Admittedly, it has a rather daunting price tag, but consider the quality: a long out-of-print masterwork by Moebius, perhaps the greatest comic-book artist of all time.
For existing fans this is a no-brainer, as Dark Horse has produced a luxury hardcover complete with material that has never been translated into English before. Moebius, aka Jean Giraud, is best known for the influential Blueberry, his collaborations with Alejandro Jodorowsky (The Incal), and his celebrated film design work (Alien et al).
One of the great names in science fiction history, Moebius produced the multi-volume fantasy series Le Monde D’Edena from 1985-2001 – a project that unfurled from an initial promotion album for Citroën back in 1983.
Stel and Atan, travellers of the galaxy, find themselves grounded on a barren planet with an old Citroën model to carry them to their destination – a point of curiosity that crashed their asteroid and ship. Stumbling upon a settlement of folk similarly drawn to the planet, a mysterious pyramid transports them to a new world, a ‘Garden of Eden’. What began as an advertisement tool turned into a vast series, as Moebius found himself unable to tear himself away from the possibilities he had created.
The two protagonists are notable for their near genderless appearance, and also for their burgeoning rediscovery of their own humanity. As with much of Moebius’ work, the fantastical is employed from the very beginning with mechanical dreamwork and philosophical wonderings, but the latter is given more weight than usual, with the artist deliberately tapping into the more positive zones of his subconscious in an effort to distance the medium from its morbid tendencies of the time.
All five chapters of the Edena Cycle saga are collected here in celebration of the 60th anniversary of Moebius’ first published comic.
