An old fashioned science fiction horror story. A salvage vessel goes to a planet because of a distress signal and end up facing mind numbing horror.

I want to begin by saying I am a huge Cullen Bunn fan. I love his horror and this was everything I hoped it would be. The very first panel is stunningly beautiful. The stars and planet landscape are beautiful. Then there is the monster, a horrifying thing but still beautiful. The parent child interaction is so sweet. I love the panel where the two have their foreheads touching. It is sweet and touching. Then you turn the page. Wow!

There is one line "Remember when people used to think space was beautiful" this was said while they were complaining about how ugly this place was. This is all being done on one of the most beautiful pages.

I sometimes have a hard time telling characters apart. In Rogue Planet everyone is wearing a helmet which would make that even worse, but the colors of each character is different. I absolutely loved that because now I easily remember who was who. I cannot wait to get the trade.

Creative Team:
Writer Cullen Bunn
Illustrated by Andy MacDonald
Colors: Nich Filardi
Letters: Crank!
Release date: 3/2

Salvage vessel Cortés locks onto a mysterious signal and decides to investigate. What they find on this strange planet is sci fi horror fabulous. Picture A Nightmare on Elm Street crossed with a mystical alien race on an abandoned planet far far away. With wicked good illustrations, monsters, aliens, alien zombies... "nightmares are not indigenous here." Native planetary crystals are amping the psychic abilities of a dreamer stuck in hyper sleep which create nightmare after nightmare on planet. Salvation only occurs with the death of that dreamer. The ending was perfect. I absolutely enjoyed every page.

I'll be sharing this review on my Instagram @AprilsBookishLife, on Facebook (April Jernigan) in the Books of Horror group and Twitter (@AprilPrevette) with screenshots of the fantastic illustrations, as well as Goodreads. Thank you for allowing me to review it.

A decent sci-fi horror plot that lives from its awesome illustrations, which were the main reason for me to read this latest work by the author. I just love his style, and the 'Rogue Planet' makes no exception.

When we meet the eight-member crew of the salvage ship Cortes, they are coming out of hypersleep. They have arrived at their target destination, the planet dubbed Lonely Orphan, referred to as a rogue planet because it has no star system. They hope they are the first crew to have picked up the beacon emanating from the planet, as they are in debt and in need of a healthy scavenging payday. Once they land, however, they realize they are far from the first, as they discover a graveyard of spaceships. When a huge, indescribably frightening alien creature kills and takes the first of their crew, they begin to wonder if they were lured to the planet for just that purpose.

This is an excellent sci-fi/horror graphic novel. Cullen Bunn is a prolific author of many genres, but he always comes back around to horror before straying from it for too long (to my delight). Here he weaves an expertly crafted tale, one replete with ever-mounting tension and even pacing. The lack of characterization of the crew members would normally bother me, but that isn’t the point of this story. Bunn is more concerned with exploring the mystery of the planet and the theme of fear, and he is successful on both counts.

The art by Andy MacDonald is wonderful. His lines are precise, his spacesuits very detailed, and his alien entities unique and frightening. I especially appreciate MacDonald’s clarity and consistency. Not once did I have to squint at a panel to figure how what was drawn. And Nick Filardi’s colors accentuate MacDonald’s pencils perfectly. One would think the frequent use of bright colors in a dark story in space would be unsuitable, but Filardi makes them work well.

This book is the complete package: a great sci-fi/horror tale with impressive art. The mystery of the planet will engage you, the art will dazzle your eyeballs, and the ending will leave you thinking. What more can you ask for? Adults and older teens who enjoy this genre will relish this one.

*Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for providing this ARC in exchange for my honest review.

The crew of the the Cortes lands on an isolated planet in hopes of scavenging ship wrecks to get their ledger out of the red. It quickly becomes apparent that what they thought was a payload is instead a symptom of the evil inhabiting this barren world.

I was very impressed with the artwork straight off the bat. I thought it was competently composed and colored. The high quality helped with immersion. However, I wasn't particularly fond of the monster design for the Cronenbergian lungs and the first appearance of the Scarecrows. I feel like they were too abstract to be uncanny or disturbing. In the instance of the latter it might have just been an issue in cropping because when a Scarecrow shows up later they look FAR more intimidating.

