Traveling To Mars #10 Review

 

Writer: Mark Russell

Artist: Roberto Meli

Colorist: Chiara Di Francia

Letterer: Mattia Gentili

Cover Artists: Roberto Meli; Romina Moranelli; Fernando Proietti; Brent McKee

Publisher: Ablaze

Price: $3.99

Release Date: February 7, 2023

 

Vera's reports of natural gas deposits on Mars bolstered a society teetering on the brink of collapse. The Easy Beef Corporation funded a mission to send a human to Mars. There was only one problem: they couldn't send the resources to keep the astronaut alive indefinitely. So they sent Roy, a man with an imminent expiration date, to stake their claim. Unfortunately for Earth, Vera lied. Somehow, the rover attained sentience and craved communication with others. So, the Easy Beef Corporation will fund the infrastructure for natural gas extraction and an intrasolar delivery system. Human society will still collapse when it consumes its remaining natural resources.

 

Cancer won’t kill Roy. Nor will he live to see the Easy Beef Corporation land on Mars and watch other companies and nations battle over its nonexistent resources. He’ll consume his remaining oxygen today and die. How will Roy spend his last day on Mars? Let's put on our spacesuits, take a giant leap into Traveling To Mars #10, and find out!

 

Story

What would you eat for your last meal? How about steak? Sounds great, right? Thick, juicy, and imitation meat. Still, it tastes great, so who cares?

 

How about afterward? One final moment of entertainment? Roy watches the Kangaroo Kid movie again. Leopold and Albert sit beside Roy. Their optical sensors glow while watching. The robots rock on their wheels at the movie’s climax. So, the man who devoted his life to animals made his robot companions happy one final time, thanks to Hollywood's CGI magicians.

 

Now it's time for one last walk. Roy likens hiking around Mars to tramping through Arizona in a beekeeping outfit, but it's what he came here for, right? Isn't that the grand dream: exploring an alien planet? Yet Roy's thoughts remain tethered to Earth.

 

In earlier issues, we glimpsed Roy's courtship with Candace. We saw them marry and survive the storm that destroyed their town. In Traveling To Mars #10, Mark Russell returns us to Eufaula, Alabama, in the year of our Lord, 2024.

 

Roy and Candace live in a FEMA trailer. Thanks to his job at the pet store, he's filled their trailer with animals. Candace wants to start their family. Roy wants to wait to have children. Hey, aren't animals family? The choices he makes define their relationship. Candace argues that life will try to curtail your potential, but he can't embrace bigger dreams. Ultimately, Roy achieves his career goal, but at too great a cost.

 

Mark Russell forges a link between Roy and Vera in Traveling To Mars #10. Life consigned the rover to the scrap heap, just as it threw Roy's marriage onto the rocks. Both seek meaning and purpose in their lives. Like Roy, Vera cared for others and became a leader. As with Candace, the rover's journey will continue, while Roy's will end.

  

Art

Roberto Meli begins and ends Traveling To Mars #10 with Roy confronting Vera and the other surviving rovers. He divides the remainder of the tale between life on Earth and Roy's final morning in the shuttle. Roy looks charmingly ridiculous in his cowboy hat as he sits at a table and eats his fake steak with one hand. Meli portrays the purposelessness of his mission and life in one glimpse of the town Roy left behind. He also shows us a final sketch from Roy's notebook, as the lone Human on Mars commits his thoughts on the meaning of life to paper.

 

Under the glowing starfield, Roy sleeps in his illuminated shuttle. Sunrise fills the sky with red. Light streams through the shuttle windows. Like Leopold and Albert, Chiara Di Francia paints the shuttle interior in blue and orange. Highlights and shadows convey individuality to wall tiles and interior furnishings. I don't know its origin, as I've not followed this series since its inception, but a child's handprint-turkey drawing on yellow paper sparks the most vibrant color in Roy's present.

 

Mattia Gentili relates Roy's reminiscences with uppercase black letters in white dialogue balloons. The yellow/orange narrative boxes—which match the faded color schemes of life back on Earth—feature small lowercase handprinted font. Gentili fills tan paper strips with tiny lowercase handprinted font in Traveling To Mars #10. The coloring of the tiny lettering seems faded, closer to brown than black. A solitary sound effect announces something unexpected that brings a sense of completeness to Roy's final day.

