also has a hyperfixation with ethics, which makes sense because his power set means he can make anyone do anything. Like Professor X in some iterations of X-Men, Etienne is quite well-read and gets a boost from skimming the minds of other people. He name drops Bertrand Russell, Kant, and the Beach Boys as he tries figure out what role he and the superpowers play in the world. In conversation, he flirts with authoritarianism, genocide, and seems really into benevolent dictatorships. Etienne tries to live in the grey areas and keep a Cold War detente, but with some of the other superpowers that pop up in this issue, this isn’t going to cut it.
Caspar Wijingaard brings mood and a feeling of time and place to The Power Fantasy #1 and punches up the talkier, early bits of the comics. (But with these characters, a conversation is basically a fight scene.) His color palette for the 1966 evokes the warmth of listening to Pet Sounds for the first time, the needle crackling on your parents’ turntable with faded tie dye t-shirts and peace beads in the attic. However, he immediately leaves this nostalgic ambience for more direct, flat background colors as Etienne and Valentina debate the role they’re going to play in the world. Finally, Wijingaard’s colors reach a new level when the superpowers actually use their abilities. The double page compositions almost sneak up on you as Etienne droning to a reporter about past events turns into something a little more summer blockbuster. In addition to his and Gillen’s storytelling chops shown through Etienne and his 1999 rival Heavy having different panel layouts when they talk, Caspar Wijingaard’s character designs are striking and adds to the richness of the world even though we only get the tiniest glimpses of superpowers like Eliza and Masumi.
From the genre’s earliest days, writers, artists, directors, and showrunners have pondered the question, “What if superheroes were real?”, but even something interesting like The Boys TV show (I haven’t seen the latest season.) devolves into heroes vs villains as part of a neverending soap opera. This is why Watchmen having a finite end served it so well even as Warner Brothers/DC Comics continues to exhume its corpse. The Power Fantasy goes a step forward and shows how status quo shifting even six Superman/Dr. Manhattan/Omega mutant type individuals would have on the world. Let’s just say Etienne is one scary guy.
The Power Fantasy #1 is a smart, fresh, and thought-provoking take on the superhero genre. Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijingaard craft a world that is pure catnip for folkswho did all the history reading in school, but also like pop music and fashion.
The highly anticipated, launch-of-the-Summer The Power Fantasy #1 by Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijngaard has been wiped out completely at the distributor level, a day ahead of its release. Image Comics will rush this white-hot debut issue back to print this week in order to keep up with relentless reorder activity.
A daringly uncompromising new superhero hero epic, The Power Fantasy offers an edge-of-your seat read in which every character is a nuclear weapon on the brink of detonation… And the entire planet is on high alert.
It’s a world where “Superpowered” has a specific meaning. It’s reserved solely for those with the destructive potential of the nuclear arsenal of the most powerful nations on Earth. There are presently six superpowered beings, and the future of the planet is reliant on them never, ever coming into conflict.
The Power Fantasy #1 will be available at comic book shops this week—readers will want to contact their local comic shop asap to snag a first printing before they’re gone.
The Power Fantasy #1, second printing Cover A (Lunar Code 0624IM916), The Power Fantasy #1, second printing Cover B (Lunar Code 0624IM998), and The Power Fantasy #2 will be available at comic book shops on Wednesday, September 11.
(W) Kieron Gillen (A/CA) Caspar Wijngaard In Shops: Aug 07, 2024 SRP: $3.99
Series Premiere. “Superpowered.” You have certain preconceptions. They’re incorrect. Here, that word has a specific technical definition. Namely, “any individual with the destructive capacity of the nuclear arsenal of the USA.” There are six such people on Earth. The planet’s survival relies on them never coming into conflict. Come dance to the ticking of the doomsday clock with Kieron Gillen (The Wicked + the Divine, Die) and Caspar Wijngaard (Home Sick Pilots, All Against All). The eternal fight against fighting starts now.
After the atomic bomb dropped in the 1940s, a group of six super-powered beings appeared in the world, where they each possessed the destructive power capacity of the United States nuclear arsenal. If they ever got into conflict, it would mean the end of planet Earth. Since then, the Atomics or the Nuclear Family have built a fragile series of alliances to prevent each other from causing the end of the world. Now, as the clock draws close to the new millennium of the year 2000, Earth’s future continues to stand on these superpowers from never coming into conflict with each other. Kieron Gillen and Caspar Wijngaard take readers to the fragile doomsday clock as the future could disappear within the blink of an eye in The Power Fantasy #1.
