Dreaming and Drowning

In Our Dreams Awake Issue 2

Comic Book Cover, Title reads In Our Dreams Awake. A bald man wearing a trenchcoat sits in a chair as his portrait is painted by a bearded man. — Variant cover for In Our Dreams Awake. Art by Egg Embry

I reviewed the first issue of In Our Dreams Awake back in 2022. The book tells the story of Jason Byron a man living in a mediaeval theocracy where technology both mundane and exotic is forbidden. But when he dreams, he seems to slip into a very different world. This realm is a post-apocalyptic flooded city and Jason is a shaven headed tech wielding dude, straight from cyberpunk central.

This issue opens up with a return to the drowned city of London. Is it in the future? Is it in a parallel reality or on another planet, or does it even exist at all? As the tale begins to unfold we have more questions about what is real and what is not. What is being hidden and what is being revealed.

Three panels of a comic book. The first reads 'The London Waterpark' with a purple sky behind high rise apartments. In the second a hammer head shark swims around a tube in which a fish woman is swimming. In the third we see the fish woman swimming directly at us. — Art by Rolands Kalniņš

This time Jason is having a run in with some rather unfriendly cats. “Drown you in litter!” one of them exclaims. Which does sound like the kind of thing a cat gangster might say. The scenes have the rain soaked and neon lit atmosphere which denotes all things cyberpunk.

Luckily the art by Rolands Kalniņš is up to the job with wonderful vistas of grim docklands alongside vibrantly coloured aquariums (where the fish are visiting other fish). The sense of Lovecraftian subaquatic menace is evoked perfectly by the murky, green waters, home to sharks and maybe worse things.

Back in the land of the mages, Jason runs afoul of their strict rules after witnessing something mysterious falling from the skies. You can almost hear the War of the Worlds theme in the background. Even with dungeons and wizard-priests this is a brighter world which the art of Edgar Salazar and inkers Javi Laparra and Genaro Olavarrieta are perfect for.

A comic book panel. A man is in a chair being questioned by two men. The man says "I am myself. It is only that I shave my hair and beard and have a lust for...aquatic women who are not my wife." — Art by Edgar Salazar

When contrasted with the grim alternative of high tech weaponry and urban decay one begins to think the magi might have a point in subduing forbidden technology. But people are people (also cats and fish-men) and seem to be equally vicious in both realities.

This issue sees some tense plot developments that will have readers wanting to know what comes next. If you are a fan of Transmetropolitan or Halo Jones then you will enjoy the world-building, the visions of futuristic dystopia and the blurring of lines between reality and dreams.

In Our Dreams Awake issue 2 Kickstarter is due to be released on April 2nd 2024.

Credits. It takes a village and/or a dystopian hellscape:

Fantasy Dream:

John McGuire (The Crossing, The Gilded Age, Tiger Style) – Writer
Edgar Salazar (X-Men Blue, JLA: Black Adam, Red Sonja) – Pencils
Genaro Olavarrieta (In Our Dreams Awake) – Inks
Javi Laparra – Inks/Colors

Cyberpunk Dream:

Egg Embry (En World, Knights of the Dinner Table) – Writer
Rolands Kalnins (Red Winter, Chicago Supernatural Defense Department) – Artist/Colorist
Alexander Lugo – Letters for both
Moonee Art – Cover Artist