 

Thanks to Ablaze Publishing and Arancia Studio for providing this copy for review.

 

Final Thoughts

Bittersweet and satisfying, Traveling To Mars #10 delivers a poignant reminder to live our lives to the fullest, cherish those closest to us, and nourish others' beliefs and values.

 

Rating 9/10

 

For more cover art see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.

Traveling To Mars #9 Review

 

Writer: Mark Russell

Artist: Roberto Meli

Colorist: Chiara Di Francia

Letterer: Mattia Gentili

Cover Artists: Roberto Meli; Michele Benevento; Dario Tallarico; Brent McKee

Publisher: Ablaze

Price: $3.99

Release Date: November 1, 2023

 

In leaving the spaceship, Roy Livingston signed his death warrant. Already terminally ill, he’s got a few days on Mars before his shuttle and suit’s air runs out. Was his flag-planting exercise worth it? Let’s warp into Traveling To Mars #9 and find out!

 

Story

After six months, Roy reached Mars with his companions. Leopold and Albert talked, felt emotions, and enjoyed movies with him. The robots found new friends in the rovers from previous missions. Foremost among them is Perseverance II, which Roy calls Vera. The rover reported the natural gas deposits that excited energy companies back on Earth. Yet when Leopold and Albert introduced it, Vera admitted that it lied.

 

In Traveling To Mars #9, Mark Russell invites us to share Vera’s journey. It’s a story of heartbreak as the rover struggled to understand why its creators fell silent. What did it do wrong? How could it repair the damaged relationship? As it sought answers, it met more of its kind. Abandoned by their creators, Vera welded the scattered rovers into a community. Eventually, Vera conceived a way to become valued once more and get the answers it desperately craved.

 

As in previous issues, Roy’s thoughts return to the past. A hurricane caused him to doubt God's existence. The fragility of life taught him to value it more. He’s tempted to spend his remaining days avoiding Vera, Leopold, Albert, and the other robots. After all, they’ve done him and Humanity wrong. But as a former pet store manager, can he ignore these aging, mechanical beings who look to him for hope?

  

Art

When he met Vera, Roy sensed cruelty and indifference. Roberto Meli details the weathering, surface imperfections, and brokenness of the rovers in Traveling To Mars #9. As Vera rolls across the regolith, testing shale, sending radio signals, repairing its robot brethren, and gazing upon a member of the species that created it, we sense something more. We feel the pain, longing, and determination that earned it the name Perseverance II.

 

Roy likened trekking across Mars to exploring Arizona in a beekeeper suit. Chiara Di Francia brings light to this red planet with the dust Roy and the robots kick into the thin Martian atmosphere. Blue seeps into objects not bathed in the distant sunlight, whether a crater wall, a pile of mechanical debris, or Roy's transparent helmet. Light speeds across pages, following prescribed pathways, forming a circuit-like backdrop as Vera regales Roy. Mauve lines streak panels showing the rover's journey, while yellow circles make radio signals visible. Umber shadows roam orange dunes, darkening each wheel's tracks. A stained component deemed unsalvageable lays in a bluish shade while the robot community seeks its next temporary home in Traveling To Mars #9.

 

Mattia Gentili reveals the characters’ speech with black uppercase words in white dialogue balloons. Vera accompanies her illustrated past with black words in yellow narrative boxes. Roy’s thoughts appear as lowercase words written on scraps of beige journal paper. The latter may strain the eyes more than the robots’ conversations. Yet sound effects enliven Vera's story, and Roy's emboldened words swell as he attempts to come to grips with the robot community's leader.

 

Thanks to Ablaze Publishing and Arancia Studio for providing this copy for review.

 

Final Thoughts

Do you ever feel unwanted? Traveling To Mars #9 reminds us of the pain of abandonment and how those who work hardest are often deemed inconsequential and needy.

 

Rating 9.2/10

 

For more cover art see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.

