I've recently been reading Dan Dare: The 2000AD Years Vol. 1. I'm not really that familiar with DD - I know of his publication origins in Eagle, but I've never read any. and while I've only finished the first storyline so far, I now have a new favourite artist - Massimo Belardinelli.
The future as we envision it today - cynicism and fears about the fate of humanity aside - is very consistent. All technology is synergised, working together on user-friendly platforms. When I imagine the representations of this future on film, names like Minority Report, Star Trek 2009 and Ex_Machina come to mind. Everything is digital and sleek, made of variations of gorilla glass, white light and chrome. Their aesthetics are deceptively simple and pleasing to the eye, though somewhat sterile and lacking in character. I guess the closer we get to the future that all the great minds foretold through art and science, the more accurate that fictional portrayals of it get.
But Belardinelli's work is so out there and intense! It encapsulates everything I love about vintage sci-fi. It's like a Wally Wood sci-fi strip took acid. It's not a completely analogue world like a Wally Wood sci-fi, the tech feels more post-2001 (probably because it is.) But there are space suits made of weird fabric, guns in leather holsters, creative alien designs and a very busy space backdrop. Lots of nebulae and cosmic energy. Each issue is only about 5-6 pages long so it makes sense to burn brightly and quickly. It means every issue structure is simple:
- Splash page with colour, that pulls you straight into the action
- Next spread packs as much character and story as it can, and does it surprisingly well
- Final page ends on a big dramatic event or image, the events of which will be the splash page on the next issue.
These spreads just make me want to draw forever. There's so much packed into each panel and page, and with so much energy and action. Reading this is like listening to a hardcore punk album, where every song is around 1 or 2 raw, intense minutes. That's kind of what all early 2000AD is like though - I have a small collection that I found around charity shops and second hand bookshops, and they read like pulp fiction. The paper is cheap newspaper paper, and they feel like zines or something, as if they were photocopied at home and sold in record stores.
If you find yourself in the presence of 2000AD's run of Dan Dare, check it out!
(as a bonus, here's one of my favourite Sci Fi images ever by Frank Frazetta)
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