The following is a list of characters from Brian K. Vaughan and Fiona Staples' epic space opera/fantasy comic book series Saga, which debuted in 2012 by Image Comics. It depicts a husband and wife from long-warring extraterrestrial races, Alana and Marko, fleeing authorities from both sides of a galactic war as they struggle to care for their newborn daughter, Hazel, who occasionally narrates the series.Zalben, Alex (March 5, 2012). "The 'Saga' Of Brian K. Vaughan: How He Went From Runaway Kids To Epic Fantasy" . MTV Geek."AICN COMICS REVIEWS: Brian K. Vaughan's SAGA! FAIREST! UNCANNY X-MEN! AKA! & MORE!!!". Ain't it Cool News. March 14, 2012.Richards, Ron (January 30, 2012). "ADVANCE REVIEW: SAGA #1 (Spoiler Free)". iFanboy. In the series (and herein), each issue is referred to as a Chapter, and each story arc, which consists of usually six Chapters, is referred to as a Volume.
The family and its allies Alana First appearance: Chapter 1
The female lead of the series. She is Marko's wife, and mother to Hazel.Arrant, Chris (April 15, 2013). "Comic Book Casting: SAGA Live-Action Movie". iFanboy. Her father is Rustik, her mother has not been named, and her stepmother is her best friend from childhood, Even.
Alana is a native of the technologically advanced Landfall, the largest planet in the galaxy, whose people have wings that give them the power of flight.Vinciquarra, Christine Marie (May 23, 2014). "New Saga Reader Gets Onboard – Savoring The Magic Of Volume One". Bleeding Cool. Unlike other Landfallians, Alana believed her wings were vestigial and nonfunctional, until discovering otherwise in issue #18. Landfallians speak a tongue called Language.
Alana is an only child. Her stepmother, Even, is a young woman that Alana knew since they met at a summer camp. Even met Alana's father long after she was out of high school, and after Alana's parents had legally separated. Even says that Alana took the wedding "Great, all things considered," and that Alana had been going through "some hard stuff at that age", but one of the couple's wedding photos shows Alana scowling at the newlyweds, and she joined the armed forces a few months after Even moved in, and never set foot again on Landfall. (Note: Chapter 1 previously indicated that she was drafted after flunking out of state college, while the revised circumstances of her joining the military are from issue 14.)
All of Alana's uncles were slaughtered by Wreathers at Southmoor. After joining her planet's war against the Wreathers, she was subsequently reprimanded for "abject cowardice" following her first experience in battle, which occurred when as a Private first class, she was stationed as a tank gunner and bombardier on the planet Mota. Though she had previously distinguished herself at Wettingham, her commanding officer, Countess Robot X, ordered her to destroy a bridge to prevent it from being used by Wreath troops to access an island where a Landfallian platoon was trapped. Alana initially refused because the bridge was filled with civilians. When pressed by the Countess, who pointed out that any military-age civilian not actively resisting Wreathers was a "clean target", Alana complied, sending a hundred vehicles into the water below, but was nonetheless punished by the Countess for her hesitancy by being redeployed to the planet Cleave, where as a prison guard she met Marko. While in captivity, Alana read to Marko A Night Time Smoke by D. Oswald Heist, a romance novel about a man made of rock and a rich quarry owner's daughter, which Alana stated was the best book she ever read, and which altered her outlook on life. The Brio Talent Agency first appears in issue #2, but is not named until issue #8. When Alana learned that Marko was to be transferred to Blacksite, a prison from which detainees never return, she freed him from his shackles so that he could escape, just twelve hours after having met him. She later married him, and gave birth to their daughter, Hazel, which occurs in the opening scene of the premiere issue.
An only child, Alana dismisses emphasis on the family as a justification for a given course of action, calling it the "rallying cry of losers", explaining that her father sacrificed his life by working a job he hated in order to support his family, even though she believes it also made him abusive toward her and her mother during the few times he was present in their lives, including physical abuse he used to inflict on her mother. Despite this, she has found herself employing this rationale herself when protecting Hazel.
In volume 4, after the family has settled on Gardenia, Alana pursues a career in acting, joining the underground program Open Circuit, in which all the players wear masks and voice changers. Her stint in this occupation ends when Dengo kidnaps her and her family, after which the character she played, Zipless, was recast with another actress. Over the years, Hazel will have seen some of her episodes. In volume 5, she, Hazel, and Klara are captured by the robot Dengo. Three months later, she reunited with Marko, though Hazel is taken to a Coalition juvenile detention facility for Wreath children. By the end of Volume 6, she and Marko have rescued Hazel, and learn that Alana is pregnant with her second child.
Although skin color is not a part of racial ethnicity that is explicitly addressed within the books' dialogue, writer Brian K. Vaughan and artist Fiona Staples have indicated that both Alana and Marko are people of color, and Staples designed Alana with darker skin. She envisioned her to be biracial, and her father as an Indian man.
Marko First appearance: Chapter 1 Killed in: Chapter 54
The male lead of the series, Alana's husband, Hazel's father, and son of Barr and Klara.