Traveling To Mars #8 Review

 

Writer: Mark Russell

Artist: Roberto Meli

Colorist: Chiara Di Francia

Letterer: Mattia Gentili

Cover Artists: Roberto Meli; Mili Montlló; & Emanuele Gizzi; Brent McKee

Publisher: Ablaze

Price: $3.99

Release Date: September 20, 2023

 

Twenty years hence, dwindling resources drive people into the streets. As states invoke martial law to quell riots and corporations battle to control Earth’s remaining resources, can one man succeed where governments failed? Let’s warp into Traveling To Mars #8 and find out!

 

Story

Roy Livingstone is a dying man. Unlucky in love and business, he faces his final days alone. Why not do something for his planet before his cancer kills him? So he boards a ship with two robots and shoots into space. If he can stake claim to Mars’ mineral wealth, perhaps he'll feel like he contributed to a better future and can bask in the glow of reaching another planet. That is until his oxygen runs out.

 

It's been six long months, but Roy’s finally arrived. As he prepares to leave the Erimhon, Roy indulges in a final morning of escapism. Packing up prompts reflections on what drives Human progress. A chat with folks back home grants insight into how we chart our journey through life. As his shuttle descends, Traveling To Mars #8 suggests that knowing you will die soon doesn't rob fear of its power.

 

Perhaps it’s unrealistic to believe we could build a space elevator in the next two decades, let alone set up an interplanetary supply system. Mark Russell dreams big in his satire-laced Traveling To Mars #8, even suggesting we could terraform Mars in a few generations! With corporations in the United States regularly traveling outside Earth's atmosphere and other countries getting into the Space Race, perhaps Russell's vision isn't impossible. Should Humanity realize his vision, let's hope the situation on Earth isn't as dire as he paints it.

 

Art

Roberto Meli delivers action aplenty, with kangaroos punching cowboys, a drone racing toward an oil platform, and Roy's shuttle hurtling through Martian skies. Even smaller moments—like the glances Roy shares with his robots—shine thanks to lifelike portrayals and attention to detail. We see how life has ground Roy down through his expressions and movements. Yet the Martian future he imagines inspires awe.

 

The red planet casts a warm glow into space as Traveling To Mars #8 opens. Stars twinkle as the Erimhon travels through the multi-hued vacuum. The blue-and-white robot Albert plants a flag in the yellow, orange, and red regolith while Roy stands bemused beneath a textured lavender sky. Light sources gleam, and highlights and shadows ground characters and structures. Pages shine thanks to the depth and nuance Chiara Di Francia creates with his vast array of appealing colors.

 

Mattia Gentili reveals the characters’ speech with black uppercase words in white dialogue balloons. Roy’s thoughts appear as lowercase words in colored boxes. The latter may strain the eyes as Mark Russell dishes out an ample serving of narrative-driven drama. Yet balloon and box sizes scale nicely within panels. Like Roy, we're amazed he arrives in one piece, thanks to the colorful and expressive sound effects that convey the shuttle's high-speed descent.

 

Final Thoughts

As Roy reaches his destination, Traveling To Mars illustrates the coming apocalypse and hints there's still time to make our future brighter.

 

Rating 9/10

 

For more cover art see my review at Comic Book Dispatch.

Greg Bear On Mars

 

 

I've always been drawn to stories about Mars. I've long admired Greg Bear from afar. I picked up this book eons ago, as a used hardcover for $2 or $3, in the final years that the Crown Books retail chain had a store in my neighborhood. Yet only now, upon his death, did I actually pick up Moving Mars and read it.

Or at least I tried. There's a narrative flow to Greg Bear's writings that just doesn't draw me in. There's nothing strange or unique in that. Some writers you enjoy. Others--while greatly admired and enjoyed by others--you just can't get into. You don't know why, but they just don't work for you.

Moving Mars begins with Casseia, a young student at university. Powerful politicians are attempting to transform the government of Mars. She opposes their efforts to forge a strong, central government. So she joins a protest. It almost costs her her life, and proves largely ineffective. Still, those attempting the coup are deposed, and the government resumes being a confederacy.

