Final Crikeysis #7 – All foreground, all the time! (part 1 of 2)
February 2nd, 2009
It’s been a long time coming, but the Mindless Ones have at last vomited forth some thoughts on Final Crisis #7. And it turns out that we’ve got so much to say on the subject that this is but part 1 of a 2 part crikeysis extravaganza. So without further ado, let’s get on with the annocommentations…
Quick caveat before we go any further: I know the text below paints us as a bunch of Morrison fanatics but I think it’s worth pointing out that pretty much all of us have reservations about Final Crisis – it’s hard not to, to be honest. What we’ve decided to focus on, however, is all those things that we did like, find interesting, or that effected us positively, mainly because all of our negative criticisms have been well rehearsed elsewhere, and are, frankly, not as interesting to us as the other stuff.
Expect subjectivity!
Page 1
AMY: In some ways this first page sums up all we need to know about FC and what it’s about. We start off with doomsaying and ‘The end is nigh placards and finish up with Super-Obama, taking in Large Hadron Colliders and gravitons along the way. We have pretty good reasons for getting all doom and gloom at this stage in the game – global dimming, global warming, nuclear proliferation, depleted resources, economic meltdown, etc. – but, hey, we might prove superstring theory in a year or so and we’ve seen the inauguration of the first black president, so maybe there’s room to believe after all. Page 1 is all of our condensed fears and hopes crammed into 5 little panels. Very neat.
And now I’m going to explain something to you about superhero comics.
Superhero comics can and should be lots of things, but one thing they rarely are is SUPER. Sure, there’s room for action/adventure stories, suspense, grim ‘n’ gritty, romance, whatever – but if you’re setting out to write this summer’s new event comic, if, in essence, you’re attempting to get at the meat of what makes an entire universe tick and create some kind of modern myth, then you absolutely cannot neglect the ‘super’ part of the equation. It has to be front and centre. And definitely if you’re setting out to tell the tale of the FINAL CRISIS. Now I know this sort of appraisal is veering into cliche now, but Grant Morrison’s comic, whilst being a big ol’ mess, blah, blah, is just about the most insanely superheroic thing I’ve ever read. Ridiculous, history-defining events occur pretty much every other panel, and that’s what I want to see. Superheroes as metaphor for the impossible, the fantastic and everything that’s good in the world, not a thinly veiled attack on the comic fan’s neuroses. Alan Moore was staggeringly arrogant when he claimed Watchmen was the final nail in the coffin for superheroes, that no relevant or interesting things remained to be said in its wake. Yeah, right, mate – only if we get as cynical and reductive as we can be about the genre. Morrison, and Moore himself now, has disproved this bollocks time and time again, and I would argue Final Crisis 7 is just the latest nail in its coffin.
And if this comic is about dreams, wonder and primal superheroics, of course it has to be about Superman. Not just one superman, but every possible iteration of that pure, golden superangel we saw in Superman Beyond. Yep, FC is the story of the blazing “S” shield standing between us and the howling darkness. That’s what that close up on panel 5 means. What it’s always meant:
‘Beyond this point evil shall not pass!’
See evil bouncing off it, like bullets.
ZOM: So Brian Hibbs has a theory that goes like this: Dark Reign was planned by a bunch of guys that thought Obama was going to lose. I’ve been mulling over the same idea ever since the project and Obama’s victory collided in my mind. Yes there’s a lot of bad stuff going on in the world, yes the global economy is down the shitter, but Dark Reign is predicated upon the idea that totally unscrupulous, mendacious, manipulative, bad guys are in power, and that their power is to be greatly feared. Doesn’t really fit with the zeitgeist, eh?
Now here, this makes a lot more sense, a kick ass black president is gonna save the world (and contribute to saving the multiverse – I’ll leave all attempts at drawing spurious parallels to you, fair mindless reader). It’s all a bit over the top, but, hey, the Obama experience has at times felt just as heart-warmingly absurd. It’s not like he hasn’t been bound to the Superman myth before now, is it?
Anyway, has anyone noted – I suspect they probably have but I probably wasn’t paying attention – that cracked red skies look a lot like the interior of a womb? I’m sure someone must have mentioned that before now, we are talking about The Bleed after all.
Bobsy: It’s nice that the Last Son of Kenya’s got his Luthor (‘Courtney’) on the team in the Rahm Emanuel role (a name so good and Final Crisis-y it should belong to the super-analogue of Earth 2009). Always trying to be clever. Good also that the great military machine intelligence inside Washington is no more to be trusted than it was back in the Doom Patrol days.
The intersection between all my todays and all the whenevers of the DCU, is happening right here on this page – the lack of poetry in Spidey and Barry terrorist-fist-bumping (be a shame to lose that expression, no?) their way through some sad Chameleon caper becomes sadly apparent.
Pages 2-3
AMY: There’s a lot of talk about prismatic comics nowadays, but one of the things I think Final Crisis makes explicit, is that, potentially, it’s not simply an empty, tho’ altogether fun, exercise in post-modernism or an imaginative piling up of multiplicities, but also a celebration of pluralism and equality. That to non-white, non-heterosexual, non-whatever readers it might have a representational component – one that is full of charge and meaning, especially given the historic context in which this comic emerges and that it is explicitly referencing. I also feel that the new and inventive riffs Grant plays on familiar superpowers, like the super-tune Superman uses to blast Darkseid to kingdom come later on, and the fractured interplay of narrative realities that define this final chapter of the story, all in some way contribute to this feeling of new, other and autonomous worlds all rubbing shoulders and attempting to co-exist simultaneously within the overarching umbrella reality of the…ahem… *multiverse*. In and dramatic terms, doesn’t this just make the whole thing feel bigger? The DCU feels pretty small when it’s all just white blokes in pants knocking the crap out of each other.
And as is befitting a comic that aims to capture the throbbing core of superheoism, there’s lots of talk about ‘mythic time’, Argos and heroes cluttering up this two page spread. Here the superpeople aren’t even attempting to sound like *people* per-se and the text explicitly recognizes the kind of simple, primal, declarative dialogue of the comics of yesteryear as the secret language of the Gods.
