What if an alien people, the annunaki, had taken animals with them when they left our planet 6,000 years ago? After a great deal of experimentation and manufactured evolution roughly 500 years from now these new blended animal beings, the n’naki, are the highest members of society. They have created a galactic parliament and under their rule humans have become the working class, with little to no rights in this new society. In the first issue of Star’s End we are introduced to a pod of n’naki, which means a team of these beings raised together and trained to act as a team to help support their parliament, who have been sent on a mission that takes a very dangerous turn.

This pod has been sent to check the status of a mining planet destined to be gassed after a virulent outbreak was reported to have infected all of the humans working within the mines. In an attempt to reduce losses they will go in and eliminate any necrotic material so that another pod can come in and salvage what can be salvaged. Tanuki Taania, the biotech, is in charge of leading a team to get the job done. Once they land though they are surprised that the planet appears to be stable, excluding the high number of bodies. Their equipment begins registering massive rates of necrotic material, which far exceed the number of humans that should be on the planet. As they continue to investigate Taania finds a lone survivor who appears to be stable.

When they return to their ship, with the woman, she reveals that something seemed to overtake the humans on the planet. They became exceptionally violent and began attacking each other. Something doesn’t seem right about the entire situation, but when the team is preparing to leave a mass of humans attacks the ship. Taania wants to help the humans, but the leader of their team forces them to retreat and the planet is destroyed. What has happened to these humans and just what sort of secret is the leader of this pod keeping from Taania and the others?

Star’s End has a remarkably interesting premise and I enjoyed learning the history of this new animal based race. I am curious to learn more about each of the members of this pod and to seeing just what is happening throughout the n’naki controlled universe. The reveal that whatever infected the humans causes them to behave violently had me comparing the outbreak to the sort of zombie diseases that appear in stories like Night of the Living Dead. Perhaps something was introduced that altered their behavior. The art in this comic was also fun and reminded me of some of the cartoons I loved as a child, like ThunderCats. Sci-fi fans will enjoy this interesting take on brand new outer space universe.

You can check out the series on 9/24!

Share your thoughts with us in the comments or on Twitter, @thenerdygirlexp. You can find me on Twitter, @kleffnotes, on my blog, kleffnotes.wordpress.com, on my kleffnotes YouTube channel, and I run The Nerdy Girl Express Snapchat, thenerdygirlexp.