Prophetica #1

By Vince Twelve, Tim Mayer, Jason Wordie

“Heed these words, for they are my first. In all things the circle is order, and order in the natural state of all things. The wandering child returns to his mother, the star born to the stares, the raindrop to the sea. All paths close upon themselves. All loops begin another. So it is, and so it must be in this: When the pretender’s seed finds purchase in the fertile soil of civilization the procession must begin.”

Prophetica #1 sets out to establish this new series with its first prophecy from the holy text of this particular religion. Writer Vince Twelve and artists Tim Mayer and Jason Wordie set out to establish a new world, one much like our own, and show the impact this religion has on it throughout different stories each issue – each one focusing on a different topic of the religion.

This issue focuses on a long pilgrimage that must take place due to a child being born with a wing. Twelve does a great job of creating strife within the characters as we see how these traditions are put to the test over the years. He creates a way for someone to look at these traditions and judge whether they’re just or not.

At the end of the issue, Twelve talks about how artist Tim Mayer’s creative input helped to shape the fantastical world this issue takes place in. Throughout the issue we see the progression of a large caravan full of massive creatures the likes of which you’ve never seen before. Twelve’s original ideas focused on these scenes consisting of camels and elephants, but what we got instead due to Mayer’s insight is drastically different. He created a bold new landscape for this story to take place in, taking if from our world to a new one all together.

A great scene that comes from one of these huge creatures designed by Mayer has the massive beast rolling out its long purple tongue to lap up some water spilled onto the barren desert floor (there are people carrying large containers of water across the desert as part of the ritual). Colorist Jason Wordie takes this otherwise desolate landscape and packs it with color, giving these creatures unique textures and color pallets that pull them from the yellow and brown landscapes – an example being the purple tongue that falls out of the creature’s mouth with a loud “schlorp” sound, the creature then slaps the water into its forehead as a means to cool off.

Vince Twelve, along with Tim Mayer and Jason Wordie, create an imaginative landscape to go alongside this loaded narrative. With just this one story we get something from start to finish and feel like nothing has been missed. With this prophecy that must be fulfilled every decade…there was bound to be a hiccup sooner or later…right?

Prophetica is available digitally pay-what-you-want here: Prophetica