“We need some sort of framework to say what is okay and what is not okay — and we need to revisit this when the technology changes..”

The more we read, the clearer it gets — it’s just another AI-pocalypse in the making. First its replacing the means of production, then its hallucinations no one can explain. People keep saying we’ll get it under control… but we all know how that story ends. Inevitably the giant machines show up, humanity freaks out, and Judgment Day arrives — right on schedule.

But what about what comes after? The silence, the guilt, the unfinished reparations. That’s the world of DESCENDER, Jeff Lemire and Dustin Nguyen’s haunting watercolor sci-fi graphic novel epic about creation, empathy, and fear — and its sequel ASCENDER, where the age of machines gives way to something older, stranger, and far more magical. Longtime FrieMMds of the Pod Paresh and Jieun — two bastions of humanity (and comics nerdery) — rejoin to unpack this meditation on the robot apocalypse and magical redemption of love, loss, and what it really means to be human. Also we solve the current AI problem. You’re welcome.

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