Radiant Comics

I’m back from the comic shop this week and I got six new comics as I continue my search for new comics to read:

And now for a review of something I’ve read recently.

“Heartburst” by Rick Veitch

Here is another book I pulled off of my shelf that I haven’t read in decades. It was part of Marvel Comics’ graphic novel line (#10) and was originally published back in 1984. That was the year I graduated from High School and started college. I don’t think I’ve even picked this comic up since then and remembered nothing about it. Time is like that.

“Heartburst” is a story that takes place in the future on a far away world. Human beings have travelled all the way to a distant new world but have had no contact with Earth for hundreds of years. They have been able to pick up old TV shows from the 1950s though and these have become sacred transmissions to them. There is also an indigenous green skinned race of human-like people who are oppressed by us pink humans.

The main character is named Sunoco and is just trying to get by when he is sucked into world events. Earth is trying to reestablish contact, the humans are trying to wipe out the green skinned people, and Sunoco finds himself falling in love with a green skinned woman.

This, like a lot of the early 1980s graphic novels, is very influenced by European graphic albums. They were pretty much the only examples of comics for grownups at the time and so American cartoonists wanted to make works sort of like them. Not the usual super hero oriented work.

I enjoyed this story. There is a lot of plot and it moved along quickly. The book is about 48 pages long but it reads longer than that due to the larger than normal pages and the style of storytelling. The artwork is also full color so Veitch has a chance to use some different illustration techniques than in a four color comic. It’s also on good paper that is still nice and white all these years later.

There is not much else to say about “Heartburst”. It’s got an interesting story with some social commentary attached, nice artwork, and a couple of naked women. It also is interesting from a historical/creative perspective as it represents a road not well traveled since the European style graphic novel never really caught on here in the States. But there were attempts at it. This is a good one.