Nameless.

Grant Morrison, writer
Chris Burnham, artist
Nathan Fairborn, colorist
Simon Bowland, letterer
Drew Gill, designer
Rian Hughes, Logo

192 pages.

$14.99

buy it HERE.

"Abandon all hope and experience ultimate horror!"

says the blurb on the back cover.

I always was a fan of those hokey self-explanatory 'aliens visited earth long ago' pseudo-scientific stories by the likes of Erich von Däniken (Chariots of the Gods?) that I tore through in the Seventh Grade in 1972. In many ways the 1970s seemed a more 'gullible' time with the likes of Bigfoot and The Bermuda Triangle being held up and discussed as true facts. Decades later this kind of 'gee-whiz what-if' speculation had its more negative, dark turn in Government Conspiracy Theories coupled to folk tales and myths (X-files anyone?).

Which was why I really looked forward to reading 'Nameless'. The Cover illustration with the astronaut suits bearing glyphs gave me a portend of a story that would fit right in that 'Chariots of the Gods?' theme. As it turned out, the suits were of Earth origin and the signs the addition of one 'nameless' seer type of guy who ensures a dangerous mission to a remote asteroid goes smoothly -using magic as protection.

There's a backstory that is really clever, explaining the asteroid belt as really the remains of an extra planet that was destroyed by war, and that the ancient aliens there have a secret or two scientists on earth want to find out about. There's a Rupert Murdoch/Elon Musk type Billionaire magnate (Paul Darius) who has financed a special mission to explore one asteroid which bears a strange symbol on it and is headed straight for earth.

There's a mix of the Alien movies with a bit of that obscure movie Event Horizon as well, all in the same Horror wheelhouse. This will be a graphic novel that I'll re-read again because of its art mainly, which I don't think is a knock really, a lot of classic Heavy Metal stories I go back to have fairly simple stories or plot points. There's something about re-entering that world art-wise that makes them valuable to me.

The artwork's tone is hyper-detailed and hyper-violent! I'm used to a lot of extreme shit but there were a few pages that I turned to where I went 'oh my God!' So definitely not for underage readers at all!

I also liked the flip-flop reality Nameless played with by maybe showing the mission as a dreamed up psychotic episode, with the main character shown in the hospital (again, shades of 'Hard Boiled'... another Heavy Metal source).

My only nitpick was that the story fell into familiar horror-movie tropes. Without giving too much away I'd say 'Nameless' is much more a highly detailed fever-dream visually but less of a foggy mystery in words. That's strange for me to say that, since I'm complaining the story isn't vague enough(!) I guess I mean vague for 'poetic' maybe?

Anyway, this is well-worth adding to your collection, if you're into great graphic novels in Sci Fi/Horror!

Buy Mayfield Eight

Even though my Kickstarter funded you can still buy issue One of Mayfield Eight my Shopify store!

Issue Two will be available some time in late August on the same Shopify site. Stay tuned!

Facebook Youtube

10454 Lomita Ave #B, Felton
United States

SHARE FORWARD
MailerLite