I think the wonderhorn sums up something intrinsic to Morrison’s work as well. A visual reminder that his superbooks are more concerned with inspiration, awe, beauty – and all the rest of the stuff I go on about above – than they are with fighting. A lesser writer would’ve had it look like some kind of sonic weapon, but Grant and Mahnke go for the opposite approach. Aesthetically it inhabits some gorgeous cultural and historic hinterland, combining a kind of high-tech neo-classicism with the stained-glass jewelry of the Christian church and the elaborate, swirling arabesquery of Islamic design, and all of these elements combined lend it a timeless, legendary quality that, again, transcends partisanship and division, nodding to some kind of fundamental ur-religion and source of holiness from which all of our different belief systems, perhaps, sprang. It is intrinsically *about* non-violent conflict resolution. It’s about sharing a mutual space. It’s about shared human origins. It’s all built into its architecture.
ZOM: Fuck, look it’s all veiny – it’s ridiculously obvious. I’ll shut up about it.
Why is it that Morrison (and attendant artists) is the only writer who ever manages to make Wonder Woman seem magical. Those beautiful, swirling, invisible liquids, and the cursorily referenced “anti-war technology” bring more *wonder* to the character in one panel than the sum totality of Wonder Woman comics I’ve read by other writers. And then he, and the man Mahnke, goes and gives us the bloody Wonder Horn, which, as I’m sure you’re all aware, can’t fail but be blasting John Williams’s Superman theme across the multiverse.
It’s a horn. It calls Superman. All of them. Think about it. But just in case you can’t make the link.
Horns call for superman
BB: See, I was concluding – in the (correctly) implicit soundtrack… it sez in my Daily Record (not actually mine) that Nubia is a trib to Beyonce Knowles, the 21st century’s premier sex symbol; I had previously thought she looked more like lovely, lovely Michelle Obama – would you like to read my repository of Barack/Michelle slash, no alright – but then, no, there’s the horn fo’ sho’. And a mic. So, a singer lady – here is a Beyonce song with lots of horn, probably the best one. I think we’re back at – it seems an odd amount of time lingering on this one particular scenario, as we see later, from a practical point of view, but then – wasn’t this Crisis the metal crisis, the – please excuse this – rock of ages crisis, and now this countervibration of, I think, the funk. Are we back at Morrison & Afro-futurism, again? That post, my avowed favourite of ’08, just keeps giving; do read, if you’ve not already. Countervibratory because… this was the metal, the emo event comic, death- and misery-obsessed. [A short caveat about funk, because it feels necessary: growing up, as a teen, listening to not insignificant amounts of abrasive guitar music, the Red Hot Chilli Peppers singlehandedly ruined the reputation of the very notion for me - even now, I listen to the new TV on the Radio album, my favourite last year ultimately and wonder "am I liking this? It is kind of funk music, you know."]
Everyone heard something different.
The first three pages are also just lovely if, like me, you invested an evergrowing undeniably unhealthy amount of time and personal stake in 2008 following an election in another country which you had no direct sway whatsoever in. A little bit special for me, particularly, given I’d tried and failed and given up as perhaps a little imbalanced to write a blog entry on how Barry O: isn’t he a bit like Superman, really? Super’bam. The very basic precis is here, if you want to check the datestamps. Marc Singer is a lot more sensible than I am.
I was writing it up on election night, November 4, and it lost to the drama and absorption at about 2.00-2.30am UK time; wish I’d bloody done it now, obvs. Here is a picture I was focusing rather a lot on, an awful, lurid bloody mantra, this is how it will feel in the advent of an Obama defeat:
Tell yourself. There’s always hope.
Funny that; but then, I was of a mindset that here was an election with a chance to radically, radically alter the cultural sphere (possibly they all are? Maybe not winning second-term bids) and that it was predicate to really any other developments “in the world”, so to speak.
Bobsy: One of the many parts you can hear booming through the Gjallahorn-of-Plenty is the flourish of Doug Mahnke arriving in time to make the Final Crisis happen. Everything on this page is pure splendour, from the alarming bulges on Superman’s chest and…elsewhere, to the way the mike flex carries us on to the next panel in the sequence, and the arrival of the Ultima Thule like a sperm breaching the wall of the ovum…
Page 4
ZOM: Annnnd all the gravitas is sucked out like air escaping from a balloon ripped open by my son’s incisors (this happens often in our household, and with every bang comes fresh tears). The dissonance at work here is just fantastic, underscored hilariously by that look between Nubia and Obama Superman.
Which brings me to a more central point. Grant has described Final Crisis as, in part, an attempt to capture the overall feel of the DCU, with all its demented incongruities and dissonances. I appreciate that some fans might have trouble with the Question, hard bitten city cop Montoya, flying around the multiverse in the Ultima Thule in the company of hundreds of alternative supermen, but to my mind you simply couldn’t do a better job of capturing the wonderful absurdity of the DCU. This isn’t the Marvel Universe, which, even before the current continuity and coherence prizing strategy was put in place, had long been possessed of something approaching homogeneity. The DCU is a space that’s always been chock full of jarring genre shifts and tonal inconsistencies, “imaginary” stories and, in recognition of this state of affairs, the occasional fruitless attempt to bind the whole messy thing together. The DCU spins in a strange super position between the polar axis of Superman and Vigilante, Batman Black and White and Ambush Bug, resurrection and women in refrigerators, Morrison and Simone, horror and humour. That it should all describe one place, one history is a completely ridiculous idea – the best it can ever hope to do is fake it, is to make you forget for five minutes that its about the weirdest fictional construction out there*. In this small moment, Grant is encouraging us to reflect on that fact for a couple of seconds, and have a good natured chuckle. It’s totally barmy, yes, but we’re being asked to go with it. Enjoy it for the mad pile of steaming berserkness that it is.
