Mad Max: Fury Road sure didn’t waste a whole lot of time on explanations, but that doesn’t mean you can’t get answers if you want them.
An ongoing comic book series set before the events of the movie is filling in some of that backstory. The first issue explored the background of Nux and Immortan Joe, while the next one (on sale in about two weeks), will explain how Furiosa became Joe’s most trusted warrior.
Vertigo has now revealed the covers and synopses for the third and fourth issues in the series, issues focusing on the titular Max.
What will we learn from them?
The first issue sees Max visiting Gastown, a location only glimpsed in the film. He’s on the hunt for the last part he needs to rebuild his iconic V8 Interceptor (aka the Pursuit Special), which was destroyed in Mad Max 2. Unfortunately for him, that final piece is the incredibly rare and valuable Boss 351 engine, leading him to compete in something called the “Thunderdome Plus.” If you saw the third movie, I think you know where that’s going.
The second issue is the more intriguing story though. According to the official synopsis, Max has finished building his V8 Interceptor, only to have it stolen by the Buzzards (the Russian tribe with the spiky cars). To get it back, he heads into the “sunken city.”
Here’s where it gets interesting. The synopsis adds, “But the stakes are much higher than the fate of Max’s ride—an innocent girl, Glory, has also been kidnapped by the depraved Buzzards. By the time Max arrives, it may already be too late…”
Could this Glory be the little girl we see in those hallucinations in Fury Road? When the movie came out, a lot of fans (us included) wondered if George Miller had retconned Max’s kid from a son to a daughter, but this comic presents a much more likely scenario. We’ll know for sure when the comic is out of course, but it sure seems like the two characters are the same.
When is it out?
Mad Max: Fury Road – Mad Max (what a title) issue #1 will be out on July 8, while issue #2 will be available on August 26. In the meantime, you can grab Furiosa #1 on June 17.
I just finished watching Fury Road, and Google Search led me here….I watched all the “first” three originals in the theatre and know a great deal about the Mad Max movies. Over a course of almost 35 years, I have watched these movies over and over again…and it was told very clearly in all three that the cause of World War III was fighting over the oil reserves that were quickly dissipating. It was apparent that there was an all out nuclear weapon exchange among the countries that started created the Wastelands. It was the enormous amount of radiation that caused birth defects, gross mutations, cancer and leukemia which is credited for causing all the strange mutations in most of the characters in the Mad Max movies. This would also go,”hand in hand” with Fury Road where most of the characters are grossly mutated, large cancerous tumors, leukemia sickness, dwarfism, missing limbs, and other birth defects. The only difference in this movie is that Immorten Joe is actually looking for a “cure” for all the sickness, the reason for the blood transfusions. I don’t really know what story the comics will be telling in what caused the wastelands and sickness, but in the movies it was clear that it was a nuclear war that caused the wastelands and the downfall of civilization. We also know from Mad Max 2 Road Warrior, that the survivors of that movie set off to the coast in hoping to find civilization or survivors. I also know,that Max did give the feral boy a music box, and then we see that music box again in Fury Road…so I’m thinking the “green place” could be the “survivors” from the second movie, and maybe they tried to start a civilization, but the wastelands soon tookover, and the older women are left, but then again, if this part is true, someone would recognize the “Road Warrior” and none of them do. In “Thunderdome” the surviving children and plane pilot (gyro copter pilot from road warrior) end up starting civilization in the ruins of London, I assume, and we know all cities were destroyed by nuclear bombs, and the end of that movie, the children were grown, had families of their own, and was rebuilding the city, and keeping it lite…in hopes that the Road Warrior would find his way home to them. Since they actually went back to a city, I don’t think they would be the “green place”….but they may have found a way to link up to,the satillite in hopes of finding other survivors, which one day, may lead to them finding the Citadel. I just hope the comics will keep this of the part of the story straight….that nuclear weapons were used in trying to take over the remaining supply of oil, and it was radiation and nuclear fallout that caused the wastelands!