The Fossil Legacy or the excessive ambition of an Elon Musk of the future

In the middle of the desert, an old man and a little girl advance as best they can under the gusts of wind. The planet is hostile. Dust gets everywhere. They finally find shelter for the evening bivouac. In their waterproof and bright shelter, the old man continues the story of his journey, while the little girl takes notes on a digital tablet.

Twenty thousand years earlier, in 2087, four astronauts left Earth to join an exoplanet called Geminæ. The project was launched by a certain Reiz Iger, described as a billionaire philanthropist… who is none other than the old man sitting near his daughter at the beginning of the story. Even if the planet is experiencing some ecological difficulties, all is well on Earth.

At the time, the crew was in charge of a huge eight-story spaceship called Legacy loaded with billions of embryos intended to populate this new planet. Every quarter of a century, the crew comes out of cryogenics to maintain the ship before returning to hibernation. But it seems clear that something went wrong…

Fascinating story of anticipation which intertwines two stories, Fossil Heritage by Philippe Valette is a true success of the genre. With a splendid semi-realistic drawing, stylized and mixed with digital interventions, Valette has set himself quite a challenge, having until now only published three humorous albums, including Georges Clooney volumes 1 and 2 (2013-2014) and the very surprising Jean Doux and the mystery of the floppy disk (2017).

“Science fiction is a genre that I have really appreciated for a long timeexplains the author. If I started with humor, it was a bit by chance. It all started with my blog… But originally, I worked for a long time in advertising, music videos, short films. I evolved in the world of animated cinema and in particular for Cartoon Network where I worked for the series The Amazing World of Gumball. It’s just that comics came up for me at some point. It was perfect. This way, I was able to pull out of my drawers all the projects I had since childhood. At the time, with a friend who had received a camcorder for Christmas, we got into the habit of creating films, between the ages of 11 and 20. We had made nearly forty short, medium and feature films. I had been passionate about storytelling since 6th grade. I only lived for that. My encounter with comics finally allowed me to tell my own stories. The idea of Fossil Heritage dates back to this period of my life.»

Philippe Valette admits without difficulty, his primary sources of inspiration are linked to cinema. Its comic book layouts are designed like a film cut. “On a technical level, I design my narration with waffle iron layouts, with rectangular boxes, sometimes banner boxes or vertical imageshe admits. Because in my head, that’s how it goes.»

Long matured

Pour Fossil Heritagewhen we evoke a connection with Stanley Kubrick’s masterpiece 2001 A Space OdysseyValette smiles. “I think that my first cinematic and science fiction slap must have been 2001, he remembers. I saw him very young. My parents showed it to me. And this movie obsessed me for a very long time.»

Fossil Heritage has been matured for a long time and on a long format. Philippe Valette did not launch into this project without a doubt. We also think when reading this comic of that of Mathieu Bablet Carbon and Silicon published in 2020, by Ankama under the label “Label 619”.

The concept of Fossil Heritage starts from a simple idea: putting into perspective a twenty thousand year inhabited space journey towards a habitable planet. The idea being to talk about immense scales both spatially and temporally. The final twist at the end of the book is, according to Valette, the basic idea that made her want to tell this story.

«It’s a committed albumconfides Valette, which talks about ecology and the direction in which humanity is heading. It speaks of a desirable future. It is also, somewhere, a criticism of the way in which the conquest of space is evolving with all these billionaires of the style Elon Musk who are in the process of investing it to make something commercial out of it.»

The character of billionaire Reiz Iger, a sort of Elon Musk of the future, begins by displaying good philanthropy. But throughout the pages of this science fiction odyssey, he will show himself under another face, which we are not sure will completely please the human race…

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THE COMIC BOX

Philippe Valette wanted to decipher a double page so that it would be more representative of the double atmosphere that reigns in the album. His choice fell on pages 36-37 of the comic strip.

On page 36, we discover a story centered on an old man wrapped in bandages accompanied by a little girl who films him. The atmosphere and sandy colors suggest an inhospitable planet. This patched-up character displays a puzzle face, sewn back together, like Frankenstein’s monster. “Regarding the look of the protagonist, Reiz Iger, the billionaire philanthropist, comments Philippe Valette, I wanted his physique to convey a little of the paradox of Theseus’s boat applied to a person. This theme was close to my heart. This philosophical notion is based on a famous mythological story, which imagines a boat whose parts are gradually replaced. After a while, the boat no longer contains any of its original parts. So, if at the end of the trip, we changed all the parts, is it the same ship? Reiz has changed enormously over these twenty thousand years, both physically and morally. He who wrapped himself in great philanthropy and thought of sacrificing himself in this mission, is he still the person he thought he was? By betraying his humanity, by allowing himself to be guided by a sort of Hubris, by transgressing morality and his own limits, does he remain a man?»

Still on page 36, we note the presence of this little girl with a tablet who observes the old man attentively. “This little kid, baptized Nova by Reiz Iger, is very important in historye, notes Philippe Valette. She is an observer, an archivist who is necessary for the hero to report on his ambitious project. Nova is the key witness. This child was created by Reiz to immortalize the legacy he wants to pass on to future generations. She’s the pioneer, so her name is Nova, as in Planet of the Apes where Charlton Heston’s partner was called that.»

Vollmer_Lo

On page 37, the atmosphere changes radically. The board is outlined in black. We are in deep space. The first box shows the Legacy spaceship from the front. A guide indicates:“It was on our fortieth awakening that everything changed.” There’s something of the crew waking up sequence in Ridley Scott’s Alien. “Yes, it’s truerecognizes the author. I also wanted to play on the contrast between the warm tones of the planet and the cold tone of the interior of the ship. Page 36 shows a universe with an infinite horizon, while page 37 depicts a closed space. It took me two months to create the model of the spaceship. The realistic design of the spaceship is inspired by the work of NASA, its padded ambiances evoking the ISS, and the piping. »

This immense ship is built like a gigantic Noah’s ark. “Yes, I thought like an engineer, specifies the creator of Fossil Heritage. This ship is a cocoon. I was inspired by the work of artistic director Paul Pepera, whose spaceship designs I admired. I sought to give it an iconic, majestic look, and at the same time with very coherent pure lines. This ship has two functions, one for travel and the other for settling on the planet. By splitting into eight distinct modules, this ship transforms into a habitat for the installation of the colony.»

In the continuation of plate 37, we see the liquid of life from cryogenics withdrawing from the supply pipes of the hero who gradually emerges from his stasis. “This green liquid which withdraws over three squares introduces the character of young Reiz, continues Philippe Valette. The hero has a red face, which denotes to me the idea that this character has a certain form of authority. Red carries contained violence, aggressiveness. Since there are few characters in this story, I decided to give each of them different colors. As we are on monochromatic boards, I wanted to bring back touches of color.»