Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Volume 1

/ Alex Good

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Volume 1

I signed this one out of the library after just glancing through it, thinking it might be an interesting take on Philip K. Dick’s classic novel. As the front cover tells us Do Androids Dream was the “inspiration” of Blade Runner, “inspiration” being a word that’s used whenever an adaptation is only very loosely based on its source. So instead of a graphic novel version of the film, what this promised to be was a return to the story’s roots.

I should have flipped the book over and read the back cover, where it says this is the “complete text” of Dick’s novel. When I started reading I was struck by just how much text there was. This was to be expected (I’d noticed the same thing in Fido Nesti’s adaptation of Orwells’s 1984), but complete text is on another level. And since I’d just recently re-read Do Androids Dream I found myself skimming a lot and focusing more on the pictures.

Pictures that weren’t that inspiring. Not bad, but I didn’t get the feeling Tony Parker (a Warhammer artist primarily, and someone whose name doesn’t appear on either the front or back cover) was offering a really creative new vision of the text. There’s nothing at all like the cubist style of the cover. Instead, and not surprisingly, I detected a lot of influence from the iconic look of Ridley Scott’s film. Even down to the movie-star appearance of the bounty hunter (don’t call him a “blade runner”) Rick Deckard. In the novel he “seemed a medium man, not impressive. Round face and hairless, smooth features; like a clerk in a bureaucratic office.” I see him as a bit of a schlub. But here he’s more a plastic sort of movie star, smoother than Harrison Ford but well-built and obviously a tough guy. Not an office worker.

Obviously this volume doesn’t contain the entire comic, though there is an omnibus edition out there that weighs in at over 600 pages. What we have here is the first four issues of a 24-issue series that ran in 2009. According to the back cover these first four issues are “hard-to-find,” which struck me as odd since this collected volume was also published in 2009. So why would the individual comics be hard to find, unless they just didn’t print very many of them? Then there are also some supplementary essays that are worth a look.

But the bottom line here is that I don’t think I’ll be reading any more of these. And I’m not even sure what the target audience is. Hardcore fans of the book will probably still prefer to read the book, and find lots to carp about in the adaptation. Hardcore fans of the movie will probably be disappointed it isn’t more like Blade Runner. Personally, I would have liked it if Parker had taken a freer hand visually, and that they’d cut a lot of the text, while maintaining the original story. I can’t fault them too much for what they’ve done here, but at the same time I don’t think it was necessary.

Graphicalex

29 thoughts on “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? Volume 1”

  2. I read it back in highschool and watched the movie in my 20s and neither version did a thing for me. So I know I’m not the target audience.

    But man, this story just keeps on surviving. Why, I have no idea. But various adaptations (like this comic business) just keep coming out and they must make enough money because they KEEP COMING OUT! sigh. It’s odd that a library would have this though. Or are they trying to appeal to the basement dwellers?

    Speaking of basement dwellers, how is your Alexcave coming along?

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    • The Alexcave was stalled for a long time because of other stuff but should be getting done up at the end of this month. Then I’m having the entire rest of the house renovated. Big project and I may have to take a bit of a break from posting, at least posting so much.

      As for Blade Runner . . . it’s a much-loved brand. So publishers and studios are just trying to milk it to death. Same as Marvel and Star Wars and everything else you can name.

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  3. When adaptation meets obsession. The complete text?! Good Lord, what’s the point?

    I don’t know if I’ll ever get around to re-reading the book, but I remember a sequence that totally blew me away at how skillfully its effect was achieved. Only now it’s been so long I’ve lost all the details. It was, I think, when Pris was in Deckard’s apartment…and she was seated at a table…and doing something….Any ideas?

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