Comic creator Ulises Farinas’ hilarious, madcap, often dark parody that takes pokes and prods at the tropes of Saturday morning cartoons is back this fall with a brand-new Gamma miniseries from Dark Horse Comics! Taking the familiar of Power Rangers and Pokémon, creating pastiches and adding his own undeniable mark, Farina will bring the characters and world that he first brought to Dark Horse Presents and the Gamma one-shot to a more long-form look at hustlin’ kids, monster traders, and super suit-wearing teens in this all-new prequel!
Dark Horse was kind enough to give us an exclusive first look at two covers for Gamma as well as the detailed press release of what we can expect to see when Gamma #1 (of 4) hits this September!
From Dark Horse Comics’ official first announcement:
DARK HORSE BRINGS BACK THE KAIJU PACKED CHAOS OF “GAMMA”
Ulises Farinas and Erick Freitas’ Sci-Fi Comedy About Pocket Monsters, Giants Monsters, and Human Monsters Returns!
MILWAUKIE, Ore., (June 19, 2018)—It’s Pokémon meets Power Rangers in Ulises Farinas’ (Judge Dredd, Transformers, Godzilla In Hell) and Erick Freitas’ (Judge Dredd: The Blessed Earth, Godzilla In Hell) dark parody of popular Saturday morning monster media! Initially serialized in Dark Horse Presents and later collected in a one-shot, Gamma returns for a brand-new prequel series that takes inspiration from kaiju cinema and imported Japanese children’s classics to tell a raucous tale of how a young monster trainer named Dusty Ketzchemal failed upward to go from plucky teen hero to old loser.
Gamma begins in the early seventies in the Philippines, a few years since the Great Sentai War, a world war that ravaged cities across the planet, but established a new world order. The new world is run by The Guardian Force, a military organization that uses super-powered super suit wearing teenagers to patrol the planet and protect it from a plague of monsters. Dusty, Sandy and Crash are orphans living in post-war Philippines, kids left behind by parents who could not feed them. The three hustle every day to catch monsters, trading them or selling them, or eating them.
Dive into a bizarre, yet somewhat familiar world where kids in Power Rangers type suits are the foot soldiers of a World Government, people have become used to living alongside Aliens, Robots, and Giant Monsters, and a young monster trainer can’t stop making things worse. But making things worse is the only way to make things better.
Gamma #1 (of four) goes on sale September 26, 2018, and is available for pre-order at your local comic shop. Gamma is co-written by Ulises Farinas and Erick Freitas with Farinas providing interior and cover art with Melody Often on colors.
Praise for Gamma:
“Farinas and Freitas’ Gamma…is nothing less than a brilliant ode to my (and probably your) childhood, wrapped up in a messily light-hearted adult package. A laugh-your-ass-off bonanza with unique art and an oddball story. A must have if just to experience its zany charm.” —Graphic Policy
“‘Gamma’ is one of the most beautiful, funny, and fun books of the year and you’ll want to pick it up before everyone, and their grandma starts talking about it.” —Multiversity Comics
About Dark Horse
For more than thirty years, Dark Horse Comics has proven to be a solid example of how integrity and innovation can help broaden a unique storytelling medium and establish a small, homegrown company as an industry giant. Founded in 1986 by Mike Richardson, the company is known for the progressive and creator-friendly atmosphere it provides for writers and artists. In addition to publishing comics from top talent, such as Eric Powell, Mike Mignola, Geof Darrow, Brian Wood, Gail Simone, Stan Sakai, and Guillermo del Toro, and comics legends, such as Will Eisner, Milo Manara, Kazuo Koike, Neil Gaiman, and Frank Miller, Dark Horse has developed its own successful properties, such as The Mask, Ghost, X, and Barb Wire. Its successful line of comics, manga, and products based on popular properties includes Dragon Age, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Aliens, Conan, Tomb Raider, The Legend of Zelda, Halo, The Witcher, Game of Thrones, and Avatar: The Last Airbender. Today, Dark Horse Comics is the largest independent comic book publisher in the US and is recognized as one of the world’s leading entertainment publishers.