With the setting being an alternate history period set in 1999, Gillen and Wijngaard expertly build the world where they give enough context clues for readers to seamlessly understand what has been going on while fleshing it out thoroughly. From slight hints in Gillen’s writing to background dressing and clothing drawn by Wijngaard, they have thought about every detail of how the Atomics’ appearance and presence impacted the world, from major to minor. Even hints of past events serve as vital elements to explaining how much their history diverged from our own and how their existence would influence everything from public opinion to government responses to pop culture. Even though The Power Fantasy #1 may not exist in the same reality as ours, certain aspects of our own can still be found, making their world a skewed version of our own.
And I appreciate Gillen presenting a more mature series where he focuses more on the characters and their relationships instead of solely on the action. With the highly destructive nature of their powers, he emphasizes how important it is for each Atomic to stay out of conflict with each other and the world itself, which could mean the death of everybody. Focusing on Etienne Lux in The Power Fantasy #1, Lux serves as a great lens into the world where Lux essentially has to keep the other five members of the Nuclear Family in balance and work as not only a peacekeeper but a deal maker and even a clean up crew whenever one of them gets into trouble or steps out of line. He concerns himself with the ethical nature of his powers and the actions of the other Atomics, where he is willing to take drastic action if he feels it would be the sole ethical action in the situation. We also learn more about the Atomic family, such as Santa Valentina and Brother Ray “Heavy” Harris, while getting glimpses into the characters of Morishita Masumi, Jacky Magus, and Eliza Hellbound and their relationships with each other. With The Power Fantasy being an ensemble book, I find the entire cast fascinating and easy to invest in.
Then comes Gillen exploring the existential horrors and fears of nuclear arsenals and how they serve no other purpose except to end all of life. With them coming into conflict, signaling the destruction of the world, all they can do is find a way to co-exist to deter the potential armageddon. Gillen examines how one false move by an Atomic could create a domino effect and destroy the planet. Even to this day, the nuclear shadow of death hangs over us, where all life as we know it will be gone due to the press of a button. And with the series set in the past, specifically in 1999, he draws attention to the fear of Y2K, where the approaching millennium would mess up computer clocks and accidentally launch warheads. Despite us being in 2024, Gillen wants to demonstrate how those weapons still hang over us and threaten us even if we do not think about them as much as we did in the twentieth century.
The art by Wijngaard is a real standout with its vibrant colors and captures a stylized fictional version of the past. And I love his character designs for the six Atomics, where they each have a distinct vibe that says everything about their character just by looking at them. The six Atomics are instantly iconic and feel different from the standard superhero fair while reflecting the various periods of history they exist in. Outside of the fantastic aesthetics, his drawing and paneling make Gillen’s already engaging script into an even more engrossing comic combined with Clayton Cowles’s seamlesslettering.
The Power Fantasy #1 by Gillen and Wijngaard is a perfect debut issue that draws readers into its compelling story and art. While the planet continues to turn, its very existence lies in the hands of six super-powered individuals whose lives impact its livelihood. All it takes is one simple conflict for all of the dominoes to fall down and kill everyone. The clock is counting down faster, and hopefully, the people of Earth and the Atomics make it to the year 2000 unscathed.
It’s a new week and we’re getting ready for San Diego Comic-Con, Gen, Con, Otakon… a lot of conventions. While we keep bringing the lead up news, here’s some comic news and reviews you might have missed from around the web.
Writer Kieron Gillen and artist Caspar Wijngaard took Emerald City Comic Con by storm on Friday when Gillen shared news of their upcoming series The Power Fantasy. Gillen and Wijngaard were guests of the show and further entertained a queue of enthusiastic fans eager for for more details on this forthcoming series with Image Comics slated for August.
It’s a world where “Superpowered” has a specific meaning. It’s reserved solely for those with the destructive potential of the nuclear arsenal of the most powerful nations on Earth. There are presently six superpowered beings, and the future of the planet is reliant on them never, ever coming into conflict.
With an approach that sits between The Boys and Watchmen and a music video aesthetic, The Power Fantasy #1 will be available at comic book shops in August and across many digital platforms, including Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, and Google Play.
