| The Chimpanzee Complex | |
|---|---|
 The first book in the series, Paradox featuring the main character. | |
| Publication information | |
| Publisher | Dargaud (French) Cinebook (English) |
| Genre | Science fiction |
| No. of issues | 3 (in French) 3 (in English) |
| Creative team | |
| Written by | Richard Marazano |
| Artist(s) | Jean-Michel Ponzio |
The Chimpanzee Complex is a French comics series written by Richard Marazano and illustrated by Jean-Michel Ponzio. It was published by Dargaud in 2007–2011.
In 2035, the Apollo 11 reentry capsule splashes down in the Indian Ocean and is retrieved by the US Navy. The capsule is carrying Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, both claiming to have no knowledge of how they arrived in the future or why history records their successful return to Earth in 1969. The astronaut Helen Freedman, who has been tapped for a crewed mission to Mars, is tasked with verifying the identity of the astronauts. Before NASA and the US military can question the men further, Armstrong and Aldrin die from rapid aging.
Helen accompanies a team of astronauts consisting of Mission Commander Konrad, Aleksa, Alex, and Kurt to the Moon on a mission sponsored by the Department of Defense to investigate the "true" fate of the Apollo 11 mission. On the Moon, Helen, Konrad and Aleksa discover the remains of Armstrong and Aldrin, who inexplicably did not return to Earth, adding to the mystery. Meanwhile, Kurt and Alex encounter another reentry capsule containing the remains of Michael Collins. The astronauts also intercept mysterious radio signals from a lost Soviet crewed mission to Mars. In a subplot, Helen's ten-year-old daughter Sofia Freedman resents her mother's absences and thinks that she is neglecting her.
Continuing their mission to Mars, the American astronauts enter into cryogenic sleep. The shuttle is crewed by fellow astronauts Paul and Mark. The latter perishes during a solar storm while the former is driven insane. The astronauts are briefed by the Department of Defense about a lost Soviet mission to Mars led by cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin, whose death in this story was staged in order to maintained the secrecy of the Martian mission. Landing on Mars, the Americans locate the Soviet base and encounter two surviving members of the Soviet mission named Vladimir and Borislav, who claim that Gagarin went insane and has retreated inside a glacial cave.
Helen encounters the insane Gagarin, who talks about Werner Heisenberg's Uncertainty principle and claims that the lost cosmonauts and astronauts have merged into the universe's consciousness. The American astronauts later discover the remains of Gagarin, leading them to believe that the other cosmonauts killed him. They attempt to subdue and sedate the cosmonauts who fight back and are killed in a gas explosion that consumes the Martian module. The other astronauts do not believe Helen's account that she encountered Gagarin. After months traveling back to Earth, the American astronauts discover that the Earth has seemingly disappeared. Meanwhile, NASA loses contact with the astronauts' shuttle.
In the Sofia subplot, Helen leaves Sofia in the care of her NASA colleague Robert Conway. A resentful Sofia runs away from home before being returned to Robert's care by the authorities. Following Helen and her team's disappearance, Sofia runs away again to the dismay of Robert.
Helen and Aleksa awake after 70 years of cryogenic sleep to discover that fellow astronauts Konrad and Kurt have perished while Alex has disappeared. They find that their shuttle has docked with an abandoned gigantic alien ship. While exploring the alien ship, Helen watches recordings sent by Roger. Reflecting on the Uncertainty principle, Helen comes to believe that the various space missions have disrupted the spacetime continuum. The pair are also attacked by an elderly and deranged Alex, who has spent the past decades cobbling together an escape craft to return to Earth. Determined to return to Earth, Alex attacks Helen and Aleksa but is shot dead by Aleksa. Aleksa's bullet releases poisonous gas. Aleksa sacrifices himself so that Helen can return to Earth and reunite with her daughter.
Due to time dilation, Helen returns to Earth in 2097 where she splashes down in the Arctic Circle. After being picked up by Russian forces, she is questioned by an American official, who informs her that "Helen" had supposedly returned from her mission and died on Earth 30 years ago. Taking pity on Helen, the NASA official arranges for Helen to be given a new identity. While starting a new life in Seminole, Florida Helen learns that her daughter Sofia became the first female astronaut to leave the Solar System, having been inspired by her astronaut mother. While gazing at the stars, Helen hopes to reassure her daughter that she never really left her.
Cinebook Ltd translated into English the series, in the following volumes: [1]
An astronaut is a person trained, equipped, and deployed by a human spaceflight program to serve as a commander or crew member aboard a spacecraft. Although generally reserved for professional space travelers, the term is sometimes applied to anyone who travels into space, including scientists, politicians, journalists, and tourists.
Extravehicular activity (EVA) is any activity done by an astronaut in outer space outside a spacecraft. In the absence of a breathable Earthlike atmosphere, the astronaut is completely reliant on a space suit for environmental support. EVA includes spacewalks and lunar or planetary surface exploration. In a stand-up EVA (SEVA), an astronaut stands through an open hatch but does not fully leave the spacecraft. EVAs have been conducted by the Soviet Union/Russia, the United States, Canada, the European Space Agency and China.
Human spaceflight is spaceflight with a crew or passengers aboard a spacecraft, often with the spacecraft being operated directly by the onboard human crew. Spacecraft can also be remotely operated from ground stations on Earth, or autonomously, without any direct human involvement. People trained for spaceflight are called astronauts, cosmonauts (Russian), or taikonauts (Chinese); and non-professionals are referred to as spaceflight participants or spacefarers.
Vostok 1 was the first spaceflight of the Vostok programme and the first human orbital spaceflight in history. The Vostok 3KA space capsule was launched from Baikonur Cosmodrome on April 12, 1961, with Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin aboard, making him the first human to reach orbital velocity around the Earth and to complete a full orbit around the Earth.
