From the author of the 'Witchy' books comes one of the best futuristic sci-fi LBGTQ+ comics and concepts ever.
'Strange Bedfellows' - further proof that graphic novels are an art, and a miracle.
And because it is so good, I'm not going to reveal a thing about its plot or characters. Go in blind, like I was; all the better for a surprising, enriching experience.
This is what it must be like to be in space, and looking into the cosmos - throughout all the overwhelming emotion, it teaches you once and for all that there is no limit out there, and simultaneously no limit to being human. No real limits within or without. There should be no limitations placed on humanity. Why should there be? Nothing and no one beyond earth and in the big, endless universe would stop us, tell us what we should and shouldn't do; what we should and shouldn't be.
Reach out within, and above and beyond.
Imagine! Create! Be! The possibilities are infinite.
(So take down the patriarchy, white supremacy, warfare, capitalism and money, too, while you're at it.)
This is a future for humanity worth striving for.
'Strange Bedfellows' is explosive, emotional storytelling, and a creative, comforting, and hopeful ride. It is also very funny, witty, clever, touching, sad, heartbreaking, and bittersweet, to go with its themes of identity, self-discovery, connection, empathy, doing what you love, navigating with the people in your life who love you, and mental illnesses, such as anxiety, panic attacks, breakdowns, and burnout.
It isn't perfect, however. The comic is a bit long and overwrought, and the main characters are not always likeable - though they are only human... humans with mutant superpowers, and there are no actual space aliens in this intergalactic sci-fi take on the future.
But it is worth it.
'Strange Bedfellows' is, in more ways than one, a dream come true.
I recommend it to everyone, including 'Star Trek' fans, 'Doctor Who' fans, 'Neon Genesis Evangelion' fans, and people who like 'Akira', and the comics 'Project Nought', 'On A Sunbeam', 'Juniper Mae', 'The Infinity Particle', and '5 Worlds'.
Final Score: 4/5
P.S. I have to add, that I find it really funny that so many works of science fiction will bend over backwards never to use the word mutant when depicting otherwise ordinary humans with superhuman/metahuman powers and abilities, often inherent, because they are afraid that Marvel will sue them or something. As if Stan Lee and the rest of Marvel came up with the word, and therefore it is solely theirs, and they've patented it.
Like, in 'Strange Bedfellows', people with powers - developed from space radiation that infected their parents and grandparents - are called Ghosts. I don't exactly get it either. Another example is in the anime 'Tiger & Bunny', where people with powers, who are also superheroes, are known as NEXT (Noted Entities with eXtraordinary Talents). Individuals with witchlike/supernatural abilities in the anime 'Witch Hunter Robin' are called "seeds". In the television show 'Smallville', a DC adapted property, humans infected by scattered pieces of kryptonite from a meteor shower are called krypto-freaks, or just kryptonite-poisoned metahumans. And in another show, 'Heroes', people with powers are referred to as... people with powers. Zero points for creativity there, 'Heroes'.
I mean, 'X-Men' shouldn't be the only franchise in existence allowed to say a simple, pedestrian word like mutant! People in real life would definitely say mutant! Not solely "the infected" or something to do with evolution or a phenomena or whatever!
It's like in zombie horror fiction, where more often than not the word zombie is in fact never used for some reason - they are also "the infected", or "them", which is meant to sound ominous but is actually vague, lazy, stupid and unrealistic. We would definitely, 100% call them zombies! Because that's what they are!
Humans in a non-fantasy world setting with metahuman abilities - humans with cool superpowers of any kind, of any origin, but most notably from radiation and/or genetics - are mutated persons, i.e. mutants!
I just thought I'd point this trope out.
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