Karnes, John – Silent Energy

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Silent Energy

Anybody out there looking for a remarkably solid science fiction comic dealing with events occurring in 3152 and later? Then you’re in luck! I’m always baffled by people who set their “futuristic” stories 10-20 years in the future, or well within their lifetimes, as they usually end up looking silly once that actual year comes along. No such trouble with this one, and we start off with the origin story of a young turtle boy growing up and listening to Ziggy Stardust. I guess that could be a minor quibble of mine: chances are that records aren’t going to exist 100 years from now, much less 1100 years from now, and maybe some other more fantastical form of media should have been included, but that’s a nitpick of the highest order. Maybe it’s just something that’s meant to look like a record for nostalgia reasons and I’m being stupid, which is likely. Anyway, from there we get a fantastic conversation about the meaning behind the music to a future people, and from there we check in with our turtle hero at various points in his life as a space pilot and defender of the planet from alien invasions. We see Johnny (that’s his name) converse with his dad about becoming a pilot and knowing that his shell will be surgically removed before that’s possible, some down time in his college days rooming with a celestial dragon, an encounter with evil (?) robots, using his advanced weapons to stop a theoretical invasion pretty much effortlessly, dealing with the last of the giant spider gods, another conversation with his dad as an older man, some interpersonal drama between space missions, a pretty damned sweet Jack Kirby tribute, and the dreams that he is haunted by as an old man. This is a hell of an achievement, as it detailed the quiet moments in the life of this turtle person so perfectly that I didn’t even realize until the comic was done that that was the damned point. A few of the big moments in his life are here, sure, but it’s obvious that the quiet moments were by and large the things that were most important to Johnny. John (the author) also does a fantastic job of throwing in little nuggets of information here and there, tantalizing clues to a larger narrative that I hope comes out one day. But for now this is self-contained and tells the story of a life in the 32nd century, and all for a measly $3!