Broken Frontier

An international space station is the setting for an odd murder case. When one member of the crew goes out on an urgent unplanned space walk to make repairs that are kept secret from the rest of the crew, his suit goes out and sends him drifting into space. Was it an unavoidable accident or was there something more sinister at play here?

Station is set up like your average murder thriller except in space. Stokes has been a regular in the Boom! stable and maybe it was her turn to write the next movie. Honestly that is what this feels like, a movie pitch.

The book is laid out in cinematographic style by Carvalho. He uses wide shots and the emptiness of space to convey the cramped space of the space station and the unimaginable expanse of nothing right outside its port windows. His characters and designs are capable enough as well, but the computerized coloring of Imaginary Friends Studio lends a strange quality to the art.

It is a quality that is not absent in the rest of the book. This feels like the opening of a million different movie, from the blond and blue eyed narrator Dyson’s look to his boy scout-like delivery. This guy is the typical NASA drone and maybe that is a technique that Stokes is using on purpose. If you give the reader things that are familiar then it will add a sense of doom at the twist. It is even possible that it could work, but we will have to see with the next issue.

This is a nice start and there seems to be some care given to it all. However, it seems that our hero Dyson, who was put on this mission as a standby, might have it more together than the crew of the station who has been at work for months in space. Also, when he approaches the station commander about the peculiar nature of the space walk that doomed their colleague, the commander asks for him to keep mum on their situation. This would not be so odd, if Stokes did not take the time to specifically mention that astronauts are trained to take care of unusual situations and to remain calm. Of course, right before this conversation it is made obvious that there are fractured nerves at play leaving certain crew members at each others' throats. It is convincingly done, but maybe a little too convenient.

All the different pieces of a compelling story are here, but the ease of connecting dots softens its edge. This is not an insurmountable problem; in fact it is easily fixed by following it up with a surprising and intelligently written story. There is enough intriguing possibility here for Stokes to pull it off. Let’s hope she does.