The Helix Titles That Live On; Time Breakers Crowdfunding
Seeing a note about Time Breakers having one day left in its crowdfunding campaign got me wondering — just how many of the Helix titles have been reborn?
Helix was a DC imprint, back when they had lots of those, dedicated to science fiction (loosely applied, as they also had a vampire comic). Wikipedia says it ran 1996-1998, which sounds about right. It’s best remembered these days for launching Transmetropolitan, the future-painted Hunter S. Thompson comic by Warren Ellis that was successful enough to move to Vertigo when Helix shut down.
(Helix was also originally going to be called “Matrix”, but another, bigger Time Warner company called dibs on that.)
I’m using Wikipedia’s list of the imprint’s 13 titles (heh) for my search.
Currently or Soon to Be Available
Image put Bloody Mary, a religious-themed assassin thriller (originally two four-issue miniseries) by Garth Ennis and Carlos Ezquerra, on ComiXology in 2016, when they reprinted it in a paperback collection; both are still available.
The 12 issues of Michael Moorcock’s Multiverse have been reprinted by Titan Comics in two volumes (the project that got me first thinking about this). With a well-known author and talented artists (Walt Simonson, John Ridgway, and Mark Reeves), it’s no surprise this would be brought back into print.
Time Breakers was five issues by Rachel Pollack and Chris Weston but is returning as “a gorgeous hardcover featuring a brand new cover, character designs, process art and lots more” via Zoop.
Transmetropolitan by Warren Ellis and Darick Robertson has most recently been collected in three Absolute Editions.
Unavailable
- The Black Lamb – Tim Truman’s cyberpunk vampire story (see?) was available to read for free at ComicMix back in 2008, but that site is effectively defunct now, and I can’t find any comics there.
- Sheva’s War – Dark Horse collected this five-issue miniseries by Christopher Moeller in 2004 but that volume is apparently out of print.
Not Collected or Reprinted
- BrainBanx by Elaine Lee and Jason Temujin Minor – 6 issues
- Cyberella by Howard Chaykin and Don Cameron – 12 issues
- Dead Corps by Christopher Hinz and Steve Pugh – 4 issues
- The Dome: Ground Zero, a 1998 CGI short (64-page) graphic novel written and with layouts by Dave Gibbons and illustrated by Angus McKie
- Gemini Blood by Christopher Hinz and Tommy Lee Edwards – 9 issues
- Star Crossed by Matt Howarth – 3 issues
- Vermillion by Lucius Shepard, Al Davison, John Totleben, and Gary Erskine – 12 issues
Given that almost 30 years have passed since the imprint began, it shouldn’t surprise me that several of these creators have passed away, but it was still an unpleasant reminder of mortality, both of artists and books.
10:57 pm
Interesting: I think Sheva’s War and The Dome: Ground Zero were the only ones I picked up at the time. I might even still have Sheva’s War in a box somewhere, though I don’t remember anything at all about The Dome.
I read Michael Moorcock’s Multiverse as a TPB, but I’m not sure what imprint it was by that time. Transmet, of course, I discovered after it moved to Vertigo.
Of the rest, only Cyberella rings a bell, but when I read about the Time Breakers collection, I immediately thought 2 things: “Why didn’t I notice this when it was new?” And “I have to buy it now!”
In retrospect, it’s weird to me that I skipped most of the Helix line. But I think I was still mostly reading superhero comics at the time.