Just like our living breathing real world. Realism, eh? It ain’t what it used to be!
*It seems to me that much of Geoff John’s success is tied to his ability to convince readers that the DCU is a smooth, shiny, sexy topography. That’s the essence of continuity porn
Strikes me that the point here (and by here I mean in this panel and in Final Crisis as a whole) is more to do with aesthetic appreciation, to do with how the DCU looks and feels, than argumentation. GM’s not giving the lie to continuity, or trying to expose the weaknesses of the four colour DC enterprise – he’s celebrating multiplicity. Reveling in the awkwardness and the imagination that lies at its foundation.
AMY: “Enjoy our world for mad, steaming pile of berserkness it is.”
But Montoya isn’t just commenting on the dementedness of multiversalism, but, at a meta-level, this is obviously a highlighting of racial issues also – ‘they all look the same’, etc, and a comic reminder that depending on whose looking at it, our language can be read in a variety of different ways. Contexts, understandings and mileages vary. I mean, how dare Montoya suggest that anyone would have a problem telling the difference between superpeople? Absurd, isn’t it?
Bobsy: See, for me, who yet likes to think myself sympathetic and loyal and attuned to the direct currents of the various superhero universes, it’s easy to get stuck in old grooves, to fail to keep up. It happens with comic-book characters as much as music trends, which is to say: to me, Renee Montoya is just some Batman back-up cop, wearily deflecting sleazy comments from Harvey Bullock, and never a star in her own right.
All that changes with this panel, where she stands shoulder-to-shoulder with the best of the best of all the best, and looks damn elegant while doing it. Classic costume right there, fedora, Crimson Avenger lines, Pierrot buttons, foul mouth. It would have been sexier if she’d had no face (fuck off for just a minute Dr. Freud – I prefer Clement) but this comic isn’t about masks, it’s about capes.
Page 5
AMY: This is just one of those conceits Grant couldn’t resist, isn’t it? As the universe folds down into the singularity, as we approach of core of the DCU, so do the different watchtowers and super-bases – the origin story of the linear men’s fortress perhaps? It’s just such a glorious, poetic idea, not just good common sense from a defensive, scientific and archeological point of view.
The whole page is the shit, actually. You can just feel the cosmic winds blowing out there on that balcony – the electric crackle and fizz of the hostile forces outwith the defensive shields attempting to bite their way through. I’m sold on the idea that this is it – we’re completely adrift down the sinkhole at the bottom of the universe, and I totally believe in our guardians, eyes blazing in the burning cold night of eternity….
But, y’know, I’d rather read a really well crafted Paul Dini comic.
Not.
BB: Initially reading this, and the following few pages – Starman, Frankenstein, Power Girl and obscurist’s favourite Iman on the last battlements of existence of the combinant Watchtower… things had looked to be going so well, too. It’s a Crisis, so massive shit could go down – it really did appear as if all was to be lost, suddenly.
ZOM: As this page is the point where we dive into the depths of the story this seems like the best time to get something off my chest: people have complained, I have complained, that this issue verges at times on incomprehensibility, certainly on a first read through at any rate – but there’s something interesting about the difficulty I’ve faced when attempting to contextualize some of the plot. The net affect is an unusual, and rather intense foregrounding of just about everything in the book, the consequence being that everything feels important, everything takes on a grandeur, everything is completely necessary and irreducibly valuable. It’s like we’re looking at the intercises on one of those hyper crystals Morrison’s so keen on. I know, I sound like a half mad apologist, and for the record I’m pretty sure this effect isn’t intentional, despite it’s obvious ties to the channel zapping technique employed by GM, but as we like to merge the traditional critical approach with good old subjective experience around here, I feel justified in saying that’s how it worked for me.
Bobsy: The composite Watchtower makes me like my Enochian inference from last isue a lot more. Amy’s right – the recall of the Linear Men’s hangout from DC1M is strongest – the memorable line in that about the last electron in the universe about to lose its last charge of meaning to the endless entropy – the entropy has Darkseid’s name now.
The stormcloud electrophantoms are being deterred by eye beams from Power Girl and Iman, but just a baleful glare from our modern Promethean. He’s, like, sooo A-list right now – Welcome Back, Frank.
Pages 6-8
BB: What I particularly like about the narration of this issue, apart from the simple underused multiple narrators strand, is that i) three of the narrators are women and ii) that this is a fundamental role, really, on the meta-reading – in the telling of tales of valour, imagination, wonder, strength and kindness they literally unmake Darkseid’s bad world and Vanishing Point. Here are the cog-turnings of the Miracle Machine.
ZOM: I wish I didn’t have to fanwank away that Wonder Woman mask.
Ah, the giant penny, the bane of all serious Batman fans the world over. How angry they must be that Grant decided that it should be front and centre at this particular moment – singled out as the heart of the Bat mythos. Mind you, they also blast the corpse of Batman, night shrouded vigilante, into the depths of multiversal space, so start as you mean to go on I suppose.
Again, though, I come to a more important point about the miniseries. Whilst debating the merits of Final Crisis with Daily Pop over at Andrew Hickey’s site, my attention was drawn to the fact that in order to enjoy much of the event, you need to be willing to give yourself over to Grant Morrison’s ideas about how many of the DCU’s characters, and their attendant mythologies, should be written. In our discussion the case in point was Hawkman (if you should read this DP, I’d like to go on record as having softened my stance somewhat on the portrayal of the bewinged one), but it’s true enough to say that that was but one example out of a possible multitude. To get back to this page for a second, arguably the most contentious take has been Morrison’s gun-toting Dark Knight – understandably this was simply too much for some of the audience, after all wasn’t it Morrison who described the JLA as “impossibly moral”? Heroes capable of making choices that would be inconceivable to the rest of us. The point being that if Batman has got the god of evil in his sights he doesn’t pull the trigger, because he made an oath – with Batman there’s always another way. And that’s before you get into the debate about whether the Caped Crusader* should even appear in an event like this. Of course, the obvious response is that the Batman who’s been built in the pages of the Morrison’s batbook wouldn’t think twice about blasting chunks out of Darkseid, which brings us back to the original point: you have to be willing to immerse yourself in GM’s private DCU.
