Creator-owned · IDW Publishing
The Kill Lock
Written, drawn and created by Livio Ramondelli. Four robots bound by a single sentence — if one dies, they all do.
Created, written and illustrated by Livio Ramondelli, The Kill Lock is an original comic book series published by IDW Publishing.
Excerpts from SYFY Wire article and interview:
“I began this series with a premise of what would it be like to have your life depend on protecting and being protected by your least favorite people you’ve ever met? What kind of situation could get a psychopath to protect an innocent kid? Or for a moral soldier to find himself in the company of those he would formerly have been responsible for protecting society from? The Kill Lock is a story of four robots from very different classes of society (a guilt-stricken Soldier, an addict Laborer, a psychotic Engineer and an innocent Kid) being sentenced to a lethal punishment where if one of them dies, they all do.”
The series
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Issue 1 December 2019
Each found guilty of an irredeemable crime, four robots find themselves banished from their home world and bound together by the Kill Lock — a programming link that means if one of them dies, they all will. Now a soldier, an addict, a murderer, and a child find themselves forced to protect each other while in search of a cure to survive.
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Issue 2 January 2020
Bonded by their Kill Lock, four robots search for a cure — a way to live, and die, independently. Their only clue is a bot known as The Axial, supposed to be a creator of the Lock and keeper of its secrets. Of course, the first thing they have to do is find her… without getting themselves killed!
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Issue 3 February 2020
Continuing their search for a cure by seeking out one of the Kill Lock’s creators, the bots bound by it find themselves on a world that was decimated by one of their own. Meanwhile, the group’s most dangerous member, the Artisan, decides it’s time he takes over the education of their youngest, the Kid.
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Issue 4 March 2020
The Linked believe they have found the World of the Cure — the one place the Kill Lock can be lifted. Whether the journey ends in salvation or in their undoing is another matter entirely.
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Issue 5 June 2020
Run down. Beat up. On their last legs. The Linked know that this is their final chance to find a cure for The Kill Lock. Face-to-face with the last hope for salvation, will it be relief or pain? If one dies… they all do.
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Issue 6 2020
The Kill Lock works. An individual, or a pair, you may be able to hide and survive. Four cannot. When the Artisan, the Kid, the Wraith, and the Laborer reach the end of their journey, doom seems certain, unless… If one dies… they all do.
Collected edition
The Kill Lock
All six issues in one volume. 176 pages, IDW Publishing, October 2020. Followed by a sequel series, The Kill Lock: The Artisan Wraith.
Interviews about the series