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This collection is mostly European comics originally written in French or other languages, which have been translated and published for American audiences. They pretty much fall into two groupings: Mediocre sci-fi action stories, and excuses to draw naked ladies.
Honestly, the naked-ladies books are lucky to have decent art, because really, that seems to be all these creators are actually good at—the stories are nonsense and the characterization is laughably bad. I mean, stories full of people who don’t seem to understand how humans act and have deep inner monologues about how everyone around them is insane. (…Not that the sci-fi is better in that regard.) Maybe sometimes you could blame the translators? Meh.
Madwoman of the Sacred Heart - A terrible professor attracts the attention of a student who thinks she’s a reincarnated biblical figure. They meet a reincarnated Mary, there’s some weird sex, the professor shits his pants a bunch, and then Mary turns into Jesus and the professor dies but comes back as a young man and they have a baby who has superpowers. Oh, and it’s sexist, racist and antisemitic.
Pandora’s Eyes - Pandora is secretly the daughter of a mob boss and this is somehow related to her going into rages where she gets pinpoint eyes and freakish strength. Which, mind you, never comes up in her search / kidnapping to see her father. People do things and biology is destiny, or something.
Muse - This plays out like an artist had a whole bunch of scenes he wanted to draw of steampunk creations and buxom women in creative outfits (and undergarments), so they strung together all of it as a tale of mad science and shared dreams that doesn’t make much sense, but is mildly entertaining. The art is beautiful, I’ll give them that.
Milo Manara’s Gullivera - Gulliver’s Travels told as softcore pornography.
Eros Gone Wild - A collection of short (2-4 page) comics on a series of themes, all by different artists. None are standout and honestly very few of them even manage “clever”; I’m reminded a bit of the one-page comics that ran in Playboy back in the day, that are mildly funny to a Boomer audience but mostly just risqué enough that Mad Magazine wouldn’t take them. The most common gag is that everybody is horny. Get it?
Swords of Glass (volumes 1-4) – This one is actually fairly interesting, as long as you ignore the trite backstory of the white dude who lost his military post because of a love triangle, and focus on the girl who draws the magical sword that will avenge her family and save the dying world. I’m not going to say it doesn’t have problems (it has many—inconsistent characterization, issues with scale, problematic pacing especially in the last volume), but it’s entertaining and does manage to tell a complete story.
The Shadows of Salamanca (volumes 1-3) - A horror comic about a woman with dissociative personality disorder and a whole heap of trauma moving to a remote part of PA where a supernatural menace (or perhaps just a feral maniac borrowing into the basement) terrorizes her. It is particularly horrible, outside the bounds of traditional America horror—like, pile of dead babies horrible. And just in case you thought it might have a happy ending, it’s all a shaggy dog story and everybody dies in the end.
Retroworld (volume 1) - The bundle included a bunch of volumes of this and several spinoff books, apparently all based on the works of French sci-fi novelist Julia Verlanger. Humanity has spread across the universe, and some civilizations have formed a galactic federation while others have returned to more primitive societies. This focuses on a single emissary from the federation, sent to a primitive planet, who makes some impressively poor life choices leading to adventures. I can see how Verlanger likely influenced a lot of sci-fi that came after (and I suspect the Star Ocean series of video games), but I’m underwhelmed with the very premise of this particular story, much less the execution.
The Incal (volume 1) - Such pure 70s sci-fi. Robots, clones, lasers, aliens, elements stolen straight from Soylent Green and Brave New World, plus plenty of misogyny. The protagonist is a goofy schmuck with incredible luck who goes tripping his way through a convergence of world-changing alien powers. I might look up a plot synopsis, but I really don’t care about any of the characters. (The Metabaron spinoff series is also included in this bundle. I didn’t bother.)
OMNI (issues #1-4) – A rarity in this collection, this was written by American writer Devin Grayson (who I remember most notably for her polarizing run on Nightwing twenty years ago). This stars a black woman who, when attacked by mercenaries during a Doctors Without Borders stint, suddenly became hyper-intelligent, and then began searching for other “ignited” people. It’s got a very “ripped from the headlines” thing going; everyone who gets powers is a powerless person under stress, so that includes an unarmed black man who the police tried to shoot, children held by ICE, and an Asian woman fighting a bank’s terrible fee structure.
Overall: Swords of Glass wasn’t bad and OMNI has potential, but I am underwhelmed with the output of Humanoids as a publisher. I got some entertainment out of it, but I’m glad I only paid Humble prices.