I felt so confused during my first reading that I didn't like it, but on my second read through I thought to myself "Oh! Well isn't that clever!" and warmed up a bit, especially now that I had a better understanding of why certain things were happening the way they were. That said, I do wish phenomena introduced at the end was established earlier as something that exists in this universe, because having it appear where it did felt rather random and unsatisfying on the first pass. I felt like there was a bit of guess work needed in inferring the meaning of the ending, and would have like it to be more explicit in explanation. Overall there's more action than plot, but if you're into horror that leans heavily into Action/Sci-Fi this might be your catnip.

A spooky sci fi graphic novel which is certain to give you chills. A great read for people who like sci fi.
There is a nod towards Lovecraftian-esque monsters. It is not for the faint of heart.
The illustrations are well done with vibrant colors and artwork.
I would recommend it for sci fi genre readers.

Salvage team land on planet looking for profit; get picked off by aliens of all shades. Good plotting, artwork also good, echoes of Solaris, alien series etc.

The cover of Rogue Planet sets a tone pretty quickly with this book, it's one that is going to freak you out a little, and is definitely not one for the faint of heart.

The book starts on this lone rogue planet, where a race of alien beings are worshipping before a giant monument made from flesh and bone, a living, writhing monolith. A father reassures his son not to be afraid, before slitting his throat before this mass of flesh and organs. This first scene makes it clear that this is a book that will go to uncomfortable places, will push the readers to the point were you kind of want to put the book down because of how disturbing it gets at time, yet there is this central mystery as to what's happening that's raised in these first few pages that drives you on.

After this the focus shifts to the crew of the salvage vessel Cortes, who have discovered this rogue world thanks to a distress beacon from a crashed ship. Thinking that there might be some valuable salvage, the crew sets down on this strange new world and several members set out to go find the source of the transmission. However, the crew discover horrible creatures made from mangled flesh, and dozens of crashed ships, their former crews now part of the horrific creatures that seem to be stalking them across the planet.

Rogue Planet feels like a mashup of The Thing and Event Horizon and that's not a bad thing as I love both of those movies. I've seen some other people make the comparison to Alien, but other than being drawn to a planet because of a signal there's not much here like that film, and being drawn to an unknown place by a signal is not something that's unique to Alien by any means.

Instead of being beset by alien lifeforms the crew of the Cortes have to contend with disturbing body horror and their fellow crew members are twisted and transformed into awful abominations, or they have to deal with their own nightmares coming to life in front of them. This second part is the one that interests me the most, and its actually set up a lot earlier in the book than you think, with hints at what's really going on being given thanks to the appearance of snow on board the vessel. I'd have liked to have seen this gone into in more detail, however, as the idea of these people having to confront the manifestation of their fears was an interesting prospect. Sadly, the story moves at quite a fast pace, so we don't really get much time to go into things in any great detail.

Whilst this fast pace is great for keeping the pressure on the Cortes crew as they try desperately to get off planet, it does mean that the readers don't really get much time to get to know these people before something awful happens to them. There is a little bit of character development here and there, there's one crew member who recites a list of all the women he's slept with when he's afraid, and another who has a husband left on earth who's going into suspended animation whilst they're away so that they can age at the same rate, but despite these little nuggets of character I still didn't feel like I really knew any of them; and couldn't name a single member of the crew for you now. This is my biggest gripe with the book, as everything else was great. I can't help but feel that perhaps the book would have benefited from another issue or two, just so that Bunn could have had more room to fit in some of these character moments and flesh out the crew.

The art on the book, provided by Andy MacDonald and Nick Filardi, looks great, and they manage to make the book feel of decent quality, thanks in large part to the level of detail they give things. I've seen horror comics that have tried to hide things in shadow, or left some panels mostly empty voids, and whilst this can sometimes work it does at times feel a little cheap and lazy; here, however, the book never scrips on on the art, and every panel feels like there's something there for you to spend time looking through, whether that's the interior of the Cortes or the alien planet itself.

Rogue Planet isn't perfect, but its pretty damn good, and one of the few horror comics that I've read recently that has actually felt scary in places.

Short and sweet. I thought the illustrations were great. It gave me a Dead Space vibe and at one point I saw a little Harlan Ellison. This makes me want to explore more graphic novels. Great work!

Thank you to NetGalley for an ARC of this graphic novel.

