AudioComics is excited to announce its has launched a new Kickstarter campaign to help fund UTOPIATES, its latest full-cast audio production. Based on the award-winning graphic novel by Josh Finney (Titanium Rain, Star Trek: Enterprise) and Kat Rocha (Giant-Sized Batman #1), the production will star Denise Poirier, the voice and soul of MTV’s Æon Flux.
Poirier will voice the Prophet, a shadowy figure who deals in the most illicit of bio-engineered drugs in a futuristic Los Angeles. “I’m so thrilled about this,” says Poirier. “I can already see how I’m going to be able to slip into her skin.” According to author Josh Finney, “It’s Denise’s character who ties the narrative together. She’s a force of nature. When the Prophet enters the scene, people’s lives change forever.”
A merging of the words utopia and opiate, UTOPIATES follows the lives of four individuals whose paths intersect by way of the drug. The drug’s appeal is that it allows uers to inject the memories, dreams, and most importantly, the personalities, of others. Every user has his own reasons for seeking this chemical escape, but all learn the high price of “soul swapping.”
The UTOPIATES will be a full-cast production, voiced by veteran actors, with state-of-the-art sound effects and an original score by BBC soundtrack composer, Jonathan Sharp. Also featured will be choice songs from bands Bio-Tek, New Mind and Slingshot Venus. Helming the project is Audie Award-winning director Bill Dufris. “Our aim is to bring the art form of radio drama into the 21st Century,” says Dufris. “Just like our prior success with Titanium Rain, this will not be another classic radio play of old. Utopiates will have the same immersive depth, effects and intensity we’ve come to expect from a high-budget film.”
If AudioComics meets all its Kickstarter goals, UTOPIATES will be a two-disc set. The first disc will be an adaptation of Finney & Rocha’s graphic novel. The second will offer three new stories set in the UTOPIATES universe; one scripted by Finney, one by an author to be announced, and the third by sci-fi legend John Shirley. Screenwriter of the The Crow, starring the late Brandon Lee, and one of the godfathers of cyberpunk, elements of Shirley’s novels have found their way into properties such as Dark Angel, Max Headroom, and most notably, The Matrix Trilogy.
About Utopiates: An unflinching portrayal of human behavior at its most extreme. In the near future, science is able to distill human personalities into a drug called Utopiates that allows users to swap personalities with the “mental imprints” of others. The 120-page Utopiates graphic novel follows the interconnected lives of three individuals. Each is a user for his own reasons, but all learn that the cost of soul swapping is extremely high.
About AudioComics: Under the guidance of producers Lance Roger Axt, William Dufris, and Elaine Lee, AudioComics provides superior audio entertainment with professional full-cast audio productions from the world of graphic novels, speculative lit, and related media. Past and forthcoming productions include Jamal Igle’s Molly Danger, Thomas Jane’s Bad Planet, Starstruck by Elaine Lee and Michael Kaluta, and Josh Finney’s Titanium Rain, which was nominated for two Audie Awards from the Audiobook Publishers Association, received the Silver Mark Time Award, and AudioFile Magazine’s Earphones Award.
