I’m definitely in the middle of a graphic novel/ comic book phase these days
Reading Arca a few days ago made me want to go through all the comics I borrowed via Comixology (i.e. this girl is getting through Something is Killing the Children)! Arca also made me request Earthdivers from IDW Publishing because it just sounded so interesting!
Earthdivers is part of IDWs attempt to branch out after the loss of comic licenses such as Ghostbusters and transformers! As someone who hasn’t really read either of these comic series (and I’ve only half watched the Transformers movies because of Megan Fox) this doesn’t mean too much to me besides indicating that we’ll get some really interesting comics from a place that already has a good track record picking out things that most people like!
I also want to thank NetGalley and IDW for a copy of Earthdivers!
It also worked out for IDW because I ended up buying the part 2!
Review-ish
Earthdivers #1: Kill Columbus came out on the 5th of October 2022. It’s 35 pages long and seems to be under the horror graphic novels category on Amazon. It’s part of an ongoing series so I’m not sure how many we’ll have at the end! There are 6 at the very least, with episodes 4 and 5 available for pre-order and the cover for number 6 right here! It’s also already set to be a tv series by Disney!
I think its nice that we have Arca and Earthdivers by the same publishers. While Arca is take on those who leave, Earthdivers focuses on those who stay. (Did you get the Elena Ferrante reference?)
Earthdivers is about a group of indigenous survivors who come up with a plan to save the earth by rewriting history to stop the United States from coming into existence. As one of them goes back to the past and tries to change things, the others await the consequences of his actions in the future.
As with any graphic novel, you have to comment on the art, which I just loved! The story itself in this book (it is 35 pages) isn’t much. You get the basic premise and that there will be major hurdles to this plan (and it does get dark); beyond that they can’t do much because of the length. It was enough to get me intrigued, and I ended up purchasing the second part from amazon (via Comixology).
As an adult I’ve stayed away from things involving time travel, I’ve always felt like I wouldn’t vibe with that category (so no Doctor Who or Outlander), but Earthdivers makes me feel as though I should give this genre a try! As someone who did love Time Squad, I will say this is like a grown up dark version of Time Squad where they can only save the world by undoing the creation of a country.
Blurb:
Stephen Graham Jones—New York Times bestselling author of The Only Good Indians and My Heart is a Chainsaw—makes his ongoing comics debut with Earthdivers!
The year is 2112, and it’s the apocalypse exactly as expected: rivers receding, oceans rising, civilization crumbling. Humanity has given up hope, except for a group of outcast Indigenous survivors who have discovered a time travel portal in a cave in the middle of the desert and figured out where the world took a sharp turn for the worst: America.
Convinced that the only way to save the world is to rewrite its past, they send one of their own on a bloody, one-way mission back to 1492 to kill Christopher Columbus before he reaches the so-called New World. But taking down an icon is no easy task, and his actions could prove devastating for his friends in the future.
Join Stephen Graham Jones and artist Davide Gianfelice for Earthdivers #1, the beginning of an unforgettable ongoing historical/sci-fi slasher!
The Girl Who Reads 
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