Marko grew up on Landfall's moon, Wreath, whose people have horns or antlers and can wield magic. Wreathers speak a tongue called Blue, rendered as blue text. Like Alana, he is an only child. By the time he was born, the front lines in the Landfall-Wreath War had already been moved to distant proxy wars, waged mostly by unlucky draftees or conscripts from other worlds. Despite the endless conflict, Hazel says that her father's childhood was "by all accounts, a pretty decent life." Marko's first memory is of the day when, as a boy, his parents took him to the site of the final battle fought on Wreath. Using a spell that required Klara to cut the palm of her hand and spill her blood on the land, they showed Marko images of that battle, as the moon's soil still remembered the massacre that happened that day. Barr and Klara said nothing, but their point was clear: Never forget the countless heroic Wreathers who sacrificed so much. From that moment, Marko was infused with hatred of the wings.Sava, Oliver (November 16, 2012). "Saga #7 and the year of Image Comics". The A.V. Club.
When he was a child, Marko had a pet dog named Rumfer. During a seminal episode when he was seven years old, he caught the daughter of one of his neighbors practicing fire spells on Rumfer. He saw that she badly burned Rumfer's tail, and caused Rumfer to let out yelps of pain. Watching her casually hurt another living thing, especially a smaller, defenseless animal, Marko reacted by beating her so badly that she attained a black eye and a bloody nose. When the girl's mother angrily presented the girl to Marko's father, Barr apologized to the girl. And after she and her mother left their home, Barr stripped off Marko's shirt and whipped him badly with his belt, during which a tearful Marko thanked his father repeatedly. Years later, Marko called this the worst day of his life, and regards as the worst part of the experience the look on Barr's face when he saw what his son had done. As Marko described Barr as "the sweetest, gentlest man who's ever lived", his disappointment in Marko hurt Marko more than any physical suffering Marko had ever experienced. As a result, Marko feels a strong aversion to any sort of violence against women, even the mild play-slapping of the buttocks during sex, and is overcome with guilt at having thrown a bag of groceries at Alana after finding out that she was taking the hallucinogenic drug Fadeaway. Rumfer later died after being hit by his school bus when Marko was twelve.
Marko and his first fiancée, Gwendolyn, got engaged when they were in what the Landfallians would call high school, and planned to marry after Marko got back from the war, in which he would serve as a foot soldier in his people's war against the Coalition of Landfall. When Marko left Wreath, he was still a "gung-ho kid who just wanted to do [his] moon proud and kick some ass." This all changed the first time he saw battle. When he tried to share these misgivings with Gwen, she replied in her letters to him by merely encouraging him to "fight the good fight". As Marko found himself maturing with the development of a new outlook, he tried to share these ideas with Gwendolyn, and realized from her unsympathetic and jingoistic responses that she was "frozen in place", and that they had drifted apart so much that continuing their relationship would never work. Alana did not learn of Gwen until Marko was delirious following his being wounded on Cleave as they attempted to make their way to the Rocketship Forest.
Marko surrendered to Coalition forces as a "conscientious objector" 18 months before the beginning of the series. He was a prisoner of war on the planet Cleave, where he was Prisoner 9763572, and one of his guards was Alana. After Marko and Alana escaped together, married and bore Hazel, Wreath High Command sent The Will after Marko because Marko "renounced his oath and betrayed The Narrative" by fraternizing with an enemy combatant. Marko felt he was insecure, angry and selfish before he met Alana. At first Marko "annoyed the shit out of" Alana, as she found him to be "a self-righteous ass", did not think he knew how to sit still, and was put off by his tendency to laugh at his own jokes. Alana and Marko's wedding rings belonged to Gwendolyn's grandparents, who spoke two different dialects of Wreath's native tongue, and had their rings enchanted with a translator spell. The rings work for all persons who are in the vicinity of those wearing them, though the exact range has not been specified.
In Volume Four, Marko takes his father's name, Barr, as an alias, when the family settles down on Gardenia. After Dengo takes their families hostage (a "split up" that Hazel first alludes to her parents having suffered in Chapter 19), Marko teams with Prince Robot IV, Yuma and Ghüs, to find them. In Volume Five, while pursuing his family, Marko, despite his anger at Alana for taking Fadeaway, and at Yuma for having given it to her, tries some himself, after Yuma tells him that she believes that Alana was drawn to try Fadeaway because she wanted peace. Despite the disagreeable nature of the ensuing overdose, Marko later says, that for the first time in a long time, he feels like he understands both Alana and himself, and his resolve to find his family and kill Dengo is strengthened. Despite this, it would be years before he would see Hazel again.
Though he is a pacifist who vows upon the birth of Hazel to never again to use his sword, and dislikes the practice of owning firearms, he does so nonetheless when his family is threatened, and is so skilled with a sword that he can dispatch an entire squad of armed enemy soldiers, for which he is referred to by Prince Robot IV as a "force of nature". Marko is a vegetarian. On the subject of dancing, Marko has stated that he had such bad coordination that he once broke a staff sergeant's toe trying to march in formation.