(courtesy Image Comics)
God bless humanity – for a complicated, contrary and multifaceted species, we sure do like to keep things simple.
A clear example of our preference for everything being deliciously binary or linear is the way we view time which, depending on who you ask is multiversal in its expression, a state where the past, present and future mix rather being neatly and consequently in line, and easily schmooshed together in our memories where the cart before the horse, or the horse before the cart, is not as straightforward as we like to think.
Time is, far from being simple, is a LOT, and nowhere has that been clearer of late than in Assorted Crisis Events Vol. 1 by Deniz Camp (writer) and Eric Zawadzki (artist) which takes as its central premise that time is a having a MOMENT.
Quite a few of them in fact, with the back cover blurb of this most thoughtfully inventive and imaginative of graphic novels declaring, with a full caps breathlessness that “TIME IS HAVING A CRISIS!”
So much so that in the five loosely interlinked stories of Assorted Crisis Events Vol. 1 anthology, it’s not unusual for cavemen and medieval figures to be standing in a bar talking or for someone, innocently on their way to work, to walk straight into an Atypical Temporal Phenomena (ATP) and find themselves, or the homes they live in swapping places with prehistoric creatures or swampland.
Or for people, fleeing from a localised end of the world in one reality, to find themselves refugees in another reality where initial welcome gives way to bigotry, hatred and social unrest.
(courtesy Image Comics)
The effects of time, and of course, time itself, are far from simple, and Deniz Camp does a brilliant job of exploring how messily complicated it can be in ways that are simultaneously epic and blockbuster-y and intelligently, emotionally nuanced and which pack a real punch.
In fact, so talented is Camp, and so extraordinarily evocative is the artwork by Eric Zawadzki which bring the five compelling storylines to life, that premises that are on the surface really out-there – multiple timezones fighting it out in an end of the world, city-leveling stoush? Yes. Or a 13-year-old reliving the same short timeframe over and over for an unimaginable period of time? Also yes – suddenly feel very human and real.
Good sci-fi should always manage to do both, of course, with the best of the genre able to dazzle us with thrillingly exciting narrative and audacious ideas while at the same time going deep into the nature and heart of what makes us human.
Assorted Crisis Events Vol. 1 is definitely up there with the best, both writing and artwork-wise, serving up stories that speak to the complexities of being alive and how much of the time all we’re trying to do are live happy and fulfilling in the face of truly extraordinary circumstances.
By capturing the raw humanity of everyday life against some truly time twisted moments, Assorted Crisis Events Vol. 1 shines a spotlight on what it means to be alive, to be happy, to be sad, to feel sad and to feel exposed, and ultimately to forge a life that means something even when the world around us seems hellbent of stripping it of anything of value.
(courtesy Image Comics)