Writer Mário Freitas and artist Lucas Pereira team up to pay tribute to the Jack Kirby legacy with a fictionalized tribute to the comics icon in the upcoming, The Man Who Dreamt the Impossible. This treasury edition one-shot will hit shelves in August from Image Comics and is a must-read for any fan of pop culture history.
“This book is huge. In format. In scope. In ambition. Just like Jack did. But this is not a biography. It is more of a classic ‘what if?’ scenario: what if Jack Kirby had lived well beyond the age of 76? What if he had survived his Roz; if he had spent his last years in a care home, reunited with his old creative pals from the days of the ‘House of Ideas’ (a term so well spread by propaganda, as if American comics hadn’t been a house of ideas since the days of McCay, King, or Herriman),” said Freitas. “It is, above all, a narrative corollary to the great strengths of Kirby’s career: the complexity of human relations and the relentless pursuit of the impossible that lies hidden in the Cosmos. But different. Original. Just like Jack did.”
Jack King is the eldest in the care home. A prodigy of imagination, always telling fascinating stories, but recently suffering from extreme fatigue and lack of motivation. Then comes Mike, a young orderly who will help restore Jack’s spirit and his much-loved library, a place fallen into disarray and near abandonment, certainly not unrelated to the sinister pestilence lurking on its shelves…
Pereira added: “A textual and visual exploration of what could have been—but also of what truly was. Kirby suffered greatly in real life from what was done to him and to his work, and this story is no different. We don’t sugarcoat what needs to be said or shy away from reflecting on what actually happened. Jack is a genius, but his creations were, over time, distorted and rearranged at the whim of a former caretaker at the nursing home. Now, with Mike’s help, Jack King will set everything back in its rightful place—where it never should have ceased to be.”
This story is a salute to Jack Kirby, to the men who better took care of his work, and to others who suffered the same creative and editorial constraints throughout their careers.
The Man Who Dreamt the Impossible will be available at comic book shops on Wednesday, August 27 and across many digital platforms.
