AfterShock Comics have announced “Astronaut Down,” a sci-fi thriller by writer James Patrick (“The Kaiju Score,” “Campisi: The Dragon Incident”), artist Rubine (“Search for Hu”), colorist Valentina Briški (“Eden”), and letterer Carlos M. Mangual (“Dark Red: Where Roads Lead”). The book follows Douglas Spitzer, a trainee astronaut who, instead of outer space, is being prepared for a mission “into alternate realities, on a desperate mission to save Earth from a horrific crisis that has our world on the brink of extinction.”
“Unfortunately,” as the synopsis puts it, “it’s a mission where everything will go wrong, where Douglas’s training and very humanity will be put to the test, and where a deep-seeded secret could sabotage everything.”
Patrick says, “This book is about the theory of an astronaut – what it takes to be one; why do people do it? It’s about the sacrifice and duty that comes with it,” continuing, “The plot is a ‘simple’ mission to save the world. ‘Astronauts’ on a mission to save everything that we’ve kind of effed up. So, you know, it’s cool science fiction, a tad retro, it has a dash of horror, and I think it has a lot of cool ideas all related to space travel, but put into another type of travel. In this book, the word astronaut is not literal, it’s symbolic, and people will see what that means when they read it.”
He adds, “It’s probably the closest thing I’ve written to straight science fiction. I don’t think anything I do is straight anything, and that’s the case here as there are dabs of horror in this, but this is the first book that’s probably technically sci-fi for me. And of course I’m thrilled because Rubine is so wonderful and absolutely nailed it, and then Valentina Briski’s striking color work.”
“Astronaut Down” #1 will be released on June 1, with a regular cover by Rubine, and an incentive cover by Andy Clarke with colorist Jose Villarrubia. It will retail at 32 pages for $4.99. You can check out the variant cover, an interior preview, and more from Patrick in an official Q&A after the jump:
JAMES PATRICK ON WHAT THE IS BOOK ABOUT AND WHY HE IS THRILLED FOR IT TO COME OUT:
“This book is about the theory of an astronaut – what it takes to be one; why do people do it? It’s about the sacrifice and duty that comes with it. And we point all that at this one astronaut, and then we throw a wrench in it. We challenge it. We make our astronaut confront what he thinks he wants and who he thinks he is. And there are some current events in it to pull it together. The latter of which came out of the story and not the opposite, and then it all sort of weaved together. There needed to be an element in the book to challenge the astronaut’s beliefs, and without getting too detailed, that’s where those current events come in. It touches on a frustration many of us have had the last few years, and I used that to get this story where it needed to go. The plot is a “simple” mission to save the world. “Astronauts” on a mission to save everything that we’ve kind of effed up. So, you know, it’s cool science fiction, a tad retro, it has a dash of horror, and I think it has a lot of cool ideas all related to space travel, but put into another type of travel. In this book, the word astronaut is not literal, it’s symbolic, and people will see what that means when they read it.
And I’m thrilled for it to come out because it’s probably the closest thing I’ve written to straight science fiction. I don’t think anything I do is straight anything, and that’s the case here as there are dabs of horror in this, but this is the first book that’s probably technically sci-fi for me. And of course I’m thrilled because Rubine is so wonderful and absolutely nailed it, and then Valentina Briski’s striking color work.”
JAMES PATRICK ON SOME OF HIS INSPIRATIONS BEHIND CREATING THE BOOK:
“The absolute biggest inspiration for me was a movie called Possessor, which isn’t that old. And it was purely an aesthetic thing. But it gave this project its, ahem, liftoff. And in the course of its execution, I’m not sure the aesthetic is that close to it anymore, but it was the motivation I needed to get the stone rolling and then it went in different directions. After that, we sprinkled in some Akira and Moebius, stirred the pot, and what came out of that is what this book turned out to be.”
JAMES PATRICK ON (3) REASONS WHY COMIC FANS SHOULD PICKUP THIS BOOK:
“First is the art. Rubine’s pencils and inks and Valentina’s colors are the MVPs here. Clean, purposeful, and beautiful. Second is that, I hope, it takes you on an emotional journey that, when you’re done, is very fulfilling. And thirdly because it’s something a lot of my newer readers haven’t seen from me. In this case it’s sci-fi, not stylistic mesh to the extent of my other recent work like KAIJU SCORE, and that it has a specific emotional core that I haven’t used since way back when I wrote a book called Death Comes to Dillinger.”
