East of West – 2013-2019 (Image Comics) – Sci-Fi, Western, Action, Post-Apocalyptic
Author: Jonathan Hickman
Art: Nick Dragotta
Series Contents: East of West #1-45
In a United States with a revisionist history, the future has never looked so wild. Featuring a fractured country full of multiple tribal government parties warring for supremacy, East of West is an excellent Science Fiction banger full of action, explosions, revenge, creative technology and the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. The book is an absolute blast from front to back and beginning to end.
Story:
I will go ahead and get this outta the way, Jonathan Hickman is probably my favorite comic book author, only really rivaled by Grant Morrison, my other lifelong writer fascination. Both authors usually are incredibly detailed with their plots and details, using high concept storytelling and extremely well written dialogue. East of West was my first Hickman venture outside of Marvel, and it was an extremely amazing experience.
While the story is full of non-stop political characters, motivations, actions and fallout, there remains a core story about life, love and family, centered around Death, one of the Four Horsemen. Death found love with a woman Xiaolian, and even had a child, however there was an ultimate betrayal, and Death was left in… bad shape. His son? Imprisoned by his lover’s father, hidden secretly away to keep the world safe from a dark prophecy.
Death wound up facing off against the other Horsemen, War, Famine and Conquest, which don’t fare so well. However, it’s unlikely that this is truly their end. The prophecies say otherwise after all. All of these events are of the past, and we enter our tale in high gear, with Death on a strong revenge kick and in search for answers. Joining him are compatriots Crow and Wolf, two totally bad ass characters from one of the many country tribes, the Endless Nation.
East of West has intelligent and interesting takes on politics, religion, society, behavior, family, love, life and death, while infusing its story with an exciting and fast paced western-style adventure in a futuristic setting. It all works extremely well, and is a totally bad ass story all around. It has some amazing moments of action and excitement, as well as plenty of personal, human and touching moments, despite the unique nature of many of the characters involved.
The use of real history and historical characters is fun and interesting, while it is totally flipped upside down with the revisionist history and high-concept Sci-Fi elements. The results of the story are magical, and most any action or Sci-Fi reader will be pleased. This is definitely one of the best works of Science Fiction I have ever read, and some of the best comics out there.
Come meet Death, and learn the world with Babylon and Balloon.
Art:
This art and character design is just as bad ass as the scripting on the pages, and the pair of creators must have really loved realizing their vision of the twisted apocalyptic world built inside the pages. All of it looks fantastic. The action scenes look in motion and fly off the page, while the city and ship and creature designs are all intricate and detailed in the right ways. It feels futuristic and strange, yet somehow realistic and familiar. The story would not have excelled to the heights it hits without a strong pairing of writer and artist, and this one fully succeeds.
Reasons to Read:
Reading anything by Jonathan Hickman is rewarding, and this is some of this best work. It is not constrained by Marvel continuity like a lot of his work, and is his full creation of awesome Sci-Fi bad ass insanity.
The story is totally cool, the art is fantastic, and it is exciting to read from beginning to end. The 45 issues blow by, despite it seeming like a lot.
Similar Titles:
Decorum; Saga; Lazarus; Lazarus: Risen; Planetary; Descender; Ascender; Oblivion Song