With the Kickstarter campaign soon to launch as of the time of writing, it felt like the right time to check out the fourth issue of Emmanuel Filteau’s Tales from the Interface.

Set in a dystopian, technologically advanced, post-apocalyptic city, social class is determined by how much time citizens spend in a virtual world known as ‘The Interface’. Order is maintained by tentacled beasts known as Robopaxes – and citizens depend upon technology for absolutely everything; even to remind them to breathe.

In this fourth issue, Clara has discovered The Archive, which could hold vital information about the world before the ‘clypse’ (to use the in-story term). Boyfriend Gauthier, however, is seeking to improve their lives without engandering them – by gaining employment at the mysterious Transcervical corporation. They soon find their different approaches to changing their lives clashing – and it seems that things may well end up going badly for one or both of the young couple.

As was the case with the third issue, Filteau’s artwork is incredibly detailed, evoking the work of Geof Darrow; despite this level of detail, the storytelling has a real clarity; there were maybe one or two minor moments where I wasn’t sure what had happened, though in at least one of these the incident was explained clearly a few pages later.

The short, sharp shocks of gore give Tales from the Interface a real edge, though it never feels gratuitous. The citizens either live their lives on the edge or as virtually as possible to escape the horrendous reality of their daily grind.

Having only read the third issue of Tales from the Interface, I never felt lost or as if I was missing anything important; Filteau’s dialogue and storytelling gives enough expository detail that it’s pretty clear what’s going on.

There’s a real punky, anti-authoritarian feel to Tales from the Interface; it wouldn’t feel out of place in comics such as 2000AD.

If you’re a fan of the long running sci-fi anthology comic, you’ll most definitely enjoy Tales from the Interface. There’s a richly detailed world here – and though ‘fun’ may be the wrong word to use when getting to explore it, it’s never less than fascinating.

You can sign up for notification of Tales from the Interface No. 4’s launch on Kickstarter here.

Many thanks to Emmanuel Filteau for providing me with a copy of Tales from the Interface No.4 for review purposes.

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