Ether: The Copper Golems is the most bittersweet adventure fantasy I’ve ever read, and that’s a good thing. Boone Dias is a scientist who’s found his way into an alternate dimension called the Ether, where he fancies himself as a scientific Indiana Jones detective, solving all of their magical mysteries by stripping the magic away and relying on logic. There are, though, three things he can’t solve. One, he can’t eat in the Ether, so he has to jump back to our world every now and then. Two, he can’t stop his family from aging at a far greater speed; time works differently in the Ether and on Earth. Three, he can’t stop others from thinking and acting illogically.
All Boone wants to do is be a hero and to help the greater good, but he keeps getting cut off at the knees. He and a crew of adventurers have been tracking down and destroying mechanisms called Copper Golems. These constructs have been creating breaches into our world to wreak havoc. While adventuring, other things have been happening that will throw Boone even further away from his goal.
These last few issues have been a mixture of action and magic. Kindt and Rubín are having a hell of a time coming up with basically whatever sounds cool, but no matter how lost Boone gets in saving the world, underneath it all, we know that there will be a sobering return to reality for him, and reality is rough.
The insane sense of fun that this book offers is met with equal measure by how desolate Dias’ life has become outside of the Ether. He runs into his fantasy world, because…is he afraid? Is he bored? Can he just not appreciate what’s right in front of him and is ever so quickly so slipping away?
If you haven’t read Ether, I don’t know what else you could be doing that’s so important. Where Kindt is a hell of a writer, Rubín is a hell of an artist.
As an additional note: The cover of this issue is breathtaking.
Creative Team: Matt Kindt (writer), David Rubín (art, letters), Daniel Chabon (editor), Brett Israel (assistant editor), Mike Richardson (publisher), Anita Magaña (designer), Josie Christensen (digital art technician)
Publisher: Dark Horse Comics
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