Zeb Larson reviews Southern Cross #1…
NOW BOARDING: Southern Cross, tanker flight 73 to TITAN! Alex Braith is on board retracing her sister’s steps to the refinery moon, hoping to collect her remains and find some answers. The questions keep coming though—how did her sister die? Where did her cabin mate disappear to? Who is that creep across the hall? And why does she always feel like she’s being watched? Inspired by classic mysteries and weird fiction, SOUTHERN CROSS is a crucible of creeping anxiety and fear as Braith struggles with the ghosts of her past on board a ship that holds secrets best kept buried.
Southern Cross is a kind of Gothic horror, set on a space shuttle headed to Titan. Becky Cloonan and Andy Belanger have written a new ongoing sci-fi series that promises to be a combination of horror and mystery. The series is off to a good start, both because of the atmosphere, the attitude of the main character, and the really strong art style. This is an interesting new kind of horror in space.
Alex Braith is headed to the moon of Titan to recover her deceased sister Amber’s body and possessions, as well as some answers as to how she died. Alex is the screw-up of the family, with an assault and battery charge from several years chasing her even as she passes through customs. She manages to book passage aboard the Southern Cross, a combination shuttle and freighter. Stuck with an annoying roommate and a creepy guy across the hall, the trip itself would be bad enough. The problem is that there’s something that’s not quite right about the Southern Cross, in addition to all of the unanswered questions about Amber’s death.
I really enjoy Alex’s character, in part because she just barely seems to be keeping a grip on things as she boards the Southern Cross. She’s not a bad person, but she’s certainly not social either, and she’s running away from a checkered past. Her hostility toward others is barely restrained, though to be fair, most reasonable people would be exasperated under the circumstances. Alex’s irritation is part of her charm, as she behaves the way many of us would while grieving and stuck in a small, confined space.
While we know based on Image’s promotional material that this will be a horror comic, the atmosphere in this issue is very subtle. At present, the Southern Cross is a brooding sort of place, which in and of itself is appropriate for Gothic horror. The only clues that anything is really amiss aboard the Southern Cross are Amber’s case number (666), and an ending panel that I don’t want to spoil. An uncomfortable and out-of-sorts person thrown into a dark mystery on a mysterious and somewhat ominous ship is going to be a recipe for trouble.
The art is really effective at capturing the claustrophobic feeling of being stuck on a spaceship. Clearly, part of the inspiration here is from Alien, with its space-trucker aesthetic and vision of a gritty, mechanical future. Every panel suggests limited room to maneuver, people elbowing for space, and tight hallways. To quote Thaddeus Venture, “Space is a cluttered, untidy place,” and most of the panels reflect this. While the space ships resemble designs of warships from the 20th century, giving them a certain familiar and classic feel, they also have protruding conn towers and compartments. These ships are the opposite of the sleek, streamlined look we find for spaceship design that is popular today. The fact that Alex keeps getting lost on the ship and other people have to keep showing her around suggests a labyrinthine kind of geometry. Such places usually hold secrets and things better left forgotten. What could be more Gothic than that?
I keep saying that Image is the new place to go for science-fiction, but it’s true. Here is another strong title with a lot of promise.
Zeb Larson
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ONsp_bmDYXc
Originally published March 10, 2015. Updated April 13, 2018.