*I would argue that the Caped Crusader, as distinct from the Dark Knight, needs to make a come-back, and that events like this are as much his home as the streets of Gotham. Give me the Caped Crusader! Now!
Unreasonable? No, I don’t think so – this is what Morrison does, what he’s known for. He takes characters and squeezes out the bits that he doesn’t like and he’s become hugely popular off the back of this approach. Many, many of us think he that he leaves characters improved and reinvigorated, but we also recognise that his style is idiosyncratic, personal, and not easily duplicated by others. And, I think, it’s this idiosyncrasy that troubles some fans. We’re being invited into GM’s world – a place where I’m more than happy to go to, idiosyncratic visions are the ones I like best – which in some ways is necessarily at odds with the expectations of a lot of fans when they shell out for a global crossover event. They want to see the status quo, not the inside of Morrison’s brain. I, however, will go with the brain eight times out of ten.
BB: Here is my fanwank: Wonder Woman crushes the mask (p.21) after telling the story to the children, after the rocket has shot off. It’s difficult to use terms like ‘present’ because time is seriously wonky in this book – I still haven’t worked bits out, really. But the jissom of fandom is in and on me now, and I have to wonder – is Darkseid, rather than admitting a flaw because Darkseid is perfect – “He would have resisted longer than I wished!” Is Darkseid conceding really that Batman did beat him – twice, like a drum – and he was indeed The Black Glove? The I-Ching did seem to think otherwise.
AMY: Batman’s allowed to take Darkseid’s ‘life’ for the same reason Superman can take Mandrakk’s. HE’S NOT LIFE. He’s ANTI-LIFE. God, this isn’t rocket science. He’s a horrible story-virus about nullification that’s managed to hijack an old man. This is not the same as killing the Joker.
And when Darkseid intersected with the material world, he was always going to bite it anyway – Batman’s just the hand of God – because, basically, here he becomes what he represents. And what he represents is the yawning void. The black hole where his heart was.
Anyway, more wonderful folding down. And now from super-bases to super-archeology. All the magic weapons, mementos and totems can be found inside. Whole histories, runs and continuities crammed into the ultimate museum. All of it slowly crushing down and collapsing into Superman, many pages hence, alone in the dark, ready to explode again into the strangeness and charm of the DCU.
Look, I’ll explain something about why Grant’s writing is so popular. It’s not just because of how quirky it is, but because, okay, if you like the Daily Planet’s just a newspaper Clark Kent works for, but isn’t it so much better to understand it as enjoying as much right to a place within the hallowed satellite of the legion of legions as any Gamma Gong – that it is, in essence, a super-paper, and Lois Lane and Jimmy Olsen super-reporters, as much a part of the DC pantheon as anything and anyone else? There’s something deeply respectful and beautiful about this. These pages encapsulate the idea that the Daily Planet is precisely what it says on the tin – the voice of this ball of rock, and the diary of humanity itself. In the end, even a bloody newspaper is permitted entrance to this archetypal, deific space, and that’s exactly as it should be.
I should also add that as we’re venturing into the heart of the superman, it makes thematic sense that FC should incorporate its own revised retelling of the superman origin myth, but this time with the perfected human rocketed into the beyond.
Bobsy: These pages are still all overture. The rocket is the whole issue/series/multiverse in microcosm. The final caption on p7 gives away the ending.
Page 8
AMY: At the end of the road for humanity, there’s an acute symbolic resonance built into the image of superman cradling the body of the aforementioned perfected man.
Bobsy: Only now do we begin proper, where we left off last issue. The look on Soup’s face is great, the rage and grief quickly settling into his usual steely resolve. Muscley necks rule.
This was the bit, first read between karaoke bellows, cucumber sandwiches and a rising surge of skunk’n'scrumpy, where this issue really started to sing out. You know how Superman’s got his golden sunny future stretching ahead, his universal legacy being a gradual fulfilment of his normal human desire to make everyone just a bit more like himself – all that? How horrid that it could be Just More Darkseid. Not the doubtful, reflective Darkseid of The Hunger Dogs either – this is a bleeding, calipered Darkseid in excelsis, claiming Superman’s mantle as his own all along, through racking coughs of laughter.. That put the shits right up and no mistake, had to put the issue down because I felt I might be becoming Darkseid, a feeling reinforced by the fact that I was being called away to sing Nickelback…
Page 9
AMY: Just a quick thing, but of course Darkseid is incubated by conflict.
Bobsy: Don’t do it, Superman!
This is the essential difference between the two DC hemispheres of superherodom: when Batman broke his vow last issue, it was a victory – to throw away one’s core virtue when faced with the utimate evil is the right thing for a human to do, and by doing so he won. The ultimate price was paid for it, but with satisfaction, foreknowledge and acceptance of the consequences, sweetened yet by the adult understanding that he’d closed the circle on his own life. It was worth it – to fail to shoot Evil when you’ve got the chance wouldn’t just be morally remiss, but also viscerally irresistible for anyone who, when all’s said and done, is just a human being.
Superman doesn’t have that luxury – in the face of this cosmic threat, to break his vow and throttle poor Dan Turpin (+/- 3 billion souls), who tried so hard to save us all, would have been an unbearable defeat. If we’re going to lose to Darkseid, bette to lose pure. These are the impossible ethics that only Superman can be expected to uphold. He doesn’t disappoint, and his spirit demonstrates that the core difference between Man and Superman isn’t a negation of compassion, like Julius Evola and certain interpreters of Freddy Nitzsch would have you believe – it is an abundance of compassion.
Page 10
Bobsy: The Black Racer only kills New Gods, right? Are the Flashes just the road he travelled to reach Orion and Darkseid? One thing is clear from this page: he’s gaining onus.
