Invasion of The Comic Snatchers: The Saviors #1 Review

Jack Finney’s 1955 novel The Body Snatchers has, in my lifetime, been adapted about every ten years, whether we need a new version or not.

Putting aside the original novel and the 1956 movie Invasion of The Body Snatchers, we had the Donal Sutherland shrieking version in 1978, the one with Gabrielle Anwar in the early 90s, and then the Nicole Kidman version (which was inspired casting. After all, if Nicole Kidman was taken over by an unfeeling alien spore, who could tell?) in 2007.

And on one level, why not? The idea that the people that you love aren’t who you think they are, combined with the concept that your own individuality is not only an ephemeral thing, but something that, if wiped away, other people might not even notice it was gone, is powerful. But it’s a powerful concept with diminishing returns; the novel, first and second movies are rightly considered genre classics, while the 90s version is pretty much just a decent sci-fi flick, and the latest being kinda useless, since by then it was an old story told better, and besides: Kidman shows off her whole magilla in Eyes Wide Shut.

All of which brings us to The Saviors #1, a new comic by Starman writer James Robinson and cartoonist J. Bone, which gives us what so far seems to be yet another version of Invasion of The Body Snatchers, wrapped in the unlimited special effects budget that only a comic can bring, but saddled with some real storytelling difficulties and forced characterizations that simultaneously amp the excitement visually while bogging the whole thing down in writerly bits of business and force-fed pacing.

This one’s got some problems, guys.