Ender’s Shadow: Battle School #1 delivers where the Ender’s Game comic failed.  It allows someone new to the property to pick up the comic and actually understand what is going on and form a relationship with the characters.  While you do not need to go buy this comic right now, I would definitely recommend picking it up at some point, especially if you are a fan of the novel.

To get everyone up to speed, in October Marvel began running a five issue mini-series based on Orson Scott Card’s epic science fiction novel Ender’s Game. For anyone who has not read Ender’s Game, stop reading this review right now and go buy a copy and read it.  It is the story of one gifted child and a struggle to save the human race from alien invaders.  Ender’s Shadow is a parallel novel following another child named Bean.  While Bean is not recognized as such in Ender’s Game, in the parallel novel we learn that he is the one child smarter than Ender.

This month, Marvel released the first in a five part mini-series adaptation of Ender’s Shadow.  The comic manages to stay faithful to the original comic, while allowing new readers to pick it up and enjoy this amazing story.  Written by Mike Carey, the first issue follows Bean from his time on the streets as a malnourished child until it is discovered that he is a complete genius.  However, the first issue does not end with him in Battle School.  Based on the novel, that should happen in the middle or end of issue 2.

Overall, I was extremely pleased with this comic.  The art was gritty and a little dirty, not unlike Bean’s home on the streets of Rotterdam.  Bean was drawn almost exactly the way I had pictured him from the book.  That being said, if you are not already an Orson Scott Card fan, I would probably wait for the trade for this min-series.  I think something like this is more enjoyable when you can read it in one or two sittings, instead of over a five month period.

On a somewhat related note, I almost fell of my chair when I was reading the credits to this book.  Under “Special Thanks” it lists “Ralph Macchio.”  Don’t get your hopes up though.  It seems the Karate Kid had nothing to do with this comic.  Instead, there is another Ralph Macchio who is a long-time writer and editor at Marvel comics.

Anyone who’s delved much into the world of film production probably also knows that Ender’s Game has been in the process of being adapted into a movie for years and years now. Most recently I really thought it was going to happen because acclaimed director Wolfgang Peterson (Das Boot, The Perfect Storm, Air Force One) had been attached to the project for a while. I really thought he might do a decent job with a screenplay that’s (still) being written by Orson Scott Card himself.

Well, it’s now being reported that Peterson is no longer attached to Ender’s Game and the film is, once again, without a director. The film was originally slated to be released this year, if you can believe it. The producers are now in the hunt for a new director and are hoping to begin shooting by early 2009. The film, however, will require an extended pre-production due to the many visual effects expected (if you’ve read the book, you’ll know why) so that date isn’t even certain.

For those of you who haven’t read the book, this is the description from the jacket:

In order to develop a secure defense against a hostile alien race’s next attack, government agencies breed child geniuses and train them as soldiers. A brilliant young boy, Andrew “Ender� Wiggin lives with his kind but distant parents, his sadistic brother Peter, and the person he loves more than anyone else, his sister Valentine. Peter and Valentine were candidates for the soldier-training program but didn’t make the cut�young Ender is the Wiggin drafted to the orbiting Battle School for rigorous military training.

Ender’s skills make him a leader in school and respected in the Battle Room, where children play at mock battles in zero gravity. Yet growing up in an artificial community of young soldiers Ender suffers greatly from isolation, rivalry from his peers, pressure from the adult teachers, and an unsettling fear of the alien invaders. His psychological battles include loneliness, fear that he is becoming like the cruel brother he remembers, and fanning the flames of devotion to his beloved sister.

Is Ender the general Earth needs? But Ender is not the only result of the genetic experiments. The war with the Buggers has been raging for a hundred years, and the quest for the perfect general has been underway for almost as long. Ender’s two older siblings are every bit as unusual as he is, but in very different ways. Between the three of them lie the abilities to remake a world. If, that is, the world survives.

Sadly, all we can do now is continue to wait and hope that they don’t screw this one up like so many other movies and book adaptations in the past. Since they don’t have a director at the moment and the film has already been in production so long, might I suggest a couple of names?

• Alfonso Cuarón – He’s pretty busy, but worth waiting for. He proved he can take on sci-fi with Children of Men while Harry Potter showed that he can definitely handle children. Would give the production some serious legitimacy.
• Guillermo del Toro – I know he’s going to be pretty busy with the Hobbit films, but his track record in the sci-fi/fantasy world speaks for itself (Blade II, Hellboy I and II) and I hear he got a great performance out of his child actor in Pan’s Labyrinth.
• Steven Spielberg – Hey, as long as we’re making a wish list. No one right now does sci-fi better than Spielberg and his track record with children speaks for itself. The only downside is you don’t know if the movie will be a popcorn flick or a serious sci-fi piece.

How many of you have read this book? Who would you like to see direct this movie if you had your dream director on it?