Nowhere Men is an ongoing (2012-present) Image Comics series, written by Eric Stephenson, colored by Jordie Bellaire, and lettered by Fonografiks. Nate Bellegarde did the art from the series launch until issue 6, after which he was replaced by Dave Taylor. The series picked up acclaim upon its launch, with four Eisner Award nominations in 2014 (including one win), but has seen its schedule stagnate since then.
The series follows a quartet of scientists (highly analogous to a certain musical quartet) named Dade Ellis, Emerson Strange, Simon Grimshaw, and Thomas Walker, who live in a universe where science has all the popularity that pop music does in our world. The four, already the most acclaimed in the world, decide to join forces under the name "World Corp" to further their work; however, various forces split the group apart, leaving World Corp a shell of itself, the four friends bitterly divided, and a lot of the company's stranger projects in a precarious, inadequately attended-to state of limbo.
'Nowhere Men' contains examples of these tropes:
- Addled Addict: Thomas Walker ends up getting removed from World Corp in part due to his drug habits.
- Arc Words: "Science is the new Rock 'n' Roll!"
- Biopic: Emerson apparently got one in-universe titled Strange Reasons, starring Michael Caine and directed by Stanley Kubrick.
- Blood from the Mouth: Raymond Douglas begins doing this after coming in contact with fragments from the space station. Later, it progresses to him coughing up a tooth and some internal flesh.
- Body Horror: What happens to a lot of the space station crew, in particular Kurt becoming some sort of scab-tissue creature and Holly skin dissolving from her bones before she turns entirely to a gas.
- Although less grotesque than those examples, Raymond coughing up a tooth and some lung tissue is still pretty bad.
- Book Ends: Volume 1 opens with a page from the day Simon, Dade, Emerson, and Thomas go public with the idea for World Corp, and closes with a page covering the photoshoot following that conference.
- Diesel Punk: The Science Punks seem to utilize this type of tech.
- Expy: The World Corp founders have a lot of similarities to the Beatles. While there's some overlap, the closest analogues are probably: Emerson-John Lennon, Thomas-George Harrison, Simon-Paul McCartney, and Dade-Ringo Starr.
- Thomas generates a controversy similar to the Beatles' "bigger than Jesus" incident by declaring science "the new rock 'n' roll".
- Four-Temperament Ensemble: The founders of World Corp, as made obvious by their clashing personalities. The "Science Friction" excerpt gives a fairly concise summary of their differences, saying Ellis was driven by "integrity", Simon by "commerce", Emerson by "practicality", and Thomas by "truth"
- Sanguine: Emerson
- Choleric: Thomas
- Melancholic: Simon
- Phlegmatic: Dade
- Hoist by His Own Petard: Simon falls into the basement of the Arctic Facility with the murderous mutated ape that he insisted on creating.
- The Mole: Fletcher is secretly assisting Simon to sabotage World Corp.
- Reclusive Artist: In-universe. Both Thomas and Simon disappear from the public eye almost completely after leaving World Corp.
- Red-Flag Recreation Material: The four members of the eponymous Beatles-esque science team are given profiles in a magazine article at the start of the series, all of which include favourite songs, movies, and books. In Simon Grimshaw's profile, his favourite book is Atlas Shrugged, firmly establishing him as the group's cold-hearted business-minded Token Evil Teammate long before he's revealed to be up to anything overtly villainous.
- Science Hero: More or less everyone in the story, given that it's four world-famous scientists and the people employed at their company.
- Shout-Out: Several, especially to The Beatles:
- The title is a reference to the Beatles' song.
- The excerpted chapter from the behind-the-scenes tell-all on World Corp is titled "It's All Too Much".
- Stanley Kubrick and Michael Caine apparently made a movie about Emerson Strange in this universe.
- Time Skip: The story opens with the four founders about to go public with their new company. After an establishing excerpt of a magazine interview, we then jump forward to years later, when Simon is splitting with the company, then following that scene, several more years pass before the bulk of the story takes place.