Pages 11-13
ZOM: Why have Aquaman in this scene? Why just jam him in there between the moment when the Black Racer bears down on Darkseid and the Omega Sanctions blaze into his black soul? Because you can! This issue is built from delirious heroic moments, and poor old Aquaman’s been out in the cold for far too long. By wedging his one panel return against the brightest victory in the entire book, he gets to share in some of the moment’s red and gold glory. These moments aren’t bound together by narrative logic, by the left-brained god, Plot – they’re bound together by thematic resonance and poetic license.
Nice touch with he veiny, cracked, blue aquadome an’ all. Final Crisis at the seaside!
BB: It’s also King Arthur’s messianic return, here at the Omega Point, “the Terminal Moment/aneverending instant” – there’s something appealing and fitting then about the prospect that Darkseid has dug out the Radion bullet to shoot Orion at this point, in order for Batman to recover it in #2 in order – in #6 – to shoot Darkseid who dug out the Radion bullet, etc. ad infinitum, if it need be said.
AMY: Oh, this is nice.
I was wondering how Morrison would juggle all the disparate heroic endings he had in play at the end of #6, and this really is effortless. The black hole that is Darkseid is devouring him and death is racing in his direction. He’s dying. Remember we’re in mythic space now and the Flashes are just completing the spell. And for those of you wondering why the Black Racer doesn’t get straight back on Barry and co.’s trail after he’s finished with the devil-god, well, have you ever stopped to consider that his trajectory was in the direction of Darkseid all along and the Flashes were just the *event* that led him there.
Another thing I like about this page, and I admit it’s far more wanky, is that it confirms the Omega Effect as not simply a weapon employed by Darkseid, but the very slope along which death skis. It’s the Wheel of Samsara and the Black Racer’s gliding across its rim.
Bobsy: King Arthur vs. the Deep 666. Turpin is freed on this page, left to deal with his trauma and regret, and there is a shift as a second movement begins. The camelot shit is a tonal signifier of this next reflective passage, the sweet respite before the next phase of apocalypse gears up – the elegaic, end of an era feel that weeps from the pages of Mallory. (You could be well wanky and maybe flag up how this use of the most famous British version of the Grail cycle contrasts with the more ‘avin it, earlier mainland Euro versions of same that we saw in 7Soldiers 1, but you won’t get it from me.)
Page 14
BB: Everyone heard something different.
Look, it’s a world – a multiverse – of deus ex machinae, piling up on one another: that’s just an empirical statement of the matter of the DC Univere, really. So, this is the trump card.
Bobsy: Think, Superman! Work! Use your left brain! Red Devil’s line here is key – cf. the giant penny in the trophy room a few pages ago, and Most Sexcellent SuperBat’s line in a couple pages time.
Page 15
ZOM: Some of you out there probably hate the justifiers reliance on Uzis and flamethrowers. For serious, get it right Morrison! How the fuck are uzis and flamethrowers supposed to hurt invulnerable superheroes? And, for shitsake, these guys are financed and equipped by blimin’ space gods possessed of super-technology! Get with the bloody programme!
Except that having them carry real weapons, weapons which are actually used to kill and harm real human human beings is much nastier, much dingier and much more in tune with the themes at work in Final Crisis than any number of lazer gun toting evil robots. It’s a contest between the mundanity and magic, and while bullets can’t penetrate superflesh, the horrible banality embodied by fully automatic weaponry certainly can.
Bobsy: I love the Justifiers. Their weapons are tools.They’re good at their jobs, and love their work.
Page 16
AMY: If there’s been a better line than ‘Let me show you what money unleashed can do’ in any comic ever, I want to know about it. Most Excellent Superbat elevates cash from the mud of the materialistic and mammonistic to the level of pure, unbridled imagination. Money can make you a superhero, it doesn’t just have to be about cars and cribs. Unless we’re talking about supermanvans that is.
ZOM: And to go back to those fully automatic weapons for a second, contrast what you could be spending money on – photonic battle armour – with all that black gun-metal. TBH, I’m not sure if Morrison thought about this too much – it’s an unusual message to find in one of his comics – the idea that money can be profoundly transformative. Sure enough, millions of capitalists the world over cleave to that way of thinking, but I’m surprised to see it in a Morrison book. Perhaps I shouldn’t be.
Oh, and “we rule” carries with it as smidgeon of character revelation, a spot of contemporary vernacular, and a rather obvious double meaning.
Bobsy: The money thing – it’s not entirely new in Morrison’s work, it’s Mason Lang isn’t it? The other Invissies had superpowers like magic, kungfu, swearing – his was money, and his journey was about learning to get comfy with his powers. It’s a cute idea: money, the species’ (grudgingly) agreed-upon symbolic condensate of work, time, innovation and effort, but liberated from all the bad shit and put towards making the laser-besuited utopia we all want to be in. I’d be interested to know how Superbat got his tailoring just so while avoiding stuff like worker exploitation, early mornings, industrial pollution, the monkey power-politics of hierarchies and avarice, the social problems caused by financial inequality etc., but looking for the practical answer to all the world’s problems in a superhero comic is probably not the most sensible idea, would it were otherwise. (Never stopped us before.)
Here ends part 1 of our mindless annocommentations.
Check back in a couple of days for part 2.
Sex
xxxore we
Part 2 can be found here.
78 Responses to “Final Crikeysis #7 – All foreground, all the time! (part 1 of 2)”
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February 2nd, 2009 at 11:20 pm
I thought the Black Racer didn’t continue after the Flashes because Darkseid has a black hole where his heart should be, and “it’s a little-known fact that Death can’t travel faster than the speed of light.” (Jay Garrick, FC3)
The personification of Death being trapped in the singularity at the base of the multiverse would be convenient if you want to do a major story about corpses rising from the grave, after all.
February 2nd, 2009 at 11:20 pm
See that panel with Turpin, where the red fades out, and he says “in all of us”?
I am claiming that panel, right there, as Turpin recovering after Darkseid evacuates.
Batman nailed the God of All Evil, and saved Turpin while he did it.