She falls in love with one of her fellow protesters. Or at least, she thinks she does--mostly because he insists that he loves her, and she ought to at least try. But it doesn't last, and she ends up traveling to Earth. There she's part of a diplomatic team attempting to forge a better relationship with Earth. But Mars lacks a central government, so who will Earth partner with?

There's a lot going on in Moving Mars, much more than I can readily describe. On Earth, she encounters custom-created viruses that can give people enhanced abilities. Later on Mars, she marries an archeologist investigating the early life forms that thrived before the planet lost its atmosphere. She also takes up the cause of establishing a strong central government, and doing away with the confederacy. Later yet, Greg Bear finally earns his title, when a group of scientists discover a way of actually Moving Mars. That was the most exciting part of the book for me.

Oh, and did I mention she gets hunted by bizarre killing machines: a weird fusion of Aliens and Terminators?

I started the novel in December. After several breaks, I finally finished it in March. I wish I responded better to Greg Bear's prose. Still, I'm glad I stuck it out to the end, because Moving Mars was worth it.

Thanks Greg, for a thoroughly awesome read.

Dragon Dave

Sigmund Brouwer: Growing Up on Mars

 

In the first volume of Sigmund Brouwer's Mars Diaries series, an emergency interrupts Tyce's training. Tyce is a young paraplegic who exhibits unprecedented skill in controlling robots during computer simulations. Actually, he's the only young person living on Mars, as his mother is a scientist, and his father is a pilot on the Earth-to-Mars route.

His mentor Rawling has driven him hard to achieve this skill. The two hope to convert Tyce's skills during simulations into actual remote-control of robots on the surface of Mars, once the researchers can figure out how to grow plants outside their protective dome. Unfortunately, an unexplained oxygen link has curtailed unnecessary power usage. Unless the scientists in the dome can fix the problem, not being able to run computer simulations will be the least of Tyce and Rawling's problems.

In this fun, young adult novel, the scientists living on Mars are scrambling for ways to terraform Mars. They know that humans living on the surface of Mars is a long-term goal. The short-term goal--say in the next few decades--is to develop plants that can exist outside the protective dome. Should they be able to grow crops on this new world, who knows? They might even be able to grow food, and ship it back to feed Earth's starving billions.

In this first novel, they find themselves scrambling to fix the oxygen-generation problem. With his daily schedule interrupted, Tyce has a lot of time on his hands. As the oxygen-situation grows progressively worse, his mother must make a difficult choice for her own future. Along the way, Tyce will learn a devastating secret about his past, and confront his own views on faith and spirituality.

Although I didn't realize it when I began reading it, Mars Diaries Mission 1 was published by a Christian publishing house. Tyce's mother loves Jesus Christ, and her beliefs influence the significant choices she faces in this issue. But the story would work equally well, if his mother was Buddist, Hindu, or Muslim. For every person, at some point in their lives, must decide: Do I choose to believe in more than I can perceive and prove?

While I wish the novel dealt more with the reality of living outside their protective dome, I enjoyed this first installment in the Mars Diaries sequence. It employed simple (perhaps outdated) scientific terminology, and viewed at least one of the characters in rather simplistic terms. Also, I'm not sure how realistic most critics of the science fiction field would find it. 

That said, I love stories about Mars. If later novels in the series were to come my way, I would welcome more adventures with Tyce. Might his scientific community engineer plants that will grow unaided on the harsh, demanding surface of Mars? 

It's a dream worth dreaming.

Dragon Dave

Building My Kim Stanley Robinson Essentials List: Book 8

One of the problems with determining how much a book means to you is that it may have been a long time since you read it. This grew abundantly clear with this book, as I tried to skim through the text and confirm my memories of Kim Stanley Robinson's story. Memory isn't like a magnetic tape, forever running through recorder heads, and always ready to be plucked off the shelf and reviewed. Instead it's like a computer hard disk drive. Its limited capacity means that memories not only get overwritten with time, but get corrupted, as our brains, like the rest of our bodies, grow decreasingly agile with age.

My Kim Stanley Robinson Essentials List

Book 8: Blue Mars

With Blue Mars, the final volume in Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars Trilogy, the Red Planet approaches the culmination of all that its characters have worked so hard to achieve. Terraforming allows mankind to breathe unaided on the surface, and water collects in craters and depressions, leading to the formation of lakes and rivers. The presence of surface water prompts the rapid expansion of settlements, not all of which can be controlled through a strong central government. But then, that is what life on Mars is about: the freedom to begin something new. To try something new.

