Scanning My Collection: Liefeld’s Galactica Week (Day 1)

For the record, this isn’t the worst comic I’ve ever read. That doesn’t mean it’s good, but not the worst. Let me tell you a story.

Image via Wikipedia

Maximum Press started as a separate project from Image Comics, a way for Rob Liefeld to do some work that didn’t feel like it could go under Image. Considering that Image has such a wide spectrum of comics, I find that odd, but whatever. It folded when Liefeld left Image to form Awesome Comics. The only Maximum Press online is a book company.

During MP’s existence, Liefeld acquired the rights to Battlestar Galactica. In July of 1995 (at least that’s the cover date), the first issue came out. Knowing nothing about Liefeld or caring, all I knew at the time that one of my favorite shows as a kid was being revived in comic form and I was very happy. Then I started reading them. Having more money and room than I do today I went ahead and bought most of their run, and maybe I could have spent the money better elsewhere.

Usually when I do a “Scanning My Collection” article I can review the whole thing in one shot. However, I found that I really couldn’t do a simple review like I did with the various G.I. Joe/Transformer crossover mini-series, because there’s too much to get into with these comics. Maybe I’m a stricter critic now than I was then, I don’t know. At any rate, I’m splitting the review by issue and today we’re starting with the first issue.

Battlestar Galactica #1

Maximum Press (July 1995)

If you think that’s a lot for one comic, note that “Extreme Colors” is listed as consisting of around 14 people. Geez. Anyway, Liefeld also did the cover. Believe it or not, that’s Starbuck in the lower left corner, Baltar in the upper right, and Starbuck is scarier looking than Baltar. Also, I think that’s Athena in the lower right, with Apollo in the lower center. This doesn’t bode well, does it?

The story beings with Apollo’s personal journal in the colonial year 7362, as Adama lays dying. (I should note that the comic completely ignored the spin-off series Galactica 1980, but then so do most classic Galactica fans.) His big worry is that Apollo has disappeared. Apollo then returns as part of a four-page spread that introduces our cast in a most confusing layout.

I had to scan it small to fit it, but try to figure out what direction you’re supposed to read this. It too me a while. I can understand not being a slave to the “nine-panel grid”, but there had to be a better way to do this. You had two pages! This is not the biggest sin against the grid in this mini-series. That comes next issue.

I have to give the artist credit, though. Outside of Tigh having lost more hair than before (the colorist also forgot that he should have long since gone grey) the art captures the look of the actors within the bounds of copyright and other legal issues. It’s a good job. It won’t last.

Apollo tells us (again wasting two pages to show off their pretty artwork) that his disappearance was due to the Seraphs, the mysterious “beings of light” from the original series, who suddenly decided to help the fleet reach Earth quicker using a new device called the “temporal overdrive”. It’s a major “tell don’t show” moment and it feels like it’s all shoe-horned in so that Liefeld and Napton can get to what they want to do, and push the series ahead a ton of yahrens (years in Colonial timekeeping). We’re told that Adama has something called Kaitai Syndrome but Apollo isn’t ready to take command. Adama insists as well as mentioning his “last command”.

Liefeld and Altstaetter's new Vipers take flight.

Jump ahead 15 yahrens to a pitch battle between the Galactica and the Cylons. Here we see the updated designs that the creators really wanted to get to.

"Man, traffic is terrible today."

I’m not sure that the classic Viper really needed a refit. All they did was move the guns to the flattened wings and drop the thruster at the top in favor of two smaller ones. It’s not that major a change but they don’t look bad. The people, however, are a different story. Starbuck has even longer, straight hair. He’s practically a “bishie” now. Apollo actually looks like an older Apollo, but Boomer and Boxey I don’t really buy.

At least Starbuck is written right.

By the way, someone needs to tell Starbuck that one of the ships destroyed was the Rising Star, the casino ship the characters would go to relax. That’s a rather iconic ship as the show goes and it gets blown up with little fanfare. I can imagine the others having to hold Starbuck back as he tried to jump back in his is Viper and ring Baltar’s neck with his own two hands. 🙂

This time Apollo made the biggest jump yet, finally reaching Earth. Earth in Liefeld’s Galactica is still in its prehistoric period, but Starbuck’s scouting party picks up advanced technology, before Boxey is attacked by a Tyrannosaurus. Back at the battlefield, Baltar is less than happy that the fleet escaped again, when Count Iblis, the fallen Seraph that sounds oddly like the Cylon Imperious Leader, arrives, ending the first issue.

Baltar, wearing his Cable cosplay. Inset: Iblis later fried his hairdresser.

So far the biggest crime is the waste of panel space. Layouts would take two pages for no good reason other than to show off the artwork, the character and vehicle redesigns weren’t really all that necessary, and they blew up one of the most important vehicles for the stories, the place where everyone relaxed after a hard day of Cylon battling unless the Nomen happened to drop by, with little morning from its biggest resident.

But this is only the first issue. The real pain begins in issue #2. Will Boxey escape the T-Rex? What is Iblis doing with the Cylons, and why does he look nothing like Patrick Macnee? Two of these questions will be answered tomorrow as Scanning My Collection’s “Liefeld’s Galactica” week continues.

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