Earthdivers #1: Going Back In Time To Kill Christopher Columbus [Preview]

Written by Stephen Graham Jones. Art by Davide Gianfelice. Coloured by Joana Lafuente. Lettered by Steve Wands. Published by IDW Publishing.

In Earthdivers, the world has been ravaged by climate change. Set in the year 2112, many have escaped Earth altogether, but there are some who have chosen to stay. This includes a group of indigenous outcasts who think they’ve figured out how to fix things. Their solution: go back in time to 1492 and kill Christopher Columbus.

The reasoning for their target is simple. If Columbus never reached the “New World” then America as we know it – and its problems – would never exist. History can be rewritten for the better. Writer Stephen Graham Jones elaborates on this idea by saying, “a lot of us here in America who have been forcibly dispossessed, had genocide attempted against us, then been continually erased from history books, we’ve got a bone to pick with one of the people instrumental in facilitating all that: Christopher Columbus.”

Time travel is always complicated. It’s messy and always comes with unexpected consequences. There are no guarantees that Killing Colombus will help avoid the post-apocalyptic future of the comic’s characters. Fortunately for them, Columbus is not the only target. Each story arc will focus on another step of their mission, which sees the attempted prevention of a different moment in American colonial history.

Penning Earthdivers is author Stephen Graham Jones, best known for novels such as The Only Good Indians and My Heart is a Chainsaw. Jones writes stories from a Native American perspective, combining genres like horror and science fiction to explore a range of themes. Earthdivers is the author’s first foray into an ongoing comic series, allowing him to explore these themes in a longer format.

Earthdivers is the fourth series in the IDW Original line of comics. IDW Publishing uses the masthead to focus on bringing readers exciting creator-owned series in the same manner as Image Comics or Vertigo Comics of old. The result so far has been exciting comics such as Trve Kvlt and Crashing, which explore gripping ideas in new ways.

Earthdivers #1 is available at all good comic book shops, online retailers, and digitally on Kindle on 5th October.

Take a look at a seven-page preview of this issue below.

Will you be reading Earthdivers #1?

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