To become something new.

One of my favorite characters was Nirgal. As a descendant of the original hundred settlers, he occupies a special place among the leadership. And yet, he considers himself one of the people. He joins workers cooperatives, and tries his own hand at farming. He also takes part in long distance runs, which allows him to see all the different ways in which communities function. And yet, with his strong ties to the original hundred, he also gets to take part in a journey around the solar system. He travels to Earth, where he sees how different life is in the cradle of humanity. He also ventures to other planets, such as Venus, and the outer planets and their moons, and sees how human ingenuity has allowed mankind to adapt to living in such faraway places.

Another favorite character was Zo. She was another descendant of the original hundred settlers. She's a real free-spirit, in every sense of the world. My strongest memory of her is of her flying. Remember the ancient myth of Icarus? Well, in the lesser gravity of Mars, a person really can fly with wings. She tries her hand (or her arms) at this, and revels in the sensations and freedom of flight.

Then there's Art. He wasn't one of the original settlers, but he grows involved in the political arguments and debates in Mars new government. Instead of seeking power, he facilitates the process of debate, and watches with wonder and pride as a congress forms, a constitution is written, and a government grows along radically different lines than anything that ever functioned on Earth. The Red Planet may be strongly decentralized, but the information age, with the consequent ability for people to instantly communicate with each other, a functional direct democracy develops. It's the most beautiful vision of all in this novel, perhaps even more beautiful than the physical terraforming of Mars. The internet has changed our lives so radically in the last twenty years that it seems strange to think of this global phenomenon as still being in its infancy. It makes me wonder how Earth's networking sites may facilitate positive and profound societal change as the internet evolves and matures.

Of course, the original hundred settlers have their own journeys to pursue as well. There's Ann and Sax, two people who have lived out extended lifespans, thanks to medical advancements discovered in the first volume. Ann makes it her life goal to protect Mars from unnecessary terraforming, fearing that in the process much of the planet's uniqueness may be lost. In time, Sax, who only looks ahead, comes to understand the merit in some of Ann's arguments, which in previous volumes merely seemed backward and unrealistic. I never really understood Ann before this volume, but in Blue Mars I really came to like her. Sax, a scientist blessed with a profound intellect, remained a personal favorite character of mine, and his ongoing presence in the novel kept me turning the pages, wondering what he would say or do next.

Above those special characters, and my memories of their personal journeys, stand Maya and Michel. Maya was a vivacious woman, one of the standout people among the first hundred settlers. In time she found love with Michel, considered by many of the first hundred to be an outsider, as he fulfilled the role of the mission psychiatrist. He wasn't part of the group, and yet he was. That ambiguity led him to closet himself away, to remain quiet while others talked, acted, and shone in the spotlight. But in time, he and Maya grew closer, until they enjoyed a quiet, happy life together in the twilight of their years. The gentle nature of their relationship, in which each was content merely to be with the other, if only to sit together on a park bench and chart the colors of the evening sky, became some of the most vivid memories of the novel for me. Unfortunately, as I alluded in the prologue, their minds eventually succumb to the vagaries of age, growing less supple and capable of recalling memories. Still, they remembered they loved each other.

There you have it: Blue Mars, Book 8 on my Kim Stanley Robinson Essentials List. In many ways, it seems a crime that this novel doesn't rank higher, as it seems so important and foundational to me. But then, maybe it would, if only I could remember more about it. Perhaps I'll have to wedge it into the pile of books by my bed, and read it again to refresh my memory of how truly wonderful it is. Someday soon seems unrealistic. Still, like the terraforming of Mars, and the realization of a planetary direct democracy, it's a beautiful dream.

Dragon Dave 

Three Things To Love About The Big Bang Theory

In a recent episode of "The Big Bang Theory," the boys meet a doctor who's attracted to Leonard's fiancee Penny. Just like them, the doctor loves comic books and Sci-Fi movies. Unlike them, he's a urologist to filmmakers and movie stars. He invites them to his house, where he shows them actual movie props from grateful patients. Then he locks them inside, and hurries back to Penny's apartment to pitch a little woo. Leonard and his friends barely notice, so enraptured are they by his movie props, as well as his selection of video games. 

