Madi: Once Upon a Time in the Future by Duncan Jones and Alex Di Campi

Author: Duncan Jones & Alexi Di Campi 

Title: Madi: Once Upon a Time in the Future

Publisher: Z2 Comics 

Published: 2020

Pages: 260

Genre:  Science Fiction 

     Madi Preston, a veteran of Britain’s elite special operations J-Squad unit, is burnt out and up to her eyeballs in debt. She and the rest of her team have retired from the military but are now trapped having to pay to service and maintain the technology put into them during their years of service. They're working for British conglomerate Liberty Inc as mercenaries, selling their unique ability to be remote controlled by specialists while in the field, and the debts are only growing as they get injured completing missions. We meet Madi as she decides she’s had enough. She will take an off-the-books job that should earn her enough to pay out her and her sister, but when the piece of tech she’s supposed to steal turns out to be a kid, and she suddenly blacks out... she finds herself on the run from everyone she’s ever known.

     When I was young due to my Dyslexia comics were the medium that my school used to try and get me to read. Now, this had its ups and downs like reading an genre. And at the time most of what was about were superhero adventures. Something that I could never really get my teeth into for any length of time. I did find some comfort in the works of people like Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, and Art Spiegelman. Later on, I would come to find new places to escape to in Ghost in the Shell and bubblegum crisis. But then I kind of drifted away from this world into more conventional reading. Novels took over and that was for the most part. Recently however there have been a few publications that have brought me back all be it in a small way.

     So why Madi you might ask yourself, well this is largely down to one man. Duncan Jones has directed some of my favorite movies. Mute to me is up there with the best sci-fi films I've seen. A blending of genres to create something amazing. So anyway to the book at hand and my previous statement comes around here. In Madi, we get some good old staples of the genre plus some extras. Duncan seems to have a way of seamlessly blending the old with the new in his work. In Madi, we get a hero to root for but not the super kind, despite her augmentations she is someone who Is very human. What drives her is I suspect something the would push us all forward to do the right thing.  It's like those old Hollywood films where one must stand up to evil and fight for what is right.

     Now I can't really talk about this novel without talking about the artwork. And what I really like here is the use of several different artists throughout. It gives a shifting tone to the work and invokes many different eras of comics. Some to me were familiar from things I have read or seen before others what a new experience for me and I got to say I really enjoyed it. It also meant it felt like you were reading a collection of single issues rather than a novel that came out in one go. So when you are reading it you get to say I really like the way these panels are done ill go check out other books they worked on. Overall it feels like if the writers and artists of 2000 AD had come out with Ghost in the Shell. A combination that I can really get behind. 

     So can I recommend this book to you, yes of course. If you are looking for a good solid cyberpunk graphic novel take out that hard-earned cash and slap it down on the counter. You in for a whole world of nostalgia to escape into for a little while.