REVIEW | The Singularity

REVIEW | The Singularity

I found Bear McCreary through war.

God of War, to be specific. I wasn’t familiar with his work before the soft reboot of the God of War franchise in 2018. McCreary’s resume is extensive, though. McCreary, an Emmy and BAFTA Award-winning and Grammy-Award nominated composer, has worked on projects ranging from The Walking Dead to Godzilla: King of the Monsters, Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power, and much, much more. I became familiar with McCreary through his work on the God of War soundtrack and instantly fell in love. The scale, emotion, and power he brings to his compositions make them singular and riveting.

When I learned he was working on a project that was both a conceptual rock album alongside a graphic novel, I was instantly on board. The Singularity, written by Mat Groom with the story by Groom and McCreary, is a companion piece to the rock album of the same name. It’s illustrated by a long, ridiculously talented list of comics’ top artists. It’s going to take an entire paragraph to list them all, but they absolutely deserve to be credited, so here it goes.

The Singularity is illustrated by Ramon K. Perez, Danilo Beyruth, Matias Bergara with Patricio Delpeche, Federico Bertoni, Eleonora Carlini, Lorenzo Colangeli, Valeria Favoccia, Eduardo Ferigato, Marco Locati, Helena Masellis, John J. Pearson with Lola Bonato, Simone Ragazzoni, Rod Reis, Riccardo Robaldo, Stefano Simeone, Toby Cypress and Morgan Sorne, and colored by Natalia Marques and Rod Fernandes. The Singularity is lettered by Becca Carey, edited and designed by Michael Busuttil, and features Kyle Higgins as creative director.

As I said, it’s a stacked book. It’s nearly 150 pages and it is as ambitious as comics come. This review is a bit different from how I would typically review comics. It comes with the territory of this being different from typical comics. There will be slight spoilers so be warned. I won’t be getting into specifics, but if you don’t want to know anything here’s the short and sweet: this book is one-thousand percent worth the read. If you want to know why and don’t mind some light spoilers diving into what this book is about, read on.

Blue Eyes – the main character of The Singularity – can’t stop being reborn. He’s thrust from one life to another, with no context of where he’s ending up in an increasingly strange array of worlds. The one consistency in his experience is that one way or another, everything around him eventually crumbles thanks to what he views as the antagonist of this story – Red Eyes. Throughout his adventures, he catches up to a mysterious figure – Yellow Eyes – who holds some answers for what exactly is happening.

This is a multiversal story and it takes full advantage of the storytelling range that offers. The art team reaches for cosmic heights, depicting wild, awe-inspiring worlds from sea kingdoms to gladiators in space. The action is near-constant and it lands with force. You can feel every punch, sword slash, and cosmic energy blast. There’s a new wonder to behold on every page turn and it is a consistent visual treat. Page layouts are incredibly varied, taking full advantage of the breakneck, or slow-burn pacing, that the comic medium allows.

I adore the idea of transmedia storytelling. I think it’s one of the most unique ways a story can be told, so to see it done at this scale is beyond exciting.

For a book with so many different artists on it, it’s impressive how cohesive it feels. It all feels like one, singular story, which is crucial for this execution to land. Blue Eyes’ journey through the multiverse is filled with twists, turns, and intergalactic sightseeing. I could gush about the art for hours and it wouldn’t do it justice. A picture truly is worth a thousand words.

This is a story about life, death, rebirth, pain, loss, joy, and finding meaning. It’s cathartic, heartbreaking, and moving in unexpected ways. The scale is as big as possible but it maintains a crystal clear emotional core. It’s a meditation on existence itself – the pain intrinsic in simply being – and what can be done with that pain. It confronts head-on the challenges of life in the broadest terms and finds relatable responses. It’s about an unending fight and what happens when it’s time for that fight to end. It’s about growth, change, and acceptance, and it handles it all with deftness and a backdrop of cosmic grandeur.

I can’t not talk about the rock album. This graphic novel doesn’t exist in a vacuum, it’s a companion piece to a conceptual rock album of the same name, and if you check out one and not the other, you’re missing out. The album, like this comic, also features a long list of mind-blowing talent, and it’s every bit as epic as it can be. I wasn’t sure what to expect from it going in. I’d never heard any of McCreary’s music with lyrics accompanying it – aside from Blood Upon the Snow, but that was a singular track. The album is frantic, bombastic, hard-hitting, pulse-pounding, measured, and impactful. It grabs your ears and doesn’t let go for its nearly two-hour runtime.

I adore the idea of transmedia storytelling. I think it’s one of the most unique ways a story can be told, so to see it done at this scale is beyond exciting. The album and the graphic novel go hand in hand, with the lives of Blue Eyes that make up the chapters of the graphic novel being track titles on the album. Some lyrics from the album appear word for word in the graphic novel, and it’s epic. It’s incredibly rewarding to sit down with both projects and give in to each experience. Both take full advantage of their respective mediums, giving you something you won’t find anywhere else.

The Singularity gets a solid 9/10

In a recent post online McCreary said, “I’ve been writing this album for 30 years, and producing it nearly full time every day for the last 5 years.” and you can tell. This is the definition of a passion project and it shows on every page and in every note. The Singularity is a singular experience. It’s ambitious, bold, exciting, and thoughtful. It’s the culmination of so many talented people pushing towards the same goal. It explores the vastness of existence through the expansiveness of the cosmos and ends with an answer that hits the heart. I can’t recommend it enough.