Incidentally, the urologist is wonderfully played by Billy Bob Thornton, who can currently be seen in cinemas in the thought-provoking drama "The Judge."

As a fan of Sci-Fi movies and old arcade games, I thought I would share my personal favorites from the urologist's collection.

1. Favorite Alien: To Thornton's right is a Martian from the movie "Mars Attacks." It's a comedy/action movie that stars great actors like Michael J Fox, Jack Nicholson, Pierce Brosnan, Danny Devito, Martin Short, Glenn Close, and even music legend Tom Jones. It's wacky, wonderful, and best of all, a grandmother who everyone thinks is crazy saves the day! Plus, it features these great Martians. If you haven't seen it, go out and get it! You've got to watch this movie!

2. Favorite Robot: To Sheldon's left is Robby the Robot. He's one of my favorite robots ever, and not just mine. Lots of filmmakers have included him in short, cameo roles in their own movies. His first movie was "Forbidden Planet," which also starred Leslie Nielson in a serious role. It's a standout 1950's Sci-Fi movie, and while the plot may move a little slowly by today's standards, it's still well worth watching.

Bionic fans: Richard Anderson, who later achieved world-wide fame as Oscar Goldman, played a crew member aboard Captain Nielson's spaceship.

3. Favorite Game: I used to play lots of games in arcades, but the one video game I really enjoyed, but haven't found a good way to play since I "grew up," is Donkey Kong. So it was nice to see Leonard really enjoy playing it too. You know, if a urologist locked me in his "fun room," I wouldn't mind spending a few hours in it, if I could play Donkey Kong too.

That is, as long as he didn't use the time to hit on my girl.

Well, there you have it, three things that I loved about a recent episode of "The Big Bang Theory." Did you see this episode? If so, what was your favorite movie prop, character, or game? Please let me know. I'd love to hear from you.

Dragon Dave

Kim Stanley Robinson Set To Music

For many of us, Kim Stanley Robinson’s Mars trilogy was a revelation.  In the novels, he laid down a path along which Humanity might settle the red planet using existing or readily conceivable technology.  In the process, we learn more about ourselves, and how we might change as we move out to inhabit more of our solar system.  In his latest novel, 2312, he returns to this vision of the future, and we meet two people at once familiar, and yet different from ourselves: Swan and Wahram.  They meet on the planet Mercury, where they journey from the traveling city of Terminator to a museum in the Beethoven Crater.  There, they attend a classical music concert. 

First, a wind ensemble plays the Appassionata piano sonata.  The ensemble “rollicked its way through the finale…fast to the point of effervescence.”  Then two pianists play Beethoven’s opus 134, his transcription of his own Grosse Fugue for string quartet, opus 133.  “They had to pound away like percussionists, simply hammering the keys.  More clearly than ever Wahram heard the intricate weave of the big fugue, also the crazy energy of the thing, the maniacal vision of a crushing clockwork.”  After that, a string quartet play their own transcription of the Hammerklavier sonata, which Beethoven wrote for the piano.  “Broken out among two violins, viola, and cello, it all unpacked beautifully: the magnicient anger of the first movement, the aching beauty of the slow movement…and then the finale, another big fugue.” 

During the concert, Wahram looks back at the audience.  He sees the other musicians “on their feet, bouncing, swaying, faces uplifted and eyes closed, as if in prayer; hands sometimes spastically waving before them.  Swan too was back there dancing, looking transported.  Wahram was pleased to see that; he was out there himself in the space of Beethoven, a very great space indeed.  It would have been shocking to see someone immune to it; it would have put her outside his zone of sympathy or comprehension.”

