The Kickstarter campaign for the second issue of John McGuire’s In Our Dreams Awake* is now underway. For those who missed the first book (you can read our review here), In Our Dreams Awake combines elements of both sci-fi and fantasy to tell a story across two realities and is intended “for fans of love stories, dreampunk, steampunk, and cyberpunk.” Am I the only one who has never heard of “Dreampunk” before? Hurm….

The story behind Our Dreams Awake (or stories, depending on how you look at it) follows a man named Jason Byron, who alternates between two very different worlds each time he falls asleep. Some spoilers for both issues 1 and 2 will follow…

This time around, issue two opens in the cyberpunk-inspired reality where the first issue left off. In this sci-fi world, Jason is an underground gang leader and drug lord who has secretly fallen in love with a fishlike alien woman named Fem’a Lin. The sentient races of earth (which include talking cats, in this world) have an uneasy truce with these aliens (who are simply referred to as “Fish”). The leader of the Fish Folk is one Fem’a Lin’s brother, Ma’ahen Lin, and he definitely seems to want Jason dead (though it’s not clear whether his ire is associated with Jason knocking fins with Ma’ahen Lin’s sister). After the events of issue 1, Jason desperately tries to convince his allies to respond to Ma’hen Lin’s attacks, but instead finds himself being pursued by a gang led by a talking cat.

There isn’t too much story development in the cyberpunk reality before the issue abruptly and inelegantly shifts to the other reality—with a “to be continued” message, no less. This second world is a fantasy-inspired one where technology has been outlawed in favor of magic. Meanwhile, Jason has secretly held onto his grandfather’s telescope, despite his wife Laura’s protests, the results of which are a bit predictable. It’s hard to describe what happens without spoiling too much, but there is a piece of foreign technology intrudes upon this world in the form of a spacecraft, and it is quite possible that the ship is connected to Jason’s “dream” world. Before issue two comes to a close, the fantasy version of Jason does reveal that he is aware of his alternate “dream visions” of the cyberpunk-inspired reality. 

Everything in issue two moves the story forward, but the mysteries surrounding these two different worlds and the interaction between them aren’t playing out in very interesting ways yet. Given that there are only two issues left, there isn’t a whole lot of much room left to tease this out. Here’s hoping that the second half of the series uses the split realities in more compelling ways, at least jumping between them in more creative ways than just splitting each issue down the middle. 

Just as it was with first issue of In Our Dreams Awake, each of the two worlds is illustrated by different artists (Rolands Kalniņš and Edgar Salazar). Both art styles complement the atmospheres of their respective reality well enough. I find myself preferring the gritty artwork that depicts the cyberpunk/sci-fi reality, even though those fish-people kinda freak me out (fish-people often do).

As noted above, In Our Dreams Awake is intended to be a four-issue series, so issue two brings us halfway through the full story. The premise remains interesting, but the execution is in danger of becoming stale if issue two is anything to judge by. I still can’t assess the overall value of each issue is really going to be tied to how the rest of the series pans out. At least the buy-in price ($10 for an independently published, 25-page comic) isn’t too steep. You can check out the In Our Dreams Awake Kickstarter campaign here, or read our review of the first issue here.

*A copy of In Our Dreams Awake was provided to The Splintering for the purpose of this review.

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