Rogue Planet, written by Cullen Bunn and illustrated by Andy MacDonald and Nick Filardi, is a familiar horror/sci-fi story, which while beautifully drawn, is just ok in the story sense. The movie Alien and its newer prequels will be the biggest comparison, but touches of Event Horizon, Supernova, and even Dark Star are drawn from too. A salvage vessel finds a planet with secrets that doesn't want to let them escape. The science and tech is interesting, but more backstory might have been helpful. The artwork is both creepy and technologically interesting.

Iterative, nothing special. I wouldn't even pair it with similar works. Probably Bunn's weakest work.

This was fun but it felt really incomplete. 140 pages of graphic novel is an incredibly small span to be working with, but other authors have formed a complete story--even if it's just a portion of the universe in which it occurs. When I read the first few pages, I expected this to be an ongoing story based on the immediate set up and I'm disappointed at the end that everything seems to be contained in this one collection. From the first issue, there was a *lot* going on without any instant explanation. And that's totally fine! I enjoy when stories gradually reveal themselves, but this one felt rushed. In the end, I think I have an outline of what happened in the story with some gorgeous art. There aren't enough details to complete a full, comprehensive picture here--at least not the one I wanted based on my initial expectations. The story was 2 stars because it felt incomplete and the stunning, horrifying illustrations elevated it to a solid 3 stars.

An exciting and dark adventure, especially if you like deep-space horror. The mysteries were great and imaginative - they kept me reading and wanting to learn more. Characterization is solid and all crew members are likable. Well done.

I thought this was a fun read! It’s very reminiscent of Alien, but different enough that it still stands on its own. It’s a fast paced sci-fi horror novel, so my one complaint is that we didn’t get to know or connect with any characters that much (accept maybe Glory). But that is kind of part of these types of fast paced stories, so I couldn’t deduct too many points for that. I just like a story more if I can get to know and care about the characters, because when they die or survive it has more of an impact. I’m not super experienced in this genre so my opinions maybe very different from those that I’ve seen reviewing this, but I think that this was fun overall.

When the heavily in debt crew of the salvage vessel happen upon a distress beacon coming from the planet “Lonely Orphan” which has no solar system to call home, things don’t work out the way they hoped in this sci-fi horror comic from Oni Press.

The book opens up aboard the Cortes as the crew are awakened from stasis and find that it is somehow snowing aboard the ship. Franco is told to investigate whilst others gear up to head out onto the planet to investigate the distress beacon. After following it for a while, they discover a large number of crashed space vessels and are then set upon by a huge monster that looks like a mass of organs amalgamated together. Back onboard the craft Franco talks to the pilot, trying to figure out his fears and we begin to touch upon some interesting concepts.

The first of these is what the crew term “Zom-Time”, a kind of stasis where the ship operates their bodies for it to be maintained whilst they travel long distances, the crew aren’t awake or alert during this period. Franco discusses his fears of his partner back home who, due to them spending months apart, has taken to also going into stasis but Franco fears Terrance (his partner) has spoken about “going Zom” during these periods as people in this state age slower than regular “Deep Sleep” stasis. Now, stasis is a common trait of a lot of sci-fi focusing on deep space travel, it appears in everything from Red Dwarf to Alien, but the idea of the crew still running the ship whilst being unconscious feels fairly inventive, unfortunately, its never really explored any further beyond the second chapter.

The biggest theme though is that of people’s fears being manifest by whatever it is that is the big bad within any particular media, this plays on a Nightmare on Elm Street type theme where in order to stop the bad thing happening, you have to stop being scared of it in the first place (or for Freddie Krueger, don’t go to sleep). It’s a fairly common thing, we tell our kids who are afraid of the dark that the monster under their bed isn’t real but it takes a lot of will power and time for them to overcome that fear. Rogue Planet takes this to the conclusion that your fears are real, and that they can harm you, unfortunately, again, it doesn’t explore this as well as I wanted it to, with the scary things all being the same in appearance, rather than taking on a Polymorph kind of element where it genuinely takes on the appearance of their fears.

So, concept and plot-wise, Rogue Planet feels fairly run of the mill. This isn’t always helped by the artwork. Ignoring the prior criticism of everything looking the same regardless of which crew member is being preyed upon, the character art and panel work is fairly static. There’s no dynamic flow to the page, nothing to create tension, though it has to be said that the art team of MacDonald and Filardi have an absolute field day with some of the body horror on show.

Now, this all reads back as being pretty critical of Rogue Planet, but honestly, I went in not knowing anything about it and not having knowingly read anything by its creators, so I had no expectations, to begin with, but honestly, it was a really quick page-turner of a book, that doesn’t really break any ground in terms of fleshing out some fairly cool-sounding ideas, but also doesn’t really do a lot wrong.



