78 MPH #1 – Review

78 MPH #1, from Red 5 Comics on April 6th, 2022, imagines a global catastrophe that turns the Sun into a relentless source of death. Society is forced into a never-ending quest to outrace the Sun at 78 MPH.

The Details

• Written By: Mauro Mantella
• Art By: Tomas Aira
• Colors By: Tomas Aira
• Letters By: Tomas Aira
• Cover Art By: German Peralta
• Cover Price: $3.95
• Release Date: April 6, 2022

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Was It Good?

Now, THIS is the type of post-apocalyptic sci-fi I can get behind. 78 MPH #1 gets so many things right, that it’s hard to know where to begin, so let’s start with the basics.

First, the premise. A global catastrophe makes exposure to the Sun instant death. The setup is super clean and simple in explaining how the catastrophe happens. Once the deed is done, you can intuitively imagine all the ways life on Earth would need to change to maintain survival. Mantella does an excellent job explaining the catastrophe, and the adaptations humanity undergoes, to make the situation seem realistic as well as nihilistic. You could imagine a catastrophe of this sort happening, as well as everything that comes after.

The characters and conflict are fairly bare-bones here as not much page space is available to get deep into the lives of the main character. That said, the lack of character development isn’t a detriment here as the setup is so thorough, that the main character’s life and actions flow intuitively. When the conflict comes to upset the delicate status quo, the stakes are already established as incredibly high and the character’s motivations are obvious. You don’t need to know a lot about the main character because everything in this new status quo is hyper-focused on survival.

The one down point in the writing is the narration. This may be a problem with translation from Italian to English, or Mantella may have intentionally fudged the narration to make it seem like a bastardized version of English in a future world. Either way, the narration has a lot of spelling and grammatical errors. Too many to ignore.

The art is generally good. There’s a heavy reliance on the coloring to sell the look of this new world since the entire society is cast in the perpetual glow of pre-dawn light. Everything is saturated in Reds, Oranges, and Yellows to draw you into society constantly teetering on the brink of destruction. The color is used for maximum effect, and it works well. That said, there is so much haze, dust, and shadow that most details are fuzzy, so it’s hard to tell the quality of the lines, but again, the color sells the art, so a lack of detail makes sense.

Keep scrolling for a closer look at the covers, or Click Here to jump right to the story description with some spoilers.

What’s It About?

[SPOILERS AHEAD – Click here if you just want the score without spoilers]

We begin with a prologue about a scientific program focused on sealing a hole in the ozone layer. The “sealing” rocket goes off as planned by the chemicals released into the atmosphere accidentally reverse and amplify the atmosphere’s sunlight filters, turning the sky into a giant magnifying glass that scorches everything the Sun touches with 900 degrees heat.

There is no way to escape the Sun’s devastating rays above or below ground. The only recourse is to run and keep running to stay on Earth’s dark side by banding people together that never stop running at 78 MPH. After 100 years, society has evolved into caravans in perpetual motion.

One night, the advance scouts find boulders placed in the path of the caravan. too many to stop and move before the dawn arrives. We conclude the issue with acceptance of the end, a miracle, and a new threat.

Keep scrolling for a closer look at preview images of the internal pages, or Click Here to jump right to the score.

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