Blade Runner 2039: Luv Vol. 1 by Mike Johnson, Mellow Brown and Andres Guinaldo (graphic novel review).

Following on from an earlier series, ‘Blade Runner 2019’, this particular volume contains the first four issues of a series set twenty years later and therefore ten years before the most recent film, ‘Blade Runner 2049’. As usual, this is a grey, wet and thoroughly depressing world filled with frightened people and potentially homicidal Replicants. Telling the two groups apart is hard and the work of ‘retiring’ Replicants is left to the titular Blade Runners.

In this series, we’re introduced to Luv, a Blade Runner who also happens to be a Replicant. This, of course, is not popular with her colleagues, who mostly treat her badly and refuse to work with her. Like most humans, they’re suspicious of Replicants and sees them as, at best, unreliable allies.

It has to be said, the cops aren’t wrong here and Luv isn’t merely a Blade Runner but also an agent working for Niander Wallace, CEO of the company that builds the Replicants. Wallace wants some research about the potential for Replicants to have children and he also wants Luv to find a child called Cleo who carries a mutant gene that could extend life.

Violent shenanigans ensue as Luv ploughs her way through anyone who gets between her and Cleo. A former Blade Runner called Ash turns up, though, thwarting her plans. Ash has been playing a risky game, it turns out, operating an ‘underground railroad’ that takes hunted Replicants to safety. Ash is an interesting character, in some ways more so than Luv. That he’s part of a movement of Replicant sympathisers brings some humanity to the ‘Blade Runner’ story that isn’t always obvious. This underground railroad will be a major plot point in the 2017 movie, so seeing how it operates during its formation is interesting and worthwhile.

The artwork is good. While Luv doesn’t much resemble actress Sylvia Hoeks, who played the character in the 2017 movie, most of the major characters are unique to the series. Otherwise, the visuals capture the atmosphere well and, if the panels are relentlessly dark or washed out, that’s the point: this isn’t a nice place to be. There are some weird scenes, live goldfish being fed to cryptographers for a start, which underscore the strangeness of the ‘Blade Runner’ world that otherwise resembles ours so closely in other ways.

Overall, the four issues collected in this volume set up the larger story while working adequately well as a standalone read. If there is a fault with this collection, it’s really one aimed at the ‘Blade Runner’ franchise generally. The setting is interesting enough, but all the stories seem to be telling the same depressing story over and over again. Put another way, there’s nothing new here that you aren’t getting in the original cult classic, but there is groundwork laid down for the 2017 film, and if you enjoyed that sequel, you’re going to find ‘Blade Runner 2039’ well worth reading.

Neale Monks

December 2023

(pub: Titan Comics, 2023. 112 page softcover graphic novel. Price: £14.99 (UK), $17.99 (US), ISBN: 978-1-78773-844-7)

check out website: https://titan-comics.com/