A 250 word (or less) review of the Ignition City collected
volume
By Warren Ellis and Gianluca Pagliarani, Avatar Press
In Ignition City, grounded spacegirl Mary Raven travels to Ignition
City, the last, isolated spaceport on Earth, to investigate the murder of Rock
Raven, her legendary space adventurer father.1 The book is kind of a
diesel-punk western mashed up with retro 1930s science fiction: “irons” are
rayguns, instead of Indians there are Martian Longboys and Crabs from Venus,
and the dusty streets of Ignition City are lined with flop houses built out of
derelict spacecraft. It is a very neat aesthetic that artist Gianluca
Pagliarani really brings to life; the man was apparently born to draw rusting
sci-fi detritus. The script by Warren Ellis is predictably great, and I think
one of his best written during my comic reading period.2 While the
core plot, the murder mystery revenge tale, is tight and twisty, it’s the
thematic heart of the story that really elevates Ignition Story for me. The book begs the question, at a thematic
level, of whatever happened to the old space heroes, humanities fascination with
space, and that 1950s optimism concerning the future. Ignition City
simultaneously demonstrates why 1930s science fiction is still so resonate to
Ellis and how tragic it is that these characters and this sub genre are largely
ignored by modern culture.3 Ignition
City is good enough to recommend to anyone and, since it is only a single
volume, serves as an accessible read for people interested in reading a Warren
Ellis comic but unwilling to commit to his longer works.
Word count: 246
1: It’s kind of interesting that “solving the murder of a
loved one” is the central plot device in Ignition City as well as Lawless (and
many others), yet the two stories are radically different in execution and
content. Probably a lesson about good writers or fictional archtypes. Or
something.
2: 2005 and upwards.
3: Or at least mainstream pop culture and big two comics.
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