Picking up the pieces
Picking up the pieces |
|
Page 35 of 38  Pages from 'Ranxerox' (1984), an incredibly violent tale of a 'half man, half photocopier'. Art: Gaetano Liberatore. It was in the field of science fiction that the biggest advances were seen. The key title here was Heavy Metal (Heavy Metal, 1977), a glossy science fiction anthology -and nothing to do with the headbanging musical genre. In its first incarnation, the comic was a version of the French title Metal Hurlant (Les Humanoides Associes, 1975), which was part of the new wave of adult comics on the Continent: the latter was influenced both by the American underground and the French student revolts of the late 1960s (and their accompanying cultural expression), and took its science fiction very seriously. Metal Hurlant's stories were a mix of psychedelic, and often very pretentious, future odysseys and heavy satires, and typically included a great deal of female nudity. The production standards were unprecedented, and many strips featured fully painted art, where creators made the most of the magazine-quality paper by utilising airbrush techniques, which gave a smooth finish to the colour work. Heavy Metal followed this formula, and translated Metal Hurlant's best fantasy creators (the satire strips were generally ignored on the grounds that they would not travel). The foremost of these creators was 'Moebius', the 'grand fromage' of French science fiction, many of whose strips became readers' favourites over the years (including 'Arzach', 'The Airtight Garage' and 'The Incal'). His art style was influenced by Robert Crumb, but was much more realistic, and introduced a new sophistication into comics: his were science fiction worlds you could really believe in, and it was no surprise that Hollywood would borrow his ideas for movies such as Blade Runner and The Empire Strikes Back.  Heavy Metal |