Batman is the bollocks.
FIRS–oh, my bad. Wrong board.
February 2nd, 2009 at 11:34 pm
You’re right, Neon – you can tell because the eyes ain’t red no more and DARKSEID CRIES NOT.
It’s a shame Superman continues to address the doubtless horribly distressed and upset p.i. as “Darkseid” thereafter, really, but he is – after all – a dick.
February 2nd, 2009 at 11:42 pm
[...] Tim O’Neil, Jog, Dr. K, Andrew Hickey, Douglas Wolk, Sean T. Collins , The Mindlesses and Tucker Stone , making the definitive statement on the book. Here’s a taste – You want a [...]
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:04 am
Zom, re-read your Supe Beyond #1. The monitrix Zillo Valla calls the Bleed “ultramenstruum”.
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:17 am
Only the once, Bots. And I’m claiming Turpinseid as still in recovery at that point. Later on, when Darkseid is all essence and godsight, Turpin’s body isn’t around.
I know it’s bollocks, but I’m still claiming.
February 3rd, 2009 at 9:33 am
Less coherence = more fun.
The pedantic fanboy within me enjoyed reading about the disintegration and rebirth of a multiverse that actually showed things like cause and effect and linear time falling apart. It was, for the lack of a better term, a very realistic and literal-minded portrayal of reality dying.
Of course, something does bug me just a little about the reassertion of conditions almost identical to the status quo pro ante being equated with rebirth. I’m not very comfortable with that one — it’s a little too pat. The text also allows the interpretation that the DCU is now trapped inside the Omega Sanction, forced into an endless series of increasingly degrading re-births.
February 3rd, 2009 at 9:36 am
Chaps, question: The Omega finder beams – are we mean’t to presume that the crowd of ALEZombies have cast these at the Flashes? It looks like they’re coming out of the eyes of the crowd in the 3rd panel of page 12.
February 3rd, 2009 at 10:08 am
I think so, yes, but maybe not.
Aaron, thanks, that term was lurking on the tip of my consciousness at the time of writing.
Hilker, good point, but it seems to me that Amy’s explanation is broad enough to contain those details.
Dave, I’m sure if Morrison had his way it wouldn’t be almost identical in the long run. Morrison is unlikely to get his way, however.
February 3rd, 2009 at 11:12 am
I read Darkseid’s “He would have resisted longer than I wished” as Morrison confirming that Darkseid wasn’t the Black Glove – I think the “would have” implies “had I tried, which I didn’t”.
Where are you getting that Batman’s body was in the rocket? Is it from the scene near the end, where we see the rocket, or is it indicated any earlier? I was confused by that bit, since it seems that that’s how Bats ended up at Anthro’s side, but I couldn’t see anything earlier which confirmed it.
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:18 pm
Nor could I, it just seemed to be the only explanation that made sense. Vessels carrying dead bodies plus stuff have a long and venerable fictional and real world history, from Star Trek to the Vikings
Just one of the many holes in the FC narrative
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:26 pm
I had a vague “Well, the Omega Sanction is what sent Sonny Sumo off to feudal Japan, so it must have just sent Batman back to pre-history” explanation in my head. Somewhere in Kirby’s 4th World stuff, Darkseid does the same to the Forever People.
But, sod it. I like your explanation better. I like that the (current) DCU started with a perfect baby superboy being sent to Earth, and it ends with the perfect human being sent away from Earth. Good one. Until proved otherwise, I’m going with that.
Which is pretty much my approach to most of Final Crisis 7, in fairness.
February 3rd, 2009 at 12:28 pm
Hah! Yeah
February 3rd, 2009 at 1:42 pm
Brilliant stuff as always guys.
I just figured the rocket was how Bats got his kit back after finding himself in the past Sonny Sumo style (Forever People #6ish methink). Darkseid describes the Omega wotzit as having many strange properties in that issue so if he wants it to simultaneously shrivel Bats body and send his essence back in time it can. And didn’t we expect as much from the similarity to Booster Gold’s “corpse” in 52? Well a little maybe.
I picture Bats wandering the world at the dawn of man, resourceful and resilient, but unable to recall his true identity, until one night a star screams out of the sky and crashes to the ground. Uncontrollably drawn to its crater, he discovers an object both unbelievably alien and utterly familiar. And within there is a cape and belt and the symbol of a bat, and suddenly he remembers….
February 3rd, 2009 at 3:37 pm
That’s my preferred reading (until someone comes up w/ something more to my taste, Andy) but you know, go hogwild; I like Darkseid=TBG because also of certain symmetries – Batman as he shoots the God of Evil in the shoulder telling him “you gave me the idea”, which you might recall is exactly what Hurt did to him at the conclusion of RIP. There’s other stuff like him – the Bat – apparently having Godsight at that point, so alternatively/additionally being ridden by Orion to explicate that bit of dialogue: “We gods are only masks. Who wears us? Find it out!”
February 3rd, 2009 at 3:52 pm
That works, too, Andy. I’d want some kind of proto-bat flying through an open cave door, too, I think.
Wonderhorn – it’s a bit Horn of Jabreel from Vimanarama, innit?
February 3rd, 2009 at 4:31 pm
Aye. Polyphonous.
February 3rd, 2009 at 4:51 pm
Yeah – a giant f**k off Pterodactil thing.
Didn’t the Challengers of the Unknown find Anthro’s drawings in #2 or #3? With Bats’ handywork close buy – “help, trapped in the past, bring fresh underwear”.
February 3rd, 2009 at 5:37 pm
It’s cyclical – the sliver cover of #1 has Batmanhandiwork.
Was actually Calvin “Cave” Carson and his team (Bulldozer Smith, Christie Madison and Johnny Blake), not the Challs.
