Aftermath (Science Fiction)

by Richard Thurber 

Published by Gulf Comics (Issue 1), Gulf Coast Comics (Issue 2) 

Softcover, 36 pages each issue

Issues 1 & 2 Mile High Comics   

This will be one of my more obscure entries, as it is a pair of comic issues based on an obscure pen-and-paper role playing game from the early 80s. In fact, it is so obscure that there is no mention of it on the Wikipedia page on the game. Yet the game is advertised in the pages of the comic.

The game itself was a bust. Published in Fantasy Games Unlimited and placed in a post-apocalyptic setting. The exact nature of the devastation was up to the individual game master, but the manual offered advice on what would happen after the event and the breakdown of society. Actual play, however, was god-awful. It made the mistake of many independent games and went for “realism” over fun. The combat rules are especially tedious, to the point where a six second gunfight might take up to two hours of real time to play out. As such, it was not popular.

I actually owned a copy of this game (it is probably still rattling around in my mother’s attic), and only played it once. It was nearly incomprehensible to my nine-year-old brain and I was never tempted again. There is a small group of supporters still, and a few PDF supplements have been released in the 2000s, but there is no reason to buy the game.

This leads to the comic Aftermath, put out by Gulf Comics (or Gulf Coast Comics, not to be confused with the comic shop of the same name) in 1983. I found almost nothing about the writer and artist, Richard Thurber, and this seems to be his only commercial endeavor. He must've gotten a license, but not much other support.

Both issues have the same protagonist, Charles “Hunter” Hunt, a grizzled soldier working as head of security for Mainstreet, a military survival compound in Texas. The back story is that in 1990 a limited nuclear exchange ruined most of the world and now the remaining superpowers are fighting over what's left.

What I found of interest in here was that the government (even in a limited capacity) survived and kept functioning, while the rest of the country reverted to a more frontier Old-West style of life. The specific s are a bit hazy, as it had only two issues to develop, but it ended with Russian troops entering Texas just as the state decided to cede from the Union.

I would have loved to see a third, fourth, fifth issue. But it was not to be. As most independents, it stank in sales and sunk into obscurity. If my local comic shop, Queen City Comics in Buffalo NY, hadn't gone out of their way to stock independent comics, I would never had heard of it.

What probably prevented the comic from taking off, apart from poor advertising, was the art- which can be charitably called amateurish. Now I will say that each character was distinctive and easily identifiable, but the quality of the art is below par. Stiff limbs, awkward balloon placements, poses obviously ripped off from old Jack Kirby comics. It looks like two pages from issue 2 were drawn by someone else (much better quality). Even the first few issues of Poison Elves (I, Lusiphur to megafans) were drawn more skillfully.

And despite that I have read these two comics over and over again. There is a distinct charm to them. It is truly a labor of love, and despite the brutality of the action (the comic does not pull punches) that love comes through. There was potential here seen in the setting, dialogue, and the characters. Obviously a lot of thought had been put into the background. If only he had gotten someone else to do the art.

For more readings, try books by Rex Hurst.