8/29/14 - Trillium - (DC/Vertigo)

Now son, you've heard me !@#$ing go on about dimensional travel, before, and how much I !@#$ing hate that !@#$? Walking through a big !@#$ space donut, landing !@#$ knows where, and discovering you're on a parallel Earth run by !@#$ing McDonalds, or some such? Having to survive in places where Hitler never lost, Rome never fell, and no one ever !@#$ing invented toilet paper? 

Well, let me tell you, there's one thing I !@#$ing hate more than space donuts, and that's !@#$ing time machines. Time travel makes me want to shoot things in the face, repeatedly. Every !@#$ time I go back I have to have a legion of people watching my every !@#$ move, just to make sure I don't !@#$ something up and create a parallel world of my own. 

And the complications are... well, let's just say there's a reason I get kind of misty when I think about President McKinley. And that's all I'm going to !@#$ing say about that. 

 

See if you can find me in this photo.

But, as with dimensional travel, even if you don't !@#$ing want to do it eve !@#$ing again, it's still fun to read about. And same with time travel, too. There's reasons SPYGOD makes time on Saturday nights to sit down and watch a certain BBC show. And there's reasons I force people to !@#$ing watch it with me at gunpoint. Because it's good for them, and I really !@#$ing care. A lot.

Which brings me to Trillium, the new graphic novel by Jeff Lemire -- a truly weird and mind-blowing dance of time, space, language, identity, and the far-reaching cosmic connections that bind us the !@#$ together.

So it's 3797, and the !@#$ has hit the fan. Humanity has mostly succumbed to a god!@#$ sentient virus called The Caul, and is down to about 4000 people - period. And this !@#$ing plague with a plan is creeping its !@#$ way from system to system, intent on stomping humanity underfoot and wiping us off its !@#$ing shoe.

"Wibbley Wobbly Timey Wimey" my bony !@#$! Get me out of here!

And here's the thing, son -- the only !@#$ing thing standing in its way is a bunch of white flowers, being watched over by a bunch of blue aliens with a !@#$ weird language. And some poor Xeniologist is trying to communicate with them so her people can take them and live, and do this before her superiors decide to go all "manifest destiny" and take them, hurt feelings or broken bodies be !@#$ed.

Thing is, it's also 1921, and a former soldier is trudging through the Amazon with a small expedition, trying to find the big !@#$ lost temple of the Incas. He had a really !@#$ing bad go of it during the Great War, and life in England since just hasn't done a !@#$ thing for him. So here he is, looking for something that may not exist, and then having his !@#$ handed to him by the locals, who aren't !@#$ing happy to have nosy white people walking on their !@#$ lawn.

One big !@#$ weird coincidence later, these two people come face to face in his time. They can't !@#$ing understand each other, and they're both confused as !@#$. But there's one word they both have in common: Trillium.

And that's when things get really !@#$ing weird...

Now, let me tell you something, son: Jeff Lemire is a !@#$ing treasure. Canada should insure his !@#$ hands and his head for a couple million dollars apiece. !@#$ knows, they'll do it for much less worthy individuals, some of who I wish they'd !@#$ing frog-march back across the border in chains and throw to the !@#$ bears. 

"SPYGOD, I'm taking away your gay card..."

 But if you were !@#$ing astounded by his work on Animal Man, and were incredibly grateful that he managed to not only salvage the !@#$-tastic mess they made of the Green Arrow reboot, but also knock it out of the !@#$ing park and all the way to the moon, you haven't seen anything until you see what he does when he writes and illustrates his own work. That's when the chains come off and he goes !@#$ wild. I'm thinking of things like Essex County, The Underwater Welder, and his last major work for Vertigo, the post-apocalyptic epic Sweet Tooth. They're trippy, heartfelt, and never less than outright !@#$ing astounding.

(Yes, son, I used that word twice. I'm !@#$ing allowed)

So why should you get the collected edition of Trillium? Let me break it the !@#$ down for you, SPYGOD style. 

1) The Story

I get really !@#$ing bored when someone wants to tell me a science fiction story, these days. I've been there, seen it, gotten the !@#$ t-shirt, and been orally serviced by some weird thing out behind the toilets while waiting for them to call my number and send me the !@#$ home. 

