‘The Future Is ******#1’ (review)

Written by Fred Van Lente 
Art by Ennio Bufi
Published by REKCAH Comics

This is an intriguing premise for a comic and a really interesting debut issue. There are a lot more pages than the typical comic book issue. It is a cyberpunk tale, the kinds of which we have not really seen before.

At the helm writing this tale is Fred Van Lente, who always delivers a new and interesting story. Van Lente has done a lot in different genres and this book does find him in new territory for sure. It is refreshing to read and the book has a great story that is easy to follow but definitely has a lot of interesting dimensions to it. I enjoyed it very much.

As this book begins, the Hacker Wars are over, and the Black Hats have won. There is a digital gang that has come together made up of digital ronin, freebooters, and hackers. They call themselves Black Mountain.

They band together to try and stop data barons, artificial overlords and technological terrorists. Their conflict makes up much of the comic, yet it is completely compelling watching the two groups at odds with each other. That is the basis of the book and things sort of springboard from there.

The storytelling reminded me a bit of a good long television show like Mr. Robot. There is a lot of brains behind the operation of this comic. The world building and breakdown of everything is truly impressive and there is an incredible attention to detail.

Each character in this world comes equipped with a sprite, which is a kind of assistant to the character they are attached to. These AI assistants don’t always have the main characters best interests in mind and it becomes pretty apparent throughout the book that they may all have plans of their own or are developing plans that are bigger than what we initially see. There is a lot at stake from the get go and the layers are pretty apparent.

Our main character, or the character who is at the center of it all is Wheeler.

Wheeler is a former black hat operative who thought he had escaped the war. Yet, it keeps dragging him back in. Wheeler is the character that I gravitated towards the most in this book, and I loved his scenes the most. He gathers the group together, which includes Martina De Leon, Sally Chu, Eli Nilsson, Art and Arf. They all bound together for a singular cause. And what exactly is that cause?

Well, they are all united to stop Jason Roanoke.

Roanoke is the villain of the piece and he once ran all of the supply chains in the world. Now that he doesn’t, he is pretty ticked off. He used to control the world’s private armies as well and he is using his former contacts to help him with his current cause. We find out that he now runs Tranquility Base and it is a fortress in space that is out of the jurisdiction of the world at large. He is also planning something pretty big. Roanoke is a hell of a villain and we get to see that as the story progresses as well.

Roanoke is the undisputed master of space, and it seems like the future is his to shape however he might want. This is not good news for the world at large. Everything sort of goes crazy from there as the de facto bunch of earth’s heroes have to stop this crazy madman.

But they may not be able to.

Can the Black Mountain gang stop this crazy madman from destroying all of reality? Will they even have a chance to confront him about his forthcoming misdeeds?

A lot happens very quick and it is truly an enjoyable time watching this whole thing unfold. The first chapter here really grabs you and you can’t put it down from start to finish. And I loved that.

The story by Fred Van Lente is top notch. His writing is so seamless that I really could not put it down. The artwork by Ennio Bufi is fantastic as well.

There is a lot to like in this book. I cannot wait to see where this creative team takes us from here. This is a great first issue and an intriguing start to this universe.

RATING: A