The Futurians

Marvel Graphic Novel #9

by Dave Cockrum

marvel graphic novel comic

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Comic Book, Superheroes, Science Fiction

64 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

David Emmett Cockrum was an American comic book artist known for his co-creation of the new X-Men characters Nightcrawler, Storm, and Colossus. Cockrum was also a prolific and inventive costume designer, who updated the uniforms of the Legion of Super-Heroes, and did the same for the new X-Men and many of their antagonists, in the 1970s and early 1980s.

Reviews

[Little Timmy]

Great story and art. Very recommended

[Stewart Tame]

Say what you will about Marvel’s line of graphic novels from the 80's, but I’d rank Dave Cockrum’s The Futurians as one of the high points. Yes, it's your basic superhero comic book, but it holds up surprisingly well. And, I’ll admit: I’m a sucker for a good superhero yarn.

We begin on Earth in the far distant future. There are basically two dominant city-states: Terminus and Ghron. Ghron are presented as the bad guys, doing their best to wipe out Terminus, even going as far as pulling the Moon from orbit and smashing it down on their foes--it's apparently very much a space opera future. Fortunately, superior force field technology saves the day. But then a new gambit: the Ghronians flee through time into Earth’s past, a technological feat that saps the energy of the sun, forcing it prematurely into red giant phase. Not enough energy is left in the star to duplicate the feat, but Terminus is able to send genetic packages targeted at specific bloodlines into the past, seeds that, with the right prompting, will grant special abilities. And their leader is able to cast his consciousness back into an ancestor's body to activate the seeds and provide guidance …

So the Futurians truly come from the future to save Earth’s past. It's gloriously apocalyptic! Needless to say, we get a team of diverse personalities who bicker and banter amongst themselves, but save the day in the end. Cockrum was an old hand at drawing team books--I grew up on the Legion of Superheroes and X-Men. In addition to the main storyline, there are all sorts of hints dropped for future tales. Cockrum did continue the Futurians at least briefly with an independent company, and at least one further graphic novel was published.

As I write this in 2019, there's definitely an old-school vibe to this book. I don't consider that a detriment though. It's bright and shiny and just plain fun. Some of my love for it may be nostalgia--Cockrum represents some of that first heady rush of comics fandom for me. But there's an excitement and optimism--this was created before Grim and Gritty was really a thing after all--to these pages that just brings a smile to my face every time. Recommended!

[Daniel Parmenter]

If you like what Dave Cockrum brought to the Legion of Superheroes and The X-Men in the seventies, you'll probably like this.

[James]

More Marvel graphic novels!! What can I say, I like collecting these. This one was decent. In the far future, the earth is has two factions. One wants to take out the other to rule the planet themselves. The leader of our main group realizes that the enemy has gone back in time to figure a way to undo them. So, he sends himself back in time, uses his abilities and tech to create a group of super heroes to track down the enemy and stop them. Dave Cockrum does some cool looking artwork and the story ended up being solid. Not the greatest thing in the world but I was somewhat entertained.

[Bryan]

The artist who revived the X-Men in the mid-‘70s takes a crack at his own superhero team epic in the early ‘80s. It doesn’t really break any new ground, but it’s a great excuse for Dave Cockrum to design a bunch of superhero costumes, which is never a bad thing.

[Troy-David Phillips]

This was a decent story by Dave Cockrum, who had previously worked on X-Men, and before that, Legion of Super-Heroes.
Influences from those series can be felt here.
A traveler from the future comes to the past to save the Earth.
Seeding humanity with “genetic timebombs” which blossom into a team of special superhumans to battle the time-travelling bad guys and maybe to become heroes for a generation.
This graphic novel shows some of the late Dave Cockrums’ finest artwork.
Excellent costume designs and very well done backgrounds.
The dialog is a little stiff and the pace of the story is frantic, but that’s also the limitation of the medium at times.
In all, a fine work: definitely a fun sci-fi/super-hero adventure!

[Devero]

Questa Graphic Novel rappresenta il tentativo di Cockrum di diventare autore completo, e per quanto sia facile leggervi una scarsa originalità nei personaggi protagonisti, la trama, a sfondo essenzialmente fantascientifico, e alcune idee lasciate qua e là fanno solo intravedere quello che davvero Dave Cockrum avrebbe voluto creare.
Purtroppo un immeritato insuccesso non diede seguito alla storia.
Peccato.

[David]

Was surprised to find a Cockrum book that I'd never read. It's a decent "pilot" type of episode but without a follow up of a continuing series it just doesn't add up to much. It's a fairly basic home-brewed super-hero team. The type every early teen boy dreams up for himself, with little to distinguish itself from slush pile. 3 stars is being very generous out of fondness towards Cockrum.

[Mike Gallagher]

One of my favorite super hero teams. I wish Dave Cockrum could have done more with it.

[Brian Rogers]

So one of the types of "Graphic Novels" from the 1980's Marvel bullpen was "give one of our artists free reign to write their own books" and in this case it produced a new super hero world and super hero team from one of the worlds most prolific character/costume designers. He also tries to write.

That sounds unfair, but this is a paint by numbers form a team, split it into groups, face individual threats, get together, fight the big threat story. The world thinks grand scale, but the individual graphic novel isn't enough time to explore it, and there are too many characters for things to flesh out. On its own, the story is a disappointment, but its one that's pretty to look at because Cockrum is a master of character design and panel layout.

[Rex Hurst]

A very colorful book with dynamic art, but the story seems like a rehash of other tales with a futuristic twist. The villains are sort of bumbling and don't seem to pose a real threat to the main characters. Additionally, there are a lot of main characters, so many that there is almost no space for any character development, so they come across as one-dimensional and we've seen those dimensions in many other comic book characters. This also was a supposed to be the start of a series, but that never materialized - except for four issues from an indie publisher. Still, it has a lot of smashing and good old-school comic banter, so it might be worth a look.

[Duncan]

An interesting combination of everything that makes comics comics that unfortunately doesn't fully come together. It's strange to read a comic that has all the tropes and cliches that usually make a comic into a fun read being swirled together and creating something that's only okay. All the ingredients are there in terms of team members, powers, cool origin, and good art but it didn't come together. Perhaps it's just too dated and I'm an old man now who needs more. But it was an interesting experience to read it.

[Simon]

Marvel really did some different things within their Graphic Novel range, this is t one of them though.

While enjoyable to read, with some great art, it is pretty much an old school superhero story. That doesn’t mean it’s not a lot of fun it just means you’ll not see anything different or new in the story.

[Patrick]

Fun little book from Dave Cockrum. There are some great designs from Cockrum, but he probably would have been helped with a writer on this. Fun, but forgettable read, with some great character designs.

[Guido]

Los irrepetibles no-X-Men no-Legion-de-Superhéroes del gran Cockrum.

[Tobin Elliott]

The Cockrum art was what drew me to this, but the pacing and overall storyline of this was weird, and the writing was...well, not great.

[Adam Dawson]

3 / 5 for 'The Futurians' by Dave Cockrum

One of the early Marvel series of graphic novels, this one has fantastic art from Cockrum, who was always excellent at character design. Unfortunately, the story isn't quite up to the standard of the art, it feels quite formulaic and predictable.

Still an enjoyable read though - 3 / 5.