Wish fulfillment (and how it can go horribly wrong) has been a mainstay in storytelling for a long, long time. I, like many of my generation, remember reading and analyzing The Monkey’s Paw in high school English class. In recent years, I haven’t found myself drawn towards stories featuring wishes, as I haven’t seen new ground being broken on a thoroughly explored idea. Eight Billion Genies changed that. Charles Soule and Ryan Browne created something really special with this one, and at 275 comic book pages, it’s a quick read.
Read if Looking for: ensemble casts, stories spanning centuries, mischievous (but not evil) genies, whimsical art
Avoid if Looking for: morality lessons, stringent wish fulfillment adherence, innovative villains, genies with any relevance to their mythological origins
Elevator Pitch:
When the population of earth reaches Eight Billion People, every human gets their own genie, each able to grant a single wish. Chaos immediately ensues, and the apocalypse is here, complete with cheese monsters and a moon that enjoys eating people. The Lampwick Bar owner wishes for his bar to be a safe haven free from the influence of wishes, leaving those inside (visitors from China, a father and son in grief, and a rock band in desperate need of rehearsal time) able to find a safer way forward. The story spends most of its time on the immediate aftermath of this even, followed by 8-10 years after the event, followed by 800 years after the event.
What Worked for Me
Soule did a phenomenal job of balancing various narratives. While each major character gets their own time in the spotlight, none are ever forgotten about. Seeing each character grow (or stagnate) was delightful, and the story often went in unusual and unexpected directions. I expected a lot of zaniness, but I didn’t expect that joyful chaos to be accompanied by deeply heartfelt stories. When a 12 year old wishes to become a superhero to protect his father, only to be sucked into a life of violence that breaks him … this book wasn’t afraid to go deep. Frankly, I am astounded at how Soule and Browne worked together to cram so much development into such a small space without things feeling rushed.
Timeskips helped of course. We get a few montages, but the comic isn’t afraid to just zoom into the future, dropping us across the world and into whatever situation the new viewpoint characters find themselves in. Story beats are picked well, constantly offering us a peek into the soul of the perennial question that wish stories try to answer: what happens when people get what they want? The friction between desires is a running theme in these stories, which I thought was a smart move. The genies honor the spirit of the wishes, and conflict arises from human nature and unexpected consequences of simple wishes. While the ending offers a more direct moral statement than the rest of the book, I appreciated how the story found a balance of humanity’s best and worst properties. Avarice goes hand in hand with love, fear with joy.
What Didn’t Work for Me
My complaints mostly come in the form of nitpicks around wishes, but it never really got in the way of the story. I could see some people struggling with the contrast of the nuanced storytelling mixed with a lot of bizarre and comedic choices in terms of art style. When you have a whole page dedicated to the moon eating Santa, it doesn’t really inspire confidence that a book will be thought-provoking. Personally however, I thought almost every choice made was the right one, and I don’t have a lot that I’d want to see changed.
Conclusion: An easy comic to recommend. It felt impeccably balanced, with serious themes, crazy ideas, and emotional resonance.
- Characters: 4
- Setting: 4
- Themes: 4
- Craft: 5
- Enjoyment: 5
Marked for Plot 