Honestly, the naked-ladies books are lucky to have decent art, because really, that seems to be all these creators are actually good at—the stories are nonsense and the characterization is laughably bad. I mean, stories full of people who don’t seem to understand how humans act and have deep inner monologues about how everyone around them is insane. (…Not that the sci-fi is better in that regard.) Maybe sometimes you could blame the translators? Meh.
Madwoman of the Sacred Heart - A terrible professor attracts the attention of a student who thinks she’s a reincarnated biblical figure. They meet a reincarnated Mary, there’s some weird sex, the professor shits his pants a bunch, and then Mary turns into Jesus and the professor dies but comes back as a young man and they have a baby who has superpowers. Oh, and it’s sexist, racist and antisemitic.
Pandora’s Eyes - Pandora is secretly the daughter of a mob boss and this is somehow related to her going into rages where she gets pinpoint eyes and freakish strength. Which, mind you, never comes up in her search / kidnapping to see her father. People do things and biology is destiny, or something.
Muse - This plays out like an artist had a whole bunch of scenes he wanted to draw of steampunk creations and buxom women in creative outfits (and undergarments), so they strung together all of it as a tale of mad science and shared dreams that doesn’t make much sense, but is mildly entertaining. The art is beautiful, I’ll give them that.
Milo Manara’s Gullivera - Gulliver’s Travels told as softcore pornography.
Eros Gone Wild - A collection of short (2-4 page) comics on a series of themes, all by different artists. None are standout and honestly very few of them even manage “clever”; I’m reminded a bit of the one-page comics that ran in Playboy back in the day, that are mildly funny to a Boomer audience but mostly just risqué enough that Mad Magazine wouldn’t take them. The most common gag is that everybody is horny. Get it?
Swords of Glass (volumes 1-4) – This one is actually fairly interesting, as long as you ignore the trite backstory of the white dude who lost his military post because of a love triangle, and focus on the girl who draws the magical sword that will avenge her family and save the dying world. I’m not going to say it doesn’t have problems (it has many—inconsistent characterization, issues with scale, problematic pacing especially in the last volume), but it’s entertaining and does manage to tell a complete story.
The Shadows of Salamanca (volumes 1-3) - A horror comic about a woman with dissociative personality disorder and a whole heap of trauma moving to a remote part of PA where a supernatural menace (or perhaps just a feral maniac borrowing into the basement) terrorizes her. It is particularly horrible, outside the bounds of traditional America horror—like, pile of dead babies horrible. And just in case you thought it might have a happy ending, it’s all a shaggy dog story and everybody dies in the end.
Retroworld (volume 1) - The bundle included a bunch of volumes of this and several spinoff books, apparently all based on the works of French sci-fi novelist Julia Verlanger. Humanity has spread across the universe, and some civilizations have formed a galactic federation while others have returned to more primitive societies. This focuses on a single emissary from the federation, sent to a primitive planet, who makes some impressively poor life choices leading to adventures. I can see how Verlanger likely influenced a lot of sci-fi that came after (and I suspect the Star Ocean series of video games), but I’m underwhelmed with the very premise of this particular story, much less the execution.
The Incal (volume 1) - Such pure 70s sci-fi. Robots, clones, lasers, aliens, elements stolen straight from Soylent Green and Brave New World, plus plenty of misogyny. The protagonist is a goofy schmuck with incredible luck who goes tripping his way through a convergence of world-changing alien powers. I might look up a plot synopsis, but I really don’t care about any of the characters. (The Metabaron spinoff series is also included in this bundle. I didn’t bother.)
OMNI (issues #1-4) – A rarity in this collection, this was written by American writer Devin Grayson (who I remember most notably for her polarizing run on Nightwing twenty years ago). This stars a black woman who, when attacked by mercenaries during a Doctors Without Borders stint, suddenly became hyper-intelligent, and then began searching for other “ignited” people. It’s got a very “ripped from the headlines” thing going; everyone who gets powers is a powerless person under stress, so that includes an unarmed black man who the police tried to shoot, children held by ICE, and an Asian woman fighting a bank’s terrible fee structure.
Overall: Swords of Glass wasn’t bad and OMNI has potential, but I am underwhelmed with the output of Humanoids as a publisher. I got some entertainment out of it, but I’m glad I only paid Humble prices.