February 3rd, 2009 at 8:51 pm
RE: Superbat’s Supercapitalism: Odd message, but this is ANTI-LIFE we’re talking about: in contrast, even a joy in wealth and power is still a human joy and a success-narrative. This also explains Luthor’s line about good and bad. Darkseid is the God of EVIL, of anti-life, and so everything human with any spark of positivity is opposed to it. “Enemy of All Existence” implies being in conflict with all existence, the psychedelic mainstay universal defence system. Having said that, I’ve just read the comic, and am still somewhat staggered, so my apologies for any lack of coherency.
Re: the Superman/Obama/music thing, you might find
this interesting. No horns, but it’s interesting the man’s made the comparison himself.
February 3rd, 2009 at 9:51 pm
[...] Marc Singer has the most intelligent negative review of Final Crisis I’ve seen. He’s also, unfortunately, giving up blogging. Luckily, he’s writing a book on Morrison, which could well be the definitive word on the subject if his blog posts are anything to go by. Doctor K, meanwhile, has a more positive review, as do the Mindless Ones. [...]
February 3rd, 2009 at 10:10 pm
On the dual Bat-corpse and Neander-bat, a property of objects hitting the event horizon of a black hole is that an objects information lingers nearly forever on the horizon,while hte matter itself gets sucked in, doing the spaghettification/singularity dance.
Darkseid seems cognate with a black hole in the narrative, and so one interpretation could be that Batman’s “information,” his symbols and aspects, remained behind while the matter of Batman passed through, and meeting Darkseid is getting to the singularity.
Now, a “naked” singularity has been referenced by physicists as acting similar to a wormhole, and the Radion/aspect-degrading material could have stripped off that layer just enough to turn Darkseid from a Supermassive Black Hole to a Naked Singularity, philosophically. The corpse could be chalked up to the ‘information.”
Going on the rocket thesis, Superman was sent to the Consensus Reality through space, and Batman was sent from the Consensus Reality through time. Yet more parallels.
Y’know, I really hope that when Bruce comes back to the Consensus that no one explains the particulars of his leaving. It’s like the “nine steps” taken by Thor after fighting Jormundgandr, or what Wodan whispered into Baldur’s ear: the unanswered questions about those moments that make them divine.
February 4th, 2009 at 12:16 am
I really loved this supercomic. The first sequence is mint for so many reasons, obviously.
I don’t see what the problem everyone has with Wonder Woman crumbling the beastmask is. This whole comic jumps around in time, in a muddle of three people’s narratives — I see no problem in that one page being symbolic of Diana’s rebirth, and the crumbling coming much after it’s in a glass case — possibly before she goes off to take the kids to bed, she stops and has a moment. It’s a minor detail. A lot of these sequences come across as total collage work.
No All-Star Super-Lois in the big FUCK-YEAH Superman Rescue Squad? Sadness!
I’m not sure I see what the problem with the giant penny is, exactly. Is it because it’s a clear hold-out from Sprang’s glorious reign? I love Sprang, and I love Batman having giant props. If you were to ask me what Batcave needs? Giant penny, dinosaur, Batcomputer. That’s it. Some poor lighting.
You know, the first time I read it, I thought Superman’s song led to him ending up somewhere else, but … well, no shit, he doesn’t. Everything just looks awful because he’s destroyed it all to disperse Darkseid. And there’s Metron’s chair.
Metron, who brought the Metron circuit of freedom not to mention fire, to the people, lends Superman a chair to sit in while he draws schematics for the Miracle Machine. Hits home the timeline of the thing.
I love that Renee doesn’t bother with the pseudoskin mask half the time. THE MASKS ARE COMING OFF. Her outfit is wonderful, though, and totally points at her demigod status (she’s human, sure, but she walks with Gods, and seems to transcend…)
The mythopoetics of the Wonderhorn, and Nubia’s Earth are great — good job, gang.
I love that moment — “On your knees. Submit. The armies of Libra have arrived.” — when everyone flounders and Sivana hehhs. Libra? So passe, Wonderbeast.
It is appropriate that Diana leads the Female Furies, who are the distilled qlippothic shithouse equivalent of the Amazons. Too bad Morrison doesn’t seem to care for her, by and large, as he said in that exit interview; if we ever get past the Trinity paradigm, Renee’s Question has the chops to take her position, and it seems like maybe that’s what he’s getting at.
FRANKENSTEIN RIDES FOR JUSTICE. He needs his own damn book already. He knocked it out of the park, Morrison did, using him in SEVEN SOLDIERS; he is, in my mind, the stand-out expected performance of that project. I WILL WRITE IT FOR THEM IF THEY WANT.
February 4th, 2009 at 12:20 am
Poor Clark, by the way. Apollo gets to go home and cuddle Midnighter after this is all over; Clarkie’s one true Bat-Love is stuck in a Raquel Welsh movie. I’m hoping this leads to a pseudo-Sprang Bat-Caveman bridge story.
February 4th, 2009 at 12:38 am
Also, yeah, I know, but: the alternate title for this issue should have been YOU’LL BELIEVE A MAN CAN SING.
February 4th, 2009 at 4:32 am
Ah, won’t someone who hasn’t read any FC draw a version of it based on these notes alone?
February 4th, 2009 at 9:46 am
Dear Papers, I am stealing that line.
Thanks,
Dan
February 4th, 2009 at 9:51 am
A lot of people think that both the penny and the dinosaur should go, Papers.
They’re just not serious enough.
February 4th, 2009 at 10:04 am
They should go. They should be replaced with grubby polaroids of broken-wristed rapists tied to lamp-posts outside the GCPD building. Grr.
In fact, the cave should look more like the offices of The Wire’s MCU, because that’s what Batman would really, really be doing if he were really, really real.
Meanwhile, on Newsarama’s 20 Questions with Dan DiDio, he confirms that Shilo Norman’s colouring was an error, and will be corrected for the trade.
February 4th, 2009 at 10:21 am
They should go. They should be replaced with grubby polaroids of broken-wristed rapists tied to lamp-posts outside the GCPD building.
Yes
February 4th, 2009 at 12:00 pm
Teh secret origin of the monitor’s names:
IGN Comics: I want to get to the Monitors and their overall role in Crisis and Beyond, especially the role played by Nix Uotan – am I saying that right?