When I was young, my parents, both music lovers, forced me to practice classical music on the piano.  In time, I became proficient.  After my father’s death, I forsook lessons, and played sporadically.  In the following decades, I would return again and again to piano playing.  Each time, I would enjoy it for a time, only to later give it up.  For several years, I’ve felt a yearning to return to it: I have a piano, after all, in my living room.  Wahram’s love of classical music, the way it forms a part of his soul, encouraged me to sit down and dust off the keyboard.  At first, the fingers proved unwilling to move with their former alacrity, but through daily practice, I feel as if I am, in many ways, picking up the pieces of a broken life, and even returning to a path that can fill some gaps in my soul.

Despite their differences, Swan and Wahram will cultivate a friendship that grows throughout the novel.  They will share great experiences, and together, they will do wonderful things for Humanity.  Music will play a part in that relationship: it will unite them, and tie them together, even when their differences, and trying circumstances, might otherwise tear them apart.  Thanks to Kim Stanley Robinson, I’m wondering if piano playing will prove a continuing part of my life, and if so, where it may take me.  I’m also wondering what I may discover along the way, and how that journey may ultimately transform me.

Dragon Dave

Another Welcome Return to Babylon 5

In her novel Accusations, Lois Tilton returns us to Babylon 5, a space station built by humans after the Earth-Minbari War.  While Commander Susan Ivanova played a small role in John Vornholt’s novel Voices, Tilton’s story centers on her.  While working in Command & Control (C&C), she gets a call from J. D. Ortega, her former flight instructor.  The man has retired from the military and works on Mars.  He sends her a message, asking to meet with her later in the Alpha Wing ready room.  When he doesn’t show, Ivanova visits Michael Garibaldi, the Chief of Security, who informs her that Ortega is wanted for terrorism and conspiracy back on Mars.  This makes no sense to Ivanova.  As with Talia Winters’ uncle in Voices, Ivanova cannot believe that Ortega is a terrorist.  Garibaldi conducts a search, only to discover that Ortega has been murdered.

Babylon 5 then receives a mayday signal: raiders are attacking a transport ship.  Susan Ivanova leads the Starfuries of Alpha Wing from the station.  Before they reach the ship, the raiders take its cargo, and kill its crew.  Raiders have grown bold of late, and hit a large number of heavy transport vessels.  Ivanova conducts an investigation into inventory records, and discovers that many of these transports were carrying supplies of morbidium, a metal mined on Mars, and important in the manufacturing of military weaponry.  She sends her findings to Earthforce, in the hopes of preventing future attacks. 

Events rapidly escalate on Babylon 5.  After an investigation team arrives from Earth, Ivanova is relieved of her duties in C & C.  Meanwhile Garibaldi discovers another body.  The investigators round up anyone with the slightest ties to Mars, and they order Talia Winters to scan their minds, or even perform deep probes.  As these are conducted without the witnesses’ permission, she protests.  But the inspectors produce orders from Psi Corps: she must accede to the team’s demands, without question.

Mysteries build upon mysteries, and we’re never sure what will happen next, or why.  But Tilton keeps us focused on Garibaldi’s search and Ivanova’s dilemma.  The heavy-handed methods of the inspectors impede Garibaldi’s efforts, and their superior access to computer records make it difficult for him to discover clues before they classify the records or arrest a potential informant.  But he won’t quit, as inspection team has linked Ivanova with a Martian terrorist.  Ivanova also does what she can, knowing that her career is over unless she can uncover the plot involving Ortega, and demonstrate that she was not involved in…whatever it is that Earthforce seems so concerned about.

In Voices, John Vornholt returned us to Babylon 5, showed us Earth in the twenty-third century, and then whisked us off to Mars for a thrilling climax.  Now Lois Tilton returns us to Babylon 5 for an entire novel, and spins such an involving mystery that I tore through the book in a couple days.  I literally couldn’t put Accusations down for the last seventy-five pages.  If you loved the show, seek out these novels.  They’re real treasures, and would have made wonderful TV movies.  Plus, both tantalize us with the possibility of colonizing Mars.  And who doesn’t love stories about Mars?

