The main setting is the 28th century, when Earth is a utopia, space and time travel are just a fact of life, and most of the inhabitants spend their time on leisure activities, not work. The long running series of Valerian and Laureline bande-dessinees are the perfect hybrid of time-travel science fiction and space opera, with some stories following the dashing pair of spatio-temporal agents to different planets, and others to different eras. Valerian and Laureline (Dargaud 1967-2010) In chronological order, here are the top ten best space opera comics that you should check out.ġ0.

Vaughan, Fiona Staples, Dave Gibbons, Alejandro Jodorowsky, Moebius, Jim Starlin, and of course, the King of Comics himself, Jack Kirby. Some of them take place in the shared Marvel and DC Universes, and others have inspired current or future films, but they are all original visions of war, the future, heroism, and cool stuff blowing up brought to life on the comic book page by some of fiction’s greatest creative minds, including Brian K. Decades after the original Star Wars trilogy wrapped, its spirit of adventure survived in the Expanded Universe Dark Horse comics, a sort of homage to the movie’s debt to Flash Gordon as well as other comic books, like the bande dessinee Valerian and Laureline, and the future technology and machines found in the artwork of Jack Kirby.Įven though there are some great ( and not so great) comics based on sci-fi franchises, like Star Wars, Serenity, Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, all the comics on this list aren’t based on pre-existing media, however.

This compelled him to make his original space opera, Star Wars, and the rest is movie and merchandising history. George Lucas himself wanted to make an adaptation of Alex Raymond’s comic strip Flash Gordon as his second feature film after THX-1138, but legendary Italian director Frederico Fellini had the rights. Before advances in visual effects, comic books and strips were arguably the best places to experience epic stories of swashbuckling heroes, princesses, and extraterrestrials in galaxies far, far away. With a “special effects budget” that is only dependent on the imagination of the writer, artist, and colorist, comics are the perfect medium for space opera.

Space opera novels