We know it’s a sandworm.
With the reveal of Issue 15’s cover yesterday, we saw a lot of comments regarding the sandworm. Nothing negative or mean (that we saw, though I’m sure it’s out there somewhere) but many remarks talking about its resemblance to shai-hulud from Dune. Of course we put a sandworm on the desert planet. You don’t tease a desert planet for four chapters and then not put a sandworm in the fifth and final chapter. Sandworms are badass and we wanted one of our own. If Beetlejuice can have sandworms, so can we. Of course we were inspired by Dune, but this sandworm doesn’t produce magic space dust as part of its life cycle because that would be too inspired by Dune. And if you’ve been reading the tale of the desert dwellers between Issues, you know the name of our sandworm already.
Honestly, I couldn’t be happier with all the comments we got about the sandworm. I get happy whenever anyone throws Dune references at me. But it wasn’t only shai-hulud and spice jokes! There was some love shown to Mass Effect with thresher maw comments, and even one graboid reference to show some love to Tremors! Giant worms, whether they live in deserts or underground or on wholly alien environments, are as much a part of our collective mythology as dragons and elves. They’re a staple of hostile settings and they’re awesome. Rattling off names of all the cool giant worms when you see ours reinforces our shared love of these monsters.
As much as I’m inspired by Dune and love shai-hulud, the sandworm was Garth’s idea. As we were wrapping up The Search for Black Hole Bill, we began to discuss our plans for the next storyline. Garth said to me, “Whatever we end up doing, I want Star Power to fight a sandworm. It’s an image that’s been living in my head and I need to get it out!” I jumped at the opportunity for us to have our own sandworm. One big ancient apex predator of the deep desert on a distant alien world. Did I mention I love working with Garth?
You’ll get to see more of this monstrosity as we delve deep into Issue 15, the extra-long finale to The Mystery of the Zel Gux Dynasty. We hope you enjoy it.