Future Favors The Bold is one of the most biting satires of retrofuturism. As a more recent Trekkie, I know plenty of parodies that challenge the tropes and scenarios. As well as how some of these events look to the kill fodder. But what happens when the puzzle solving anti-violence formula is the very thing holding it back? Doesn’t that also mean we should look at society from a more controversial lense? To boldly go in a direction that isn’t dependent on sensitivity? Even if it is absurd? I know I had a good time looking into it!
Future Favors The Bold: Star Trek Meets Rick and Morty
One thing I like about Rob Norman’s writing is that he’s not pretentious about twisting a favorite franchise. There’s a real love for what Star Trek is about on a fundamental level, looking at society from a cosmic lense that removes conflict. That gives viewers and writers a perspective on how contrived their present day actually is. It gives something everybody can hope for while laughing at today’s absurdities. But what happens when there’s a flip side to the cosmic lense? The kind that say nothing matters, not even this utopia.
Thankfully, Norman never makes the characters mouthpieces for an ideology. They’re all people who have grown up in entirely different lives that are so bizarre you can’t help but laugh at it. Like to cure a former Penal Colony’s low birth rates, the first thing our viewpoint character Waldo Heston does is broadcast his gruesome murders of a Star Trek substitute crew. Apparently a lot of people are into spicy kinks on this dark matter powered planet. No shaming, that’s Trek policy!
Speaking of, let’s look at our Trek-likes. They’re so removed from conflict, they can’t handle psychological warfare. Which isn’t to say that Waldo is aspirational, it’s just amusing on how over-the-top his plans get and how people react to them.
How The Crew Operates on Buffer Time
Future Favors The Bold features an impressive crew of several artists. Our main one CJ Camba pulls out all of the stops on the plots’ big swings. Like how a live broadcast of Waldo’s crew killing the diplomats is in juxtaposition with graphs showing a sharp increase in pregnancy rates. Or in the next chapter, an uneven amount of diagonal panels show how the conflict increases in Waldo’s favor. But what takes up the most space with bold outlines is a crew member showing two pairs of pants to go with his outfit. As the lettering shows, this is what’s a priority to the new captain of a space ship.
As for who the colorists and letterers are, that’s complicated. The two colorists on record are Natalia Nesterenko and Fabi Marques. Meanwhile the letterers are Hassan Otsmane-Elhaou and Rob Jones. I’m sure who did what specific job will be on the official releases, but it’s not in the review copy I got.
Where Do You Boldly Go?
Where are those official releases? Back the Kickstarter! What are you still not convinced? Alright I’ll go over the high points. An intriguing premise that’s friendly to people who casually enjoy Star Trek. The kind of crude over-the-top humor that’s meme worthy thanks to the art. Plots with genius executions that are foreshadowed to let people in without rubbing their faces in it. Numerical score: 9/10.
Thanks for coming to the end and as always remember to look between the panels.