Warped!

Back in the 80's, when comics and I were much younger, the Independent market erupted with a vigor and a panache that made fans shudder with anticipation. New companies were popping up and new titles and characters were showing up on the stands every week. A lot of it was nonsense, but some of it was great material by pros who knew what they were doing and were just waiting the chance to strut their stuff.

Warp from First Comics is such a comic. It was the debut effort for First, which soon followed with an E-Man revival, Mike Grell's Sable, Howard Chaykin's American Flagg, and more. But Warp was the first, and it was a distinctive and well-crafted comic by Peter B. Gillis and Frank Brunner. It adapted a trio of plays which had made an impact in the 70's, and sought to bring the brash energy of the comics to the stage. The designs for the play had been done by none other than comics maestro Neal Adams. So when Brunner took on this task he was playing on ground he knew well. Blending his best Doc Strange weirdo-dimension chops with his very humanistic quasi-realism he was the perfect choice to enliven the smart Gillis script that adapted the plays. The way it's credited, I imagine Brunner broke down the story and Gillis supplied the words, a hyper-Marvel style approach, but that's speculation on my part.



The story deals with a young man named David Carson (mistakenly called "John Carter" at one point so the similarity will not be missed, the one too-too moment in the initial run) who discovers he's the lost god Lord Cumulus of Fen-Ra, a fifth-dimensional cityscape led by Lugulbanda a wizard and protected by Sargon a warrior woman, as well as some robots dubbed "Facless Ones". Soon enough Cumulus falls into the clutches of his brother Lord Chaos and his minions, a treacherous man-ape named Symax and a seductive insect queen named Valeria.


The story is divided into three three-issue arcs, each arc presumably adapting one of the three plays. In the first arc Cumulus battles Chaos, in the second they team up to battle Xander an ultra-predator brought to their world by Valeria for revenge, and in the final arc they fulfill their destiny by blending into one being called Ego, a female figure who battles Infinity and beyond.

It's high-falootin' stuff indeed. And making head or tails of it calls for complete attention. I haven't read the story in decades, but many months ago I found a pile of old Indy titles for tiny money and grabbed up a bunch. The run of Warp was in it. I read the first nine issues by Brunner which adapt the plays. The series continued for a time, but really loses its way after that initial push.

If you can find, I'd recommend them. They've not been reprinted or collected. And frankly they'd make a pretty decent package. Such extended storylines are all over these days, but back then they were still a relative rarity. And for such a coherent story by such strong talent to languish as it has, I can only assume the publishing rights are the problem.

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