Hey, fans of Bronze Age superheroes! Just in time for the recent release of the sci-fi superhero comic Sideral: The Last Earthman #2, creator Chris Malgrain (my artistic collaborator on the 2005 Stan Lee comic project Stan Lee’s Alexa) appeared yesterday on J.D. Calderon’s YouTube show Indy Comics Explained, where he promoted his work, his origins as an artist, and his Oniric Comics company, whose growing list of titles includes a pair I’m involved with: The Formidables (which I edit and occasionally script) and Sideral: The Last Earthman (which I script). Grab a seat and give it a view!
The Formidables is an 8-issue series (issue 6 just went on sale) about a quintet of superheroes battling evil and bigotry in 1950s America. In their first story arc, they faced off with a Communist super-villain…who was disguised as an American white supremacist! And then things really got weird when a cosmic being arrived on Earth and announced a terrible invasion force of demons was on its way—and he knew about it because he’s actually God! It’s a unique take on the genre, as Chris examines topics like race relations and sexual identity in a Cold War setting, but with an appropriate amount of punching and explosions mixed in, of course—we are talking superhero comics, after all!
Sideral, meanwhile, is about a scientist who makes an astounding breakthrough guaranteed to change the world—just in time for the world to be destroyed when nuclear war breaks out. Caught in a unique combination of radiation and genetic transformation triggered by his experiments, as Earth’s lone survivor he becomes the cosmic entity called Sideral, and sets out to find some meaning to his existence among the stars. If you’re into “cosmic” superheroes like Marvel’s Silver Surfer and Captain Marvel, then Sideral is definitely worth checking out!
For further information on Sideral and The Formidables—including sample pages and how to order copies—visit the Oniric Comics sales page at distributor/printer IndyPlanet. Each issue is $3.99 in print—but the digital versions are free to download! How’s that for a bargain?
