Hey, old-school superhero fans, if you’re looking for a comic company whose growing list of titles takes you on a nostalgic trip back to the sort of super-fare you grew up reading, then indie comics house Oniric Comics is definitely one to check out. In fact, they recently published their 100th release—and now they’re offering a downloadable, 100-page sneak preview of their work for free!
The brainchild of artist/president Chris Malgrain (with whom I collaborated on the 2005 Stan Lee comic project Stan Lee’s Alexa), Oniric Comics launched just two years ago with the aim of bringing to life Chris’s dream of creating the sort of superhero comics he grew up loving that were produced by some of his favorite creators: Stan Lee, Jack Kirby, John Byrne, and so many others. And he succeeded in making his dream come true!
As for why I’m mentioning Oniric’s success here at the SWC blog, it’s because I’m a contributing editor to the company as well as an occasional scripter on two of his series (Sideral: The Last Earthman, The Formidables) working from Chris’s notes and final art. With Chris on art and plot, and me writing the dialogue and captions, you couldn’t find a more old-school Marvel-style collaboration outside the halls of the House of Ideas itself!
Oniric Previews presents samples from their four main titles—The Formidables, Sideral: The Last Earthman, Heroes of the Multiverse, and The Astro-Dome—plus the one-shot special Venus F.
Sideral: The Last Earthman is about a scientist who makes an astounding breakthrough guaranteed to change the world—just in time for the world to be destroyed when nuclear war breaks out. Caught in a unique combination of radiation and genetic transformation triggered by his experiments, he becomes Earth’s lone survivor as well as the cosmic entity called Sideral, and sets out to find some meaning to his existence among the stars. If you’re into “cosmic” superheroes like Marvel’s Silver Surfer and Captain Marvel, then Sideral is definitely worth checking out!
The Formidables is a series about a quintet of superheroes battling evil and bigotry (and an invasion of Norse gods?!) in 1950s America, with their first challenge having come in the form of a Communist super-villain…who’s disguised as a white supremacist! It’s a unique take on the genre, with Chris examining topics like race relations and sexual identity in a Cold War setting, with an appropriate amount of punching and explosions mixed in, of course—we are talking superhero comics, after all! There’s a definite Fantastic Four vibe to their adventures, but with a unique twist to the proceedings that only Chris could bring to them.
Oniric Previews, Sideral: The Last Earthman #1–3, and The Formidables #1–7 (not to mention the company’s other releases) are available through their product pages at printer/distributor IndyPlanet and e-comic distributor DriveThru Comics. Visit the Oniric Comics website for more information.