"I can make a film and make you my star /
You'll be a natural the way you are"

So when I say that this science fiction story is something that takes all the time travel tropes we've had shoved on us by !@#$ movies and lazy !@#$ novels, turns them upside down, and gives us something new and interesting? That's !@#$ing saying something.

This is an epic in every sense of the word. This some fierce !@#$ing imagining. There's one big !@#$ story masquerading as two, and yet the underscore of decency and humanity floats alongside it to bring you back to the !@#$ing ground in spite of the wonder. And that is an achievement.

2) The Art

 Yes, his art looks a little !@#$ing weird at times. He's got some !@#$ good drafting and style techniques, but the people all look like they've come off a big !@#$ bad drunk, and sometimes they all look the same from work to work.

But you know what, son? It !@#$ing works. The downbeat human presentation only serves to aid in his presenting creaky, old spaceships that are the last hope of the human race, or possibly its doom, or ancient temples that could be human and alien at the same time (maybe !@#$ing both), or whatever. His sense of realism underscores the fantastic, and makes it truly stand the !@#$ out.

That'll wake you the !@#$ up in the morning, alright.

3) The Audacity

When SPYGOD went to his friendly local comic shop, and bought the first issue, he was amazed to see that they'd played around with the format. The first part of that first issue was one way, covering one time period, and then met the second part halfway... from the back forward, for the other time period. You had to flip it upside !@#$ing down to read the whole thing, and see how they came together in the middle.

"A cheap gimmick," you say? Well !@#$ you. It works perfectly with the story, itself, and they mirrored that in future issues when they got separated in time (and yet still together, sort of) -- having you read the tops of the pages one way, and then read the bottom half the other. There were upside down panels interspersed with the normal ones. All kinds of visual tricks to disorient you, and yet bring you closer to the feeling you'd get when you have to wrap your !@#$ brain around this kind of !@#$.

Which was, if I'm not !@#$ing mistaken, kind of the idea all along.  And if so, well done.  

SPYGOD'S Verdict: Three thumbs up for a trippy, intricate, and truly weird tale that takes us to the far reaches of time and identity, but never loses its humanity along the way. Lemire's excellent storytelling is top notch, and his already-formidable art and design hits a new benchmark, here.

Trillium - get the trade paperback at your local comic store!

8/15/14 - All New Invaders, Vol. 1 - Gods and Soldiers (Marvel)

One of the weird !@#$ things about having been in costume back in the War, and still !@#$ing being around, is that you never know when some piece of unfinished business from back in those crazy !@#$ days is going to rear the !@#$ up, open its big !@#$ mouth, and try to bite you in the !@#$.

I mean, you know this, right? You've heard me go on about ABWEHR, and all the ridiculous !@#$ they got up to at the end of the War, and then the 50's, the 60's, the 70's... on and on and !@#$ing on until I finally decided to kick their !@#$es one last time, just the other year.

And even then, how do I know something they didn't put into motion decades ago won't explode in my face? How do I know all their doomsday devices are !@#$ing defused? How do I know all the !@#$ we did back then is really over and done with?

How deep do you have to bury the past before it stays !@#$ing buried?

I wish I knew what to tell you, son. What I can tell you, however, is that it is !@#$ing true what they say about old soldiers. We don't die - we just fade away.

But when you fade away, there's always the chance that you might just fade the !@#$ back, someday, and go kick some !@#$.

Which is one of the reasons why I really !@#$ing appreciate the All New Invaders title that Marvel's putting out, as it perfectly captures the weirdness of what happens when crazy !@#$ from six or seven !@#$ing decades ago comes slipping back up to you, while you're just trying to repair cars in Podunk, Nebraska, and kill your !@#$ for god!@#$ Hitler, or someone.

Which is sort of what happens to Jim Hammond, at the start of our story...

Wait. What's that, son? Who's Jim Hammond? 

Well, before I beat you with a sack full of big !@#$ hammers for forgetting, I'd tell you to rewatch Captain America, yet again, and pay special attention to the exhibition they go to, at the start. This time, don't wait for the !@#$ flying car. Look for the man in the tube marked THE SYNTHETIC MAN.

Yes, son. This guy.

That's Jim Hammond -- the god!@#$ original Human Torch. The flaming, flying hero who fought Nazis and assorted scum back in World War II alongside the original Invaders: Captain America, Bucky, Namor, and his equally-fiery sidekick Toro.

