Vargas reviews ARKS

It’s October and the spooky times are upon us once again. When the trees turn red and the days get longer, I always start looking for new comics to fit the vibe and boy, did I find a winner this time.

The team at Clicky Sprout Wife sent me the first 4 issues of their series ARKS and, truth be told, when I read on their site that they had invented a new genre of science fiction, I was skeptical to say the least. But I’ll be damned if I wasn't proven wrong.

The elevator pitch is something like this: what if, instead of using spaceships to colonize planets, we used bacteria to seed life trillions of miles from earth? Sounds cool, right? Well in execution it’s even better. The finished product is like if David Cronenberg wrote The Martian with a side helping of Biblical allegories. Our protagonists Lilith and Joseph have been grown from the aforementioned bacteria and have to not only survive like we do every day, by eating, drinking, and not going into septic shock from horrible wounds, but they also have to determine if the planet is viable for continuing growth and spawning more humans. Of course, since this is horror/sci fi, things are amiss. Not only is the atmosphere threatening to poison our heroes with oxygen, the oceans vinegar, and the rain acid, but there are horrible mutants roaming the planet looking for FLESH.

Every page of this book is oozing with blood, mucus, slime, gunk, and sludge and it could not be more stunning. The art is absolutely incredible across all 4 issues and really helps ground the story in a way the reader can relate to while they’re being hit with a lot of smarty pants science goodness we nerds eat up. In literally every panel of the book, someone’s nose is running or they’re bleeding. And it serves the plot! I don’t want to give too much away, but trust me when I say that everything in this book is smarter than it looks.

I can’t say enough good things about ARKS, and if I was an indie publisher I’d be knocking down doors to print this IP.

ARKS issues 1 through 4 are available right now at Clicky Sprout Wife's website, and they have a Kickstarter running for their first spin off series ARKS Proximan. It ends October 12th so act fast.

ARKS is written by R.J. Collins with art by R.J. Collins and Andrew Morris.

Lettering by Jeremiah Lambert

Produced by Holly Cameron and R.J. Collins

3D digital art by James Daly, Andrew Morris, and Neil Copland