Shangri-la is a science fiction graphic novel originally published in France in 2016 and translated into Spanish in 2017. To me it is mainly social and political critic in outer space dealing with issues such as mass media and crowd manipulation, ethics of genetics and creation of life, racism and discrimination. The scientific aspects of the work are also interesting to say the least. This is not hard science fiction, but the author takes the time to explain relevant topics effortlessly.
The events take place in a space station orbiting earth centuries after humanity made its home planet uninhabitable. There is no formal government at the station but a corporation called “Tianzhu” dictating norms and providing jobs for everyone who complies with their ideas of a perfect society. We follow Scott and the crew of a small vessel sent by Tianzhu to investigate an accident in a smaller station. They find everyone death and evidence of a small explosion. This is not the first time they find something like this and Scott goes back to Tianzhu to ask them for more resources to take his investigations further. However, Tianzhu are not interested and he is not given any explanation. Scott’s crew mates ask him to join a revolutionary movement to stop Tianzhu manipulating the population. However, he doesn’t understand their arguments and continues to be loyal to the corporation.
Not much time passes, and Scott is kidnapped by a strange man. But then rescued by his friends. While interrogating the man, he reveals plans to colonise Titan, one of Saturn’s moons. Particularly a region called Shangri-la. As earth is still uninhabitable they think Shangri-la is the best option for humanity. However, they don’t want to take the Station’s population there. They want to create a new human race from scratch. By recreating the conditions in the big-bang, or the collision of stars, (requiring huge amounts of energy hydrogen fuses into Helium, and with more energy, Helium fuses into Carbon which form the basic structures of life) they want to become the gods of a new humanity. It is not clear if this group of scientists is part of Tianzhu or not, but the ethical and moral dilemma of their actions force him to open his eyes. He decides to join his friends and fight for change in the station. Being a scientist himself he realises that the recreation of the big-bang in a small space station may be fatal to the rest of the population. He then designs a plan to destroy their laboratory.
Opinion: I really liked this novel. The story is gripping, and the art is a-ma-zing! We are given much more than a nice account in space, but social and political commentary embedded in layers on the story and which I enjoyed and recognised as relevant in our times: manipulation of masses, consumerism, critique of marketing methods, discrimination, slavery among others. We have the political and social dynamics within the space station, racism, discrimination, manipulation of masses. We have the secrets the Tianzhu heads keep from the population. We have a group of scientists playing god and all the ethical and moral assumptions this brings. We have (easy to understand) science explaining the way atoms are created, from Hydrogen, to Helium to Carbon which can lead to the creation of life, and how we can recreate this process with anti-matter and huge amounts of energy.
Although the art is of excellent quality, especially the panels of space and earth, the contrast with the space station, etc, one weakness I found is the design of the faces of the characters. Not distinguishable between them and with little appeal at first sight but not a big deal after a while. Also the social criticism, at points, came as too evident, or too much into the foreground, that it was distraction from the main plot. I like social commentary but I feel it works better if it is subtly interwoven within the fabric of a story.
I have the third Spanish edition published by Dibbuks in 2018. 222 pages in total.
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