Now, thanks to recent events in the Marvel universe, Jim's back in the world, once more, but would rather just find a quiet, folksy town in a small corner of it than suit up again. After everything that happened, he feels like he doesn't have the right to use his powers and call himself a hero -- not until he figures out who and what he is, anyway.

Of course, that's when someone comes along and tries to !@#$ up his !@#$, because that's how life works in four-color world. 

"Stop! Hammer time!" "That's not funny, lady..."

Before Hammond knows it, some giant blue woman with a big !@#$ hammer (and a bigger mouth) is beating him down, and using some weird-!@#$ gun to make him remember something he'd forgotten a long !@#$ time ago. A weird mission with the Invaders that involved only him, Bucky, and Namor, and put them up against Nazis and the Asgardian Goddess of Death, herself. Turns out the goose-stepping set had gotten their hands on something called a God Whisperer, which let them command, you guessed it, Gods.

Of course, they won the fight. They are the Invaders, after all. But they couldn't destroy this super-powerful weapon, and didn't dare hand it over to anyone. So they broke it into three parts, each of them hid a piece, and then they had their memories removed by one of their stranger colleagues. End of story... or so they !@#$ing thought.

But now the Kree know about the God Whisperer, and want it for their own purposes. And by now we know all too well that nothing that comes out of Supremor's big !@#$ green head is good for anyone but the Kree Empire.

And that means that, whether he likes it or not, Jim's going to have to put on his big boy briefs, flame the !@#$ on, and get the band back together again. Only this time, instead of mashing super nazis behind enemy lines, they're going to have to invade a whole !@#$ing Empire...

"Hey, we're totally available if you need help. Call our agent."

Marvel has a lot of really good series going on right now. So when I say that All New Invaders is one of the best ones, and one you should make a monthly pull? That's !@#$ing saying something.

But let me break it down for you:

1) James Robinson

If I had to trust anyone to handle heroes who've been around since the 1940's, James Robinson is that man. His work on DC's The Golden Age, Justice Society of America, and, of !@#$ing course, Starman, proved he's got a handle on the time, the people, and the passions that led them, good or bad.

But better than that? The man knows how to !@#$ing tell an ensemble story. Face time is balanced, people have distinct personalities and goals, and all the characters get their big !@#$ moments to shine in a plot that twists, turns, and folds the !@#$ back on itself to a slam bang, open-ended conclusion.

He also has a genius for bringing in people from out of left field that make sense, and give old-school fans something to cheer about -- especially when we get the feeling we'll be seeing them again, really !@#$ soon...

2) Steve Pugh

I've been following this guy for some time, now. When he was doing gruesome inktastic expressionism on Hellblazer and Animal Man, back in the 90's, his work seemed blocky and overdone, but it suited those books amazingly well. Over time, his work got tighter,and better-defined, but his excellent grotesque sensibilities got even better -- so much so that when he returned to Animal Man, for the reboot, he helped make that title the powerhouse it currently is.

With All New Invaders, he's !@#$ing knocking it out of the !@#$ park. Thanks in part to the excellent color art (hat tip to Guru-efx) his work is supple, full, and well-defined. And when he gets a chance to cut loose and do something squidgy and weird (Like the God Whisperer, itself, or the (CLASSIFIED) Hammond will be fighting early in the next collection), the results are !@#$ing astounding. The Kree have never looked better, Cap looks like a !@#$ing tank on legs, and Namor is... well, Namor is. Let's put it that way. 

"I hafff de powerrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!!!!!"

3) Jim Hammond

Yes, there I am getting kind of !@#$ing nostalgic, again. But having the original Human Torch back in the Marvel Universe has been a big !@#$ special treat, both for old school folks like myself and for people who are just discovering him as a character. He's our decent, everyman reluctant hero with a lot of !@#$ red to make up for, and the lens we're seeing this murky corner of the world through. He's also a massive self-questioning figure, as he's not certain if he's human, synthetic, or what, which makes for a lot of !@#$ing story and character potential.

SPYGOD's VERDICT: Three Thumbs Up for a well-written, amazingly-drawn series that takes an old team and puts it through some new and exciting adventures. You should make this a monthly pull, son. No arguments.

All New Invaders, Vol. 1: Gods and Soldiers -- get it at your local comic store!