Writers – Jonathan Hickman & Mike Costa
Art – Di Amorim
Regular Cover – Jonathan Hickman
All Other Covers – Jacen Burrows
Lettering – Kurt Hathaway
Colors – Juanmar
Created by Jonathan Hickman
Publisher – Avatar
In God Is Dead, writers Jonathan Hickman and Mike Costa pose the question, What If The Mythological Gods From Cultures All Over The World Were Real And Began Returning To Earth? The answer? A whole lot of us would die and the planet would never be the same!
In the opening pages of the book we are given geographic coordinates and death tolls along with panels showing natural disasters on steroids all over the planet. We then see Gods such as Zeus, Odin, Horus, Vishnu and Quetzacoatl returning to the world and relieving mankind of control of the Earth.
We see the world begin to change and adapt to this new rule as the news anchor goes from professional, reporting the events, to zealot speaking the will of the Gods to the masses. The U.S. Government has gone underground and don’t seem any closer to a plan for what to do about it than anyone else and a small group of rebels and scientists gather together in an Egyptian sewer to try and solve the problem.
I was absolutely blown away by this first issue.
Admittedly this kind of story is right up my alley. The blending of the religious world and the secular worlds of Government and Science appeals to me on many levels. I have always questioned the validity of religion. What makes people believe in one thing and not another? At what point does a religion followed as truth, become myth?
Conspicuously absent are the Judeo-Christian figures of the God of the Old Testament and Jesus, which are mentioned but not elaborated on. We will have to see what happens with that as the series continues.
Hickman and Costa hit this first issue out of the park and pose some really relatable questions to the readers. The artwork of Di Amorim & Juanmar is a perfect companion to the story being both vibrant and full of detail. The disaster scenes are breathtaking and Zeus’s return to Vatican City in particular is pretty spectacular.
I am a huge Hickman fan already from his work at Marvel on Avengers and Image on the awesome East Of West, so the fact that I absolutely love his concept for God Is Dead is no surprise. As hard as I try I can’t really find anything negative to critique. It’s a solid concept with a great story and beautiful artwork to go along with it.
It’s hard to say at this point where Hickman and Costa are taking us but if the first issue is any indication, I am in for the long haul! It is for all of these reasons that I Space Chief, God Of Nonsense, must give God Is Dead a solid…
5 out of 5 nerds
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