In the city, Rana does not see the stars at night, but she dreams of them. After the constellations vanish, how will this affect her life? Find out in Starsigns #1 from Image Comics!
STARSIGNS #1
Writer: Saladin Ahmed
Artist: Megan Levens
Colorist: Kelly Fitzpatrick
Letterer: Shawn Lee
Publisher: Image Comics
Cover Price: $3.99
Release Date: May 3, 2023
Previously in Starsigns: One night, all the constellations in the Zodiac vanished from the sky. It’s the greatest astronomical mystery of all time and millions of people never noticed. Rana Fawazz only found out about it from social media. Little did show know that it would affect her personally.
A MYSTERIOUS ORIGIN
Starsigns #1 opens in Canada under the northern lights. A man called Mister Duke predicted an event happening at that time in that place. He brought with him a young woman named Tatiana, and now he sends away the scientist and the military escort who brought them here. Only Tatiana stays. They are going to watch the stars die, and she is going to change.
In Brooklyn, Rana Fawazz thinks about when the signs of the zodiac disappeared. Living in a metropolitan area, no one she knows saw it happen. She only found out about it through social media. Stars vanishing seems remote and abstract. Still, she wonders why she dreams of glittering fire at night and remembers stars when she wakes up.
Her roommate interviews her about that day and how her life changed. Frankly, she tells him, literally nothing has changed. But he feels compelled to gather information and gather people’s memories before too much time passes and they forget, or their memories are altered by things they hear later.
The interview is interrupted when Rana’s father calls. She must answer, explaining that she is Lebanese. Her father, a musician, is in Germany for a job recording with Led Zeppelin, but he takes time to call her and check in with her. Plainly there is a lot of affection between them, and it is a charming, if brief, conversation. He has no wisdom about the stars vanishing.
Later Rana sets up for a catering job at a gallery. Not only is she late because of traffic, but her co-worker calls in sick and she is working solo. To top it off, the gallery owner decides to order double the amount of food at the last minute. Rana does not have the time for this! But as she thinks this, she is enveloped in a sparkling glow and realizes that time has stopped for everyone but her. She starts to freak out, then turns back to the kitchen. Cooking calms her down, so she starts cooking. Time snaps back, and the woman from the gallery is stunned at the food that, to her, seems to have appeared instantly.
Rana returns home, eager to talk to her roommate, but he is gone. She does not see him until morning. She tries to stop time deliberately, and it works. She stops it for a few minutes, then restarts it, and then wonders whether she is going crazy. Then there is a crash from her living room.
FROM HEAVENS TO EARTH
The art of Starsigns #1 is lovely. The characters are well-drawn and distinct. The opening scene in Canada captures the greenish glow of the northern lights beyond what looks like light snow. Is it light snow, or is it shooting stars? Evergreen trees are dark silhouettes against the colorful sky. We do not yet know just who Tatiana and Mister Duke are, but they are both confident and assured. Whatever happens with the stars, Mister Duke knows about it, and I cannot help but wonder if he did not do something to cause it. It is a dramatic and magical scene.
I love the double-page spread right before we meet Rana. As she muses about the stars disappearing, what we see is an astrological calendar projected across the heavens. The twelve rays of the signs of the zodiac are colored like a rainbow, if one were lit up by the light of an entire galaxy. But this projection has several chunks missing from it, chunks that make it look like an enormous sheet of glass with jagged holes and additional cracks interfering with the symmetry of the design.
BOTTOM LINE: DEALING WITH A DRASTIC CHANGE
As the opening of a story about a group of people gaining mystical powers, Starsigns #1 is strong and interesting. Rana is a particularly likable young woman and I think her story will be entertaining.
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Starsigns #1
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By day, she’s a mild-mannered bureaucrat and Ms. Know-It-All. By night, she’s a dance teacher and RPG player (although admittedly not on the same nights). On the weekends, she may be found judging Magic, playing Guild Wars 2 (badly), or following other creative pursuits. Holy Lack of Copious Free Time, Batman! While she’s always wished she had teleportation as her superpower, she suspects that super-speed would be much more practical because then she’d have time to finish up those steampunk costumes she’s also working on.