At a private press event the day before New York Comic Con, Skybound Entertainment revealed their newest upcoming series, Oblivion Song! During this intimate setting we were joined by series co-creators Robert Kirkman and artist, Lorenzo De Felici alongside colorist Annalisa Leoni and editor Sean Mackiewicz to speak about the new series and answer a few questions along the way.
Official Synopsis:
The official synopsis for the series reads: “A decade ago 300,000 citizens of Philadelphia were suddenly lost in Oblivion. The government made every attempt to recover them but after many years they gave up. Nathan Cole… won’t. He makes daily trips, risking his life to try and rescue those lost, alone and afraid, living in the apocalyptic hellscape of Oblivion. But maybe… Nathan is looking for something else? Why can’t he resist the siren call of the Oblivion Song?”
It was our friends over at FanBros.com who kicked the round of questions off to the creative team which led Kirkman and De Felici to go into some detail regarding the world building and the bizarre type of creatures that populate this dimension that has invaded our world and ravaged a large part of Philadelphia. In regards to the length of the series we were assured that since Oblivion Song is large in scope that things aren’t planned to wrap up soon. Kirkman states this is a personal story for the main character, Nathan Cole, and as we get deeper into the story that we’ll find out more about the other dimension and what’s happening on Earth.
Kirkman explains why he chose Philidelphia as a location for Oblivian Song as a way of avoiding the usual metropolitan spots such as New York and Los Angeles. This also led to a few jokes and an It’s Always Sunny In Philidelphia reference from Lorenzo regarding a scene that takes place in the first issue. Kirkman also explained that this story is “apocalypse adjacent” and that the majority of the city is still intact. But a theme the story will be dealing with is according to Kirkman will be that, “no matter how horrific something is that happens to us as a people it doesn’t take too many years for us to just kind of go back to normal and forget about it.”. Though there are some apocalyptic tropes in Oblivion Song he still wants the characters to be able to go back to a safe place and raise a family.
Lorenzo went into more detail as to how he came up with some of the creature and fauna designs. He credited his parents being Biologists which led to his understanding of biological coherence as he designed a world and creatures that looked alien but also feel like they naturally belong in this environment. Colorist Annalisa Leoni explained how they were challenged with finding the correct colors to balance the tension and not overwhelm the actions taking place in the story.
Oblivion Song began as idea over 10 years ago and Kirkman states that it’s quite different from where it started. In part because he’s a bit older and more socially aware so he’s dealing with things that are more important to him now than before. Also thanks to Invincible co-creator, Cory Walker and social media the talent of Lorenzo De Felici was noticed and Cory pointed Kirkman in his direction.
With the string of Kirkman’s success in television it was asked if he saw this being optioned as a show. He let us know that this is not why Oblivion Song exists and that he loves comics and feels the most comfortable telling the story this way. So it’s too early to tell but with his track record there’s always interest. When asked who he’d have as his lead he jokingly says Ed O’Neil.
In the back of many comic readers minds is the question of if a title will be put out on time or will we be waiting a long time between issues. This doesn’t seem like it will be an issue for Oblivion Song early on with several issues already done (Lorenzo is currently drawing issue 9) it was expressed that getting this new project out to fans on time was a top priority. With this many issues already done in advance it shows a level of confidence in the series but a dedication to the readers who want to follow the story in Oblivion Song.
Comic Attack had the privilege of checking out the first three issues and already it’s a story that grabs you both visually and in it’s writing. The look and feel of the world of Oblivion Song is quite unique and feels like a living thing thanks to Lorenzo and Annalisa whom we had a chance to sit with later on in the day.
Lorenzo is new to American comics and cited the differences in the storytelling styles and that it took him some getting used to along with handling a different type of work load since he’s not coloring his own work now. He and Annalisa both agree that one of the most challenging things about the look of Oblivion Song was finding the right colors to set the atmosphere. We also discovered that Annalisa wasn’t available right away for Oblivion Song and that other colorists were looked at but as soon as her scheduled opened she immediately came aboard. After seeing the finalized pages readers are very lucky she’s part of this project.
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