Dragon Dave

Related Dragon Cache entries

John Vornholt’s Mars Novel

Talia Winters’ Plight

John Vornholt's Mars Novel

I’ve always been curious about Mars, our closest planetary neighbor.  When I was growing up, I remember reading and watching lots of stories set there.  At the time, given NASA’s successful moon missions, Mars seemed the next target for exploration.  In my recent study of the Mercury missions, when America’s first seven astronauts were interviewed on the topic, they also espoused this belief.  Some of them even hoped to participate in such missions.  Sadly, humans have yet to travel there, but Science Fiction writers have never stopped writing about Mars.  Gregory Benford, Kim Stanley Robinson, Greg Bear, Dan Simmons, Larry Niven, Philip K. Dick: the list could go on and on.  Let’s face it: until you’ve written a Mars novel, you’re not a real SF writer.

Okay, maybe that’s overstating matters, but Mars remains arguably the most popular setting for a SF novel not set on Earth.  I was certainly pleased when John Vornholt begins his novel Voices, the first tie-in to the popular 1990s TV series Babylon 5, on the red planet.  The two people we meet there are telepaths, members of Psi Corps.  Despite his imminent meeting with Mr. Bester, the top Psi Cop (and perhaps the most powerful person in Psi Corps), Harriman Gray’s thoughts keep returning to Earth's most important space station, Babylon 5.  On his recent visit there, he met Commander Susan Ivanova, who, due to events in her past, has a strong aversion to Psi Corps.  Yet she intrigues him, and Harriman can’t help wondering if, were he to return there, he might not find some way to change her mind about Psi Corps, and hence give him a chance.

Once Mr. Bester arrives, the two take a monorail to the Royal Tharsis Lodge, where an important conference for telepaths will shortly take place.  Life is difficult on Mars, and there are separatists who, like the early American colonists, argue that Earth wields too much control over their lives.  But their political views are not on Harriman’s mind as he gazes out the windows during their ride.  Instead, he muses: “The angry red planet didn’t look so angry when it was crisscrossed with monorail tubes, prefabricated dwellings, and shielded domes.  It looked like a giant gerbil habitat on a dusty parking lot.”  His thoughts return to the present when the monorail screeches to a halt, and with his telepathic abilities, he soon realizes that a bomb has just detonated in the Royal Tharsis Lodge, and over twenty people have died.  After Mr. Bester secures the monorail, the top Psi Cop turns to Harriman and remarks that perhaps Mars isn’t the best place to hold their conference anymore.  As Bester doesn’t want to hold it on Earth, another possible venue leaps readily to Harriman’s mind.  “How about Babylon 5?” he says.

Sadly, we never really get to know Harriman Gray better.  John Vornholt uses him to get the action going, before whisking readers off to Babylon 5.  Fans of the TV series, who know Susan Ivanova’s past, will recognize that Harriman’s hopes are overly optimistic, that she could never fully give herself to anyone from Psi Corps.  Or at least, she couldn’t after the events of Season Two have played out.  But this is a view formed through hindsight, as the novel was published in March 1995, during the second season of the show, and the action takes place between episodes #1 “Points of Departure” and #8 “A Race Through Dark Places.”  While I loved Babylon 5, it never occurred to me at the time to read the tie-in novels.  After all, the show was on every week, and series creator J. Michael Straczynski had planned out the entire five-year run.  (Amazingly, he ended up writing 92 out of the series’ 110 episodes, in addition to serving as its executive producer).  So I guess I figured that reading those novels was unnecessary back then.

Today, Babylon 5 seems largely forgotten, but back in the 1990s, the Science Fiction community held a real fervor for the show.  I was a part of it, just another viewer captivated by the series’ spell.  It’s been a long time since those heady days when I looked forward to a new Babylon 5 episode each week, when I eagerly anticipated the revelations and developments that each new show might bring.  Perhaps that explains why, like Harriman Gray in Voices, I find my thoughts returning to Babylon 5, not just anxious to relive the known stories, but also to experience some new adventures.

In any case, I’m grateful to John Vornholt for returning me to the milieu of Babylon 5 for a brand new adventure.  Even if his novel is twenty years old, it’s new to me.  Despite his having written over sixty-five novels, he’s also new to me.  I find this oversight on my part surprising, as it seems he’s also an author of note in the Science Fiction community.  After all, he wrote a novel about Mars, didn’t he?

Dragon Dave

Related Internet Links

A short biography on John Vornholt