I am by no means a person who says that Grant Morrison can do no wrong. I don’t even think his entire Animal Man run reaches the “brilliant” level. The first five issues, yes, were unlike anything that came before. And the eight issues I am reviewing today: Revolutionary. But in the middle act, it did lag a little bit.
But today I am here to praise Grant’s Animal Man, not bury it. And you kind of need to read all 26 issues to get the full impact of this last arc.
At the risk of “spoiling” this story, I’m going to write about a few details. But not enough to give the whole thing away. Still, if my word is enough to get you to go buy this then stop reading now.
Ahem.
Now that we’re alone….
The last large arc on Morrison’s work with Animal Man can really be bifurcated into two parts: The gruesome and powerful slaughter of Buddy Baker’s family, and his psychological and emotional reaction to it, and then his “super hero” reaction to it. In the first half of the story, we see how Buddy’s family’s murder leads him to become vengeful and angry, so much so that he eventually seeks revenge. But before that, we get to see his denial chipping away at him, through inner dialog in which he personifies his own memories and begins to reimagine/reinterpret his own origin. We get to see him, psychologically, retconning himself. And Morrison’s entire take on this B-list DC supercharacter was a retcon to begin with. So it’s a bit of a head trip. But it’s also genuinely impactful on a gut level.
Then, to add another level, Animal Man goes and gets himself a time machine and begins to literally retcon himself, with the help of a ton of DC characters who are know for being able to reshape time and psyches (Psycho Pirate, Rip Hunter, Phantom Stranger, etc.) and heroes from various alternate Earths as well, until eventually he shatters the fourth wall and realizes that he is in a comic book–a giant “monkey puzzle,” in which everything can be fit together in a head-spinning swirl. Everything that happened in the issues preceding these is rediscovered and revised–much like Morrison has done with JLA, Batman and other characters throughout his career.
I won’t give away the very end, but it’s fantastic–and you will not see it coming.
This is probably my favorite Grant Morrison super-hero story of all time.
As artist only, the writer/artist who created Frog Thor and Beta Ray Bill will be the new regular artist for the Brian Michael Bendis written Avengers book, beginning with issue #25. Of course, with Bendis promising to leave The Avengers this year, could it be Walt is prepping for a larger role? One can only hope, as Simonson’s imagination has led to some brilliant work in the past, such as:
DC copped 40% issues sold, Marvel got 38%. Of course, DC is down a lot. 22% to be exact. But that’s totally to be expected, with the media push and 52 #1s in one month. I’d expect a little more downturn in the coming months. They’re still up from their pre-New 52 market share, but my prediction is that in a few months they’ll be back where they were before the whole relaunch. Does that mean it wasn’t worth it? Of course not. Those few months of big sales were BIG sales for DC—and the amount of hype and publicity they got can only be good for those of us who love comics. It’s probably due solely to the New 52 that overall comic sales are up 7% for the year—the first rise in yearly figures in two years.
least, which takes place 5 years ago. I guess we’ll see what happens when Titans launches. All I know is, I just ordered the Wolfman/Perez New Teen Titans Omnibus, so no matter how Geoff Johns reorganizes/erases the DCU, he’ll never get those stories off of my shelf!
lot like 1960s Batman. Also, he looks kinda gay. Actually, he kinda always looked gay. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)
For kicks and giggles, I’m assembling my list of the top comic book writers of all time. And as I go through the names, I realize that so few of them were also able to draw their own words. So I thought I’d do this list as a prelude: The best comic book writer-artists of all time. Plus, this helps me take some names off the best writers list that I’m working on, ‘cause they’re already here.
got his own series. One of the best-selling indie books of the year (#1 sold out, even though it was also offered for free comic book day). After Lord Baltimore unwittingly releases a horde of vampires, he goes searching to destroy their leader. Gothic steampunk horror.
Doug Moench, Bernie Wrightson, Angelo Torres, Mike Woods, and Jason Shawn Alexander, among many others. I saw this at my local shop (Victory Comics in Falls Church—holla!) and almost bought it immediately. But then I remembered I needed to have money for dinner that night. Maybe next time.
FEAR ITSELF #2. So we’re two issues in to Marvel’s latest event, and in this issue we see Odin imprison Thor (again). It’s a little hard to follow why Thor and Odin keep clashing, and honestly this latest one seems manufactured to match up with where Thor is at in his maturity in the movie—rather than to account for all the wisdom he really ought to have by now in the comic, from his commuppance long ago at the hands of Beta Ray Bill to the recent fall of Asgard and his voluntarily relinquishing the throne. Plus, there was a lot of set-up in this issue (setting up each villain, presumably so that they can go spin-off into other series). I was okay with this kind of exposition before, in the “prelude” and in issue #1, but it’s time to move the story forward. It’s starting to look more like a money grab—much like Shadowland—than a real event with something to say. Plus the story itself—global threat, heroes must go fight high-powered baddies-feels very “been there, done that.” There’s no mystery (like in Secret Invasion) or promise of major, important change (like House of M, Civil War).
BATMAN INC. #5. This is the first Grant Morrison story in Batman Inc.—and the first Morrison bat tale in years—that I’ve had a little trouble following, due in part to references to the Bat-past that I am not very familiar with. Nevertheless, it all made sense by the last page and continued my development from a Morrison hater to a Morrison fan. Yanick Paquette’s art won’t be for everyone—it feels very static and heavy—but I find that its uniqueness, its foreign flavor, adds to the “international” feel of this title. It’s also nice to see Morrison using Batwoman, who in my view is one of the best things to happen to the Bat-Universe in the past 10 years. It’s getting clearer (or cloudier) that all the “building a Bat-army” is actually leading to something. But I have no idea what. This title is a great ride—as great as Morrison’s New X-Men run.