I was able to review Rogue Planet thanks to being provided with an eARC by NetGalley and OniPress

***eArc provided by NetGalley & Oni Press in exchange for an honest review***

I love science fiction and I love it even more when there are visuals. It's why, despite loving sci-fi novels, I'm much more drawn to films and television shows in the genre. But then there's the best of both worlds: graphic novels and comics.

Rogue Planet is one of those one-shots that you truly love to see. It's beautifully drawn by artist Andy MacDonald, the color by Nick Filardi is supremely good, and the story by Cullen Bunn is concise and with a whole lot of heart, like all good short stories. One-shot sci-fi stories are hard, because it's difficult to give the reader a conclusion that's deeply satisfying and actually works with what you're setting up. I think the team on this book really knocked it out of the park.

Rogue Planet feels like the coolest late-70s, practical sci-fi horror flick you've never gotten to see. The visuals are out of this world and I would live and die to see them done with any amount of practicality on film. Until then, though, this is a truly great comic that I'll think about for a long time to come.

The Cortes, a space rescue ship, finds herself with her numerous crew on a lonely planet, with a unique star system.
At first when these young crew guys get off the ship and notice some strange things, they think it's just something strange and mysterious.
But it is in the most absolute silence that the real danger is hidden.
It is a hostile planet, with aliens who speak their own language and worship a divinity to whom they offer continual sacrifices and which continues to grow.
Will the crew be able to escape? What will they be willing to do to save themselves?
The Cortes crew is certainly varied, there is no doubt about this. The characters are interesting. At first I didn't really appreciate how the first of them died, no one shed a tear or worried. Everything remained static for a while until it took on dynamism and everything moved into action within the planet.
Although the designs are truly exceptional and particular, I was not intrigued by the story that is almost like the result of an old horror movie script gone bad.
One after the other they will have to try to evaluate themselves and those around them by risking their lives and that of the rest of the crew for something strange and unknown.
A slightly revised story, which is not particularly crazy. I was expecting something more from the cover and the plot, but the book did not convince me very much.
My rating for this story is 3 stars just because it stays in the middle and can't hit much. Original on the planet side but lacking in the modus operandi of the story.

Have you ever seen a comic running through a tablet that looks 3D? Holy Cannoli. Nonstop, dropkick, knock your face off, extra-pulpy SciFi monster-butter on top of SciFi bread with space jelly of whatever flavor you want, here with Rogue Planet. I really enjoyed this one! 🤨

Cosmic space horror explosion of monsters with gritty, humorous dialog. At first the artwork reminded me of Saga in style, but better, ( note: I didn’t read Saga on a tablet ) in regards to glowing on a lighted screen, and on more than one occasion, seemed to leap off the screen in somewhat of a psuedo-three-dimensional emulation sorcery. I blazed through 180-ish pages on a 10″ Kindle ( unrelated note: even though I was ready to send the device out into oblivion in regards to the new update that’s blocking me from accessing critical services on the open internet. Amazon, why have you betrayed your valued customer? ) I can’t say enough on how much I enjoyed flipping through these 180 some odd pages of absolute fun and perfect reading for a Friday night. I really don’t even want to tell you about the story or what’s in it not to spoil the fun!

Honestly, I’m not sure I’ve felt this particular way about a comic graphic novel ( I’ve read quite a bit of comics since I was a teenager ) or any comic for that matter, because the way I gauge the value of a book is by it’s entertainment value and this shoots stars across the sky, but this is for adults with some strong themes that come along with the genre. I’d say, get a digital copy of each comic so you can enjoy the effects the lighted screen gives up some 3D type effects, then buy the hard copy graphic novel when it comes out next year, in March. Every bit of matter that can fit into ★★★★★ five stars out of five, for this excellent bit of fun.

Guys, until next time – may you find all the happiness that your life can fit in it’s happy spot – S.D. McKinley

Really liked the artwork in this graphic novel. The storyline way a little hard to follow at first but it had a solid ending.

This is a haunting graphic novel in the vein of Alien and Prometheus, though it leans too far into explanation and not enough into the mystery. The characters are often difficult to distinguish from one another and one in particularl seems weirdly adept at working out what is going on and finding the solution. This would benefit from being longer with greater investment in characters. Some intriguing ideas, but better handling needed.