The Drone Shepherd: A Planet City Graphic Novel in VR

Set in the speculative future of Planet City, a single city for housing the entire population of earth, The Drone Shepherd is a VR graphic novel built from hundreds of hand-painted illustrations, a cast of voice performances and a new score by acclaimed electronic producer Forest Swords.

As the comic pages unfurl, we are introduced to a former shepherd who is fleeing his dying family farm, ravaged by climate collapse. His long journey begins in the dismantled ruins of the old world, before he arrives at the shores of Planet City. Here, food grows in towering, automated vertical farms bathed in artificial light; glowing algae canals and wildflower blooms snake between the buildings.

Initially assigned to care for the agricultural drones, the Drone Shepherd resents his new life but soon connects with one of the orchard bots he comes to call Echo. When his mentor, a bitter traditionalist, plots to burn the automated farms, the shepherd must choose whether to cling to his past or embrace the Planet City future.

About the Artist

Liam Young is a designer, director and BAFTA nominated producer who operates in the spaces between design, fiction and futures. Described by the BBC as ‘the man designing our futures’, Young's visionary films and speculative worlds are both extraordinary images of tomorrow and urgent examinations of the questions facing us today.

About Planet City

Liam Young’s Planet City is a speculative design project imagining a single, hyper-dense city housing the entire global population. It proposes radical urban consolidation to allow the rest of Earth to rewild and recover from human impact. Through film, architecture, and data-driven storytelling, Young explores themes of sustainability, migration, and future urbanism.

Planet City is not a blueprint but a provocation—an artistic vision that invites reflection on climate change, resource use, and the possibilities of collective living