This week, I want to take a look at a personal favorite of mine: Christian Gossett’s “The Red Star.” It is an operatic, allegorical epic influenced by Russian history, mythology, science fiction, and manga. Initially published by Image Comics in 2000, “The Red Star” was a smash hit due in large part to its innovative use of computer-generated 3-D modeling combined with traditional pencils and state-of-the-art digital coloring techniques. Originally selling at superhero levels, the book suffered from frequent changes in publisher as well as several delays caused by the labor-intensive processes involved in its production.
The world of “The Red Star” is highly detailed. Each issue is packed with extra tidbits of information about the world the story is set in: maps, newspaper articles, glossaries of terms and propaganda-esque pin-ups. A superpower called the United Republic of the Red Star (U.R.R.S.), modeled after the Soviet Union, wields near-unlimited power through a combination of industrialized magic and technology. The U.R.R.S’s Red Fleet is centered around flying battleships known as Skyfurnaces. Up to a mile or more in length, a Skyfurnace is a mothership capable of deploying vast armored and infantry forces, and armed with weapons known as isolator tunnels. These weapons are designed to house warkasters, magic-users capable of “kasting” spells, known as protocols, including transforming themselves into pure energy, which the isolator tunnels focus into powerful energy beams capable of destroying enemy ships.
[Spoiler Alert: This next paragraph contains spoilers from the first story arc, which become key plot points in later arcs. If you want to jump in blind, skip to the following paragraph.]The story centers around Maya Antares and her husband, Marcus. She is a warkaster, a Sorceress Major in the Red Fleet. He is an Infantry Captain. Assigned to the same unit, they find themselves deployed to invade Al’Istaan, a stand-in for Afghanistan. The first arc opens at the Battle of Kar-Dathra’s Gate, the final confrontation between the two nations. The Nistaani warriors fight hard, but they are no match for the Red Fleet. However, it turns out that they are sacrificing themselves in an effort to summon Kar Dathra the Eternal, spirit-champion of the Nistaani people. When he appears on the battlefield, the tides change immediately, and one after one the Skyfurnaces fall. Marcus is lost on the battlefield and presumed dead, but his wounds instead open up in him the ability known as the Eyes of Imbohl, which gives him the ability to see into the spirit world. Troika, a spirit-reaper tasked with collecting fallen souls, attempts to collect Marcus’ soul, but he is saved by the mysterious Red Woman, who reveals that the source of the U.R.R.S.’s power is none other than the souls of its own fallen citizens. And that’s when the story really gets interesting.
“The Red Star” is a comic that thinks big. It’s full of splash pages and two-page spreads, massive Skyfurnaces, Hydra class krawls (tanks the size of a large factory), and massive ethereal spirits that hang over the battlefield populate those pages. Long, almost poetic narrations about lofty ideals such as a warrior’s honor, freedom, love and self-sacrifice tie the major events together. Perhaps the biggest innovation in “The Red Star” isn’t the comic itself, but the innovations in its production.
“The Red Star” was built around an innovative technique combining traditional and digital art techniques. Each page combines Gossett’s pencils and computer-generated 3-D models, which were then colored in using the latest digital coloring techniques. Other comics had attempted similar methods before, but “The Red Star” was the first to get it all right. Over a dozen individuals were involved in the making of each issue, and the makeup of “Team Red Star” (as Gossett refers to them) has changed several times, so for brevity’s sake I won’t name all of the artists and designers involved.
The final product, however, is visually quite stunning. Because of the 3-D modeling, Team Red Star is able to render massive structures such as a Skyfurnace or a city skyline with an insane level of accuracy and detail that maybe a handful of artists are capable of achieving by hand. Nothing is out of proportion, which is essential to the massive scale of the sky-battles that make up much of the action-packed narrative. The colors in “The Red Star” are quite vivid, but not in a 90’s-Image-wants-your-eyes-to-bleed way, but in a way that makes the art leap out of the page at you. The lettering is, for the most part, very solid. There are a couple fonts in one or two of the issues that are a little difficult to read, which can interfere with the reading experience, but there are other cases in which the lettering is so well-done that you forget for a moment you’re reading words as well as pictures.
Continued belowIn comics, heavy-handed narration can sometimes have the effect of pulling the reader out of the story, distancing them from it in a way that makes it difficult for the reader to establish an emotional connection to the story. While “The Red Star” is full of narration, it is the kind of narration that pulls you right in to the story. Combined with dramatic visuals that entice your eye to linger on the page, Gossett’s narrations set the mood perfectly. Rather than hiding the narration in text boxes in the corners of each frame, the narration is integrated into the background of each page, similar to Fiona Staples’ hand-written narrations in “Saga” today. This helps integrate the narration seamlessly into the story.
Unfortunately, “The Red Star” is an incomplete story, having been cut-off midway through its last story arc, ‘The Sword of Lies.’ The book suffered from a tumultuous publishing history. Originally published at Image, it was then published independently by Archangel Studios, followed by a brief stint publishing through CrossGen Entertainment, before returning to self-publishing under Archangel Studios once again. With numerous delays due to juggling publishers and a labor-intensive development process, the book was unable to maintain the momentum gained from its initial success, and a new issue hasn’t been published since 2007. Gossett did write and draw a short story set in the world of “The Red Star” for Hero Comics 2012, which I enjoyed, but it was unrelated to the main storyline. When I spoke to Gossett at NYCC last year, he did mention that another volume is in the works, but was so nonspecific as to when it was coming out that I am assuming it’s going to be a long way off, and might not even see the light of day.
However, “The Red Star” is now being re-published digitally through Beyond Reality Media, Gossett’s latest comics enterprise. You can currently read the first three issues in their entirety at their website for free. If that hooks you, and you don’t want to wait a couple years for them to post the other 14 issues and both annuals, I highly recommend picking up the trade paperbacks. All four volumes are still available through online comics shops and Amazon, although you may have to do a little hunting. I’d love to recommend the oversized Special Edition of Volume 1: The Battle of Kar Dathra’s Gate, as it’s loaded with extras and made with top-quality paper that really does the art justice, but unfortunately the glue used to bind the paper to the cover is of really poor quality. My copy’s cover finished separating from the binding while being used as a reference for this very column. If you don’t mind doing a quick repair job with some rubber cement, I’d say go for it anyway.
There is currently a film adaptation in production by Warner Bros, to be directed by Josh Trank (Chronicle), tentatively set to come out some time in 2014. Previous attempts at making a film version of “The Red Star” have not made it past this stage, but I have good hope that the success of Avengers and the Nolan Batman films will give studios more incentive to put out comics-inspired films. I have a good feeling that if the movie is made, Gossett will find renewed determination to complete this wonderful epic. Now that Geof Darrow’s “Shaolin Cowboy” is already coming back, no comics-related announcement could make me happier!