Buzz Aldrin is an American former astronaut, engineer and fighter pilot. He made three spacewalks as pilot of the 1966 Gemini 12 mission. He was the Lunar Module Eagle pilot on the 1969 Apollo 11 mission and became the second person to walk on the Moon after mission commander Neil Armstrong.
Vladimir Mikhaylovich Komarov was a Soviet test pilot, aerospace engineer, and cosmonaut. In October 1964, he commanded Voskhod 1, the first spaceflight to carry more than one crew member. He became the first Soviet cosmonaut to fly in space twice when he was selected as the solo pilot of Soyuz 1, its first crewed test flight. A parachute failure caused his Soyuz capsule to crash into the ground after re-entry on 24 April 1967, making him the first human to die in a space flight.
The Space Race was a 20th-century competition between two Cold War rivals, the United States and the Soviet Union, to achieve superior spaceflight capability. It had its origins in the ballistic missile-based nuclear arms race between the two nations following World War II and had its peak with the more particular Moon Race to land on the Moon between the US moonshot and Soviet moonshot programs. The technological advantage demonstrated by spaceflight achievement was seen as necessary for national security and became part of the symbolism and ideology of the time. The Space Race brought pioneering launches of artificial satellites, robotic space probes to the Moon, Venus, and Mars, and human spaceflight in low Earth orbit and ultimately to the Moon.
Vostok 2 was a Soviet space mission which carried cosmonaut Gherman Titov into orbit for a full day on August 6, 1961, to study the effects of a more prolonged period of weightlessness on the human body. Titov orbited the Earth over 17 times, exceeding the single orbit of Yuri Gagarin on Vostok 1 − as well as the suborbital spaceflights of American astronauts Alan Shepard and Gus Grissom aboard their respective Mercury-Redstone 3 and 4 missions. Titov's number of orbits and flight time would not be surpassed by an American astronaut until Gordon Cooper's Mercury-Atlas 9 spaceflight in May 1963.
Yuri Ivanovich Malenchenko is a retired Russian cosmonaut. Malenchenko became the first person to marry in space, on 10 August 2003, when he married Ekaterina Dmitrieva, who was in Texas, while he was 240 miles (390 km) over New Zealand, on the International Space Station. As of June 2016, Malenchenko ranks second for career time in space due to his time on both Mir and the International Space Station (ISS). He is a former commander of the International Space Station.
A space capsule is a spacecraft designed to transport cargo, scientific experiments, and/or astronauts to and from space. Capsules are distinguished from other spacecraft by the ability to survive reentry and return a payload to the Earth's surface from orbit, and are distinguished from other types of recoverable spacecraft by their blunt shape, not having wings and often containing little fuel other than what is necessary for a safe return. Capsule-based crewed spacecraft such as Soyuz or Orion are often supported by a service or adapter module, and sometimes augmented with an extra module for extended space operations. Capsules make up the majority of crewed spacecraft designs, although one crewed spaceplane, the Space Shuttle, has flown in orbit.
Oleg Valeriyevich Kotov was born on 27 October 1965 in Simferopol, Crimean oblast in the Ukrainian SSR. After a career as a physician assigned to the Soviet space program, he joined the Russian cosmonaut corps. He has flown three long duration spaceflights on the International Space Station logging over 526 days in space. Most recently, Kotov flew on the Soyuz TMA-10M/Expedition 37/Expedition 38 long duration spaceflight, from September 2013 until March 2014.
A mission patch is a cloth reproduction of a spaceflight mission emblem worn by astronauts and other personnel affiliated with that mission. It is usually executed as an embroidered patch. The term space patch is mostly applied to an emblem designed for a crewed space mission. Traditionally, the patch is worn on the space suit that astronauts and cosmonauts wear when launched into space. Mission patches have been adopted by the crew and personnel of many other space ventures, public and private.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to space exploration.
Astronauts and cosmonauts, and spaceflight participants have observed their religions while in space; sometimes publicly, sometimes privately. Religious adherence in outer space poses unique challenges and opportunities for practitioners. Space travelers have reported profound changes in the way they view their faith related to the overview effect, while some secular groups have criticized the use of government spacecraft for religious activities by astronauts.
With the advent of robotic and human spaceflight a new era of American history had presented itself. Keeping with the tradition of honoring the country's history on U.S. postage stamps, the U.S. Post Office began commemorating the various events with its commemorative postage stamp issues. The first U.S. Postage issue to depict a U.S. space vehicle was issued in 1948, the Fort Bliss issue. The first issue to commemorate a space project by name was the ECHO I communications satellite commemorative issue of 1960. Next was the Project Mercury issue of 1962. As U.S. space exploration progressed a variety of other commemorative issues followed, many of which bear accurate depictions of satellites, space capsules, Apollo Lunar Modules, space suits, and other items of interest.
Women have flown and worked in outer space since almost the beginning of human spaceflight. A considerable number of women from a range of countries have worked in space, though overall women are still significantly less often chosen to go to space than men, and by June, 2020 constitute only 12% of all astronauts who have been to space. Yet, the proportion of women among space travelers is increasing substantially over time.
The Starmus International Festival is an international gathering focused on celebrating astronomy, space exploration, music, art, and sciences such as biology and chemistry. It was founded by Garik Israelian, an astronomer at the Institute for Astrophysics in Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain and Brian May of the rock band Queen.
The International Lunar Resources Exploration Concept (ILREC) was a proposed mission architecture under President George H. W. Bush's Space Exploration Initiative (SEI) by Kent Joosten, an engineer at Johnson Space Center. The plan would have used the help of international partners, mainly the Soviet Union, to assemble a lunar base and sustainable lunar transportation service.