Cobalt 60 (comic)

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Cobalt 60 is the title of a comics series created by the late underground cartoonist Vaughn Bodé.

[edit] Description

Cobalt 60 takes place in a post-apocalyptic, Mad Max-like world inhabited by mutants, aliens and other fantastic creatures. Its titular character embarks on a quest to avenge the death of his parents, murdered by the evil Strontium 90. After he succeeds in his quest, he inherits his father's kingdom, but prefers to return to his wild ways.

Cobalt 60 carries with him a high caliber carbine sniper rifle, a short revolver and a trench knife. Cobalt 60 is very violent and quite graphic in its action scenes.

Cobalt 60's enemies are called Radio-men. They are technically advanced and carry superior firepower, but lack the brutal skills for hand to hand combat. They instead rely upon larger mutants called Lopers.

[edit] History

Vaughn Bodé reputedly first drew the character Cobalt 60 on a piece of scratch paper in 1959. He later took that sketch and expanded it into an actual character in 1968, doing 10 pages in black and white for Witzend. These 10 pages do not expound much on the character, instead concentrating on action and a thorough demonstration of the world the character lives in. Bodé also created a cast of characters with whom he could populate a more involved story, but never got the chance to use them. Despite winning the 1969 Hugo Award for Best Fanzine Artist, largely on the strength of Cobalt 60, he never did anything else with the character. His son Mark Bodé reports that the project made him too depressed. Among the characters he conceived of, but never used, were Strontium 90, Franklin Gothic Green, General History, and Cordwainer Bigeye. The original Cobalt 60 short story was republished in the French magazine Metal Hurlant in 1980.

Along with Bodé's other art, Cobalt 60 strongly influenced Ralph Bakshi's 1977 animated film Wizards. In particular, the character Peace appeared to be modeled on Cobalt 60.

In 1984 Cobalt 60 was revived using full-color art by Vaughn's son Mark Bodé and a story plotted by Larry Todd. Although the story included all of the original elements envisioned by Vaughn Bodé, according to his son the finished product was more "light-hearted" than what he felt his father would have done with the same characters. The Mark Bodé and Larry Todd Cobalt 60 stories were serialized in the magazine Epic Illustrated starting with the December 1984 issue. The episodes were later gathered in four magazine-sized comics published in 1992 by Tundra Press. Donner Comics also published a 1988 Cobalt 60 book collection. Some additional Cobalt 60 stories episodes appeared in Heavy Metal during the 1990s.

[edit] Film adaptation

On October 25, 2006, The Hollywood Reporter announced that Universal Pictures had acquired the rights to adapt Cobalt 60 into a film with director Zack Snyder (300) attached to the project. The director and Debbie Snyder will also produce the film. A search for a writer is underway.[1]