Wraparound cover for "Forever & 40 Days - The Genesis of PHANTACEA", published by Phantacea Publications in 1990, conceived and written by Jim McPherson, artwork by Ian Fry, layout, colouring and typesetting by Ian Bateson
Forever & 40 Days - The Genesis of PHANTACEA -- 1990
In the mid-1980s independently produced comic books had a massive revival. After receiving, filling and, more importantly, getting paid for a large number of back issues, Jim McPherson, the creator/writer of the Phantacea Mythos, attempted to revive PHANTACEA in comic book form.
The Devil Sedon emerges from his gestation tank. Also pictured are Heliosophos and Cabalarkon prior to him becoming the Undying Utopian. The eye-wall in background belongs to Miracle Memory. Art by Ian Fry, late 1980s
Fifteen issues were fully scripted and artists assigned to a number of stories, only a few of which were completed. Ian Fry began working for Phantacea Publications in 1986. He did the backup story for Phantacea Phase One #1. It, along with 8 other stories he prepared for the ill-fated Phase One project, are collected in this 80-page volume.
From the main webpage for this title, the following is a summary of its contents:
The graphic novel, entitled “Forever & 40 Days”, occupies pages 4-71. Written by Jim McPherson, illustrated by Ian Fry and lettered by the team of Linsea Stamer, Ian Fry and Fred Armstrong, it breaks down to nine sequences.
These follow the time-tumbler, Helios called Sophos the Wise, and his most aberrant generation, the Moloch Sedon, through a series of evidently random encounters ending, circa 4000 BC, with the Genesea and the preservation of what henceforth becomes the Hidden Continent of Sedon's Head.
Another example of Ian Fry's artwork from pH-4ever&40; graphic prepared by Jim McPherson
A short story, entitled “Sister Grandmother”, occupies pages 74-83. Written by Jim McPherson, it features concepts, 6 illustrations and some characters (notably Wilderwitch and Wildman Dervish Furie) from the PHANTACEA Mythos as originally presented in the 6-issue PHANTACEA comic book series from 1977-1980.
The balance of the material is a 1-page frontispiece, a 2-page introduction written by Jim McPherson, a 2-page set of details and charts compiled and written by Jim McPherson re the 10 Golden Age Patriarchs of Humankind, and a 1-page PHANTACEA Price List as of 1990. It includes black-and-white reproductions of all seven previous covers in the franchise.
- The graphic novel formed the basis for all of Jim McPherson's Phantacea Mythos web-serials, novels, novellas and mini-novels subsequently released by Phantacea Publications
- In many respects the full-length novel "Feeling Theocidal" was a direct sequel to pH-4ever&40, albeit one for the most part set on the Hidden Continent of Sedon's Head on a single day, Mithramas 4376 Year of the Dome. That means it took place over 4000 years after the Genesea
- Although the graphic novel is considered canonical, the short story is set after ... well, that would be telling. Suffice to say the Hidden Headworld may no longer be in what amounts to its own dimension attached to the Outer Earth North Pacific Ocean. Indeed, thanks to something that happened on the outskirts of the Soviet Supracity circa 1986, there may not be an Inner and an Outer Earth anymore
- Longtime PHANTACEA stalwart Ian Bateson laid out the publication
- Click here and here for much more on this publication
Promo card featuring covers for two Phantacea Revisited collections: "The Damnation Brigade" and "Cataclysm Catalyst"