Morrison: It’s pronounced “Wotan.” Every one of them is named after writer gods from different cultures. So Uotan is named after Odin or Wotan from the Norse/Germanic tradition. Ogama is Ogma from the Celtic gods. Hermuz is after Hermes the Greek god. Tahoteh is after Thoth the Egyptian god. Novu is after Nabu from the Babylonian pantheon…there’s a ton of them. The women’s names, Weeja Dell, Zillo Valla, were inspired by the greatest lost love of them all, Shalla-Bal from Stan Lee’s Silver Surfer.
February 4th, 2009 at 4:49 pm
A lot of people think that both the penny and the dinosaur should go, Papers…They’re just not serious enough.
And people wonder why I hate them so very, very much. Heaven forfend the Bat-Mythos should have any personality. Maybe Nolan’s next film can just be David Caruso in a Bat-mask, reading out the tax code (Fans to ask, “Why are they adapting that Queen of Fables story from JLA? And getting it wrong?) — will that be serious enough? The Joker should just kill Jason Todd again and Bats can leave the body lying around in spite of Alfred’s aggressive attempts to clean up. “It’s not, ah, sanitary, Master Bruce.”
February 4th, 2009 at 5:22 pm
No, Papers, no. Batman is realistic, and noir, and human, and realistic and based in reality, and also is realistic.
Aliens and freeze-rays and timetravel and folks turning into bats and kids in green shorts and silly pits which can raise the dead and shapeshifting people made out of clay and all that nonsense have never been been a part of Batman and never should be.
February 4th, 2009 at 5:58 pm
From now on, Batman should always be depicted as Eddie Constantine’s Lemmy Caution, making bat-ears with his index fingers.
February 4th, 2009 at 6:45 pm
Is he serious, Papers, this Lemmy Caution? Is he dark? Is he broody? Is he, in short, the sort of thing that a real grown-up would read, and not something silly, like a kid would read? Because I’m a grown-up, me. I don’t want silliness in my comics. Because my comics aren’t silly. No. No, they’re not. Stop it.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
“Dark Reign was planned by a bunch of guys that thought Obama was going to lose.”
Not if you take into consideration Bendis previous event book — where all sorts of cheap and unimaginative red-scare/cylon bullshit analogues on the War on Terror were on display with some icky undertones (and overtones). Faggy liberals wanting to give their asses up to invaders and the trojan horses (“Look at the fagtards hippies lol — ‘we want teh change, messiah!’, multiculturalist givers”), a bunch of religious alien lizard sand ni**ers wanting to fuck shit up who deserve no argument if they deserve to be killed (no sign of the at least 0.1% of already-cliche “cleverness” of the invaders being portrayed as “us” in irony. Only the good old “we’re the little guys here” that every empire had to justify themselves), the weird ads, the military ads inside and outside marvel comics for a while, a good pristine pure clear white god who has a dick bigger than their gods etc. Might be something else on torture, but I couldn’t read the whole damn thing…
It was pretty Limbaugh from what I saw, man (taking in consideration that even the usual “liberal”-minded person in the U.S. is generally pretty backwards). So I’m not so sure “Dark Reign” is what you think it is (even more when putting Osborn, the guy who killed Spidey’s girlfriend, as a top dog — and he still bumps the poor guy’s fist… the nerve!). Specially if one considers good old dog-whistles of the usual sort of republican communication familiar to those who remember the Clinton era (“he’s not my president”, “we were defeated/overtaken etc”, “liberals=anti-american=enemy=islam=socialism etc”).
And it kinda makes me wonder if Lex in the White House was in synch with those views on Clinton in the 90s. But that’s for another day, since the above was already off-message.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:05 pm
My ideal Batman is just a naked man with a dead bat sellotaped to his forehead.
Issue 7 of FC didn’t feature this, sadly (though Batman in the past at the end is heading in the right direction), but it had just about everything else I want from a comic. I don’t know if this is a comparison anyone will enjoy or agree with, but it sort of reminded me of ‘Here Comes Tomorrow’ at the end of Morisson’s New X-Men – there’s a LOT going on and while I may not be 100% sure what happened on first read, I definitely felt the emotional ‘beats’ and GM’s trademark Crazy Mad Mental (etc) ideas.
It was far from incomprehensible, which a lot of people on the internet are claiming in angry tones. Surely the ‘channel-hopping/collage/whatever’ approach can be navigated by anyone who has seen a film trailer, or even a ‘last time on Buffy’ section, or anything in the entire world that isn’t completely linear or describes every single thing that happens in minute detail.
I dunno, I’m just the equally-irritating flipside to these people that HATE the comic and Morisson, I suppose, what with being hideously biased in that about the only DC stuff I own features either Morisson or Batman, or both.
Phew.
Excellent comic, though. And it’s the sign of a good internet article/review/discussion (there’s some ace stuff in the comments too) that reading you Mindless Ones actually makes me palpably excited about rereading the comic. CANNOT WAIT FOR PART 2.
P.S. Did anyone else love the Roman superman, flying with one arm behind his back?
February 4th, 2009 at 8:20 pm
Come on, this was terrible. I’m just saying compared to the last issue of Civil War, which was not very satisfying at the time, this last issue of Final Crisis is completely unsatisfying.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
I’d like to point out that Captain Trips is not me (some dude from Barbelith) and that I really liked Final Crisis.
I’d have more to add, honestly, if Neon Snake didn’t make them for me, in a more entertaining way than I could muster.
He’s my better thinking, Universe B superior. He is my nemesis… The Prismatic Agent!
Oh, I do have one thing. Someone mentioned that creepy line, “Switzerland just got further away” was, although effective, inaccurate. I reckon it’s right; if you’re being pulled into a spacetime sinkhole made out of Dirk Said then things get pulled. As Darkseid falls the things closer to him go farther first
Gravity wells: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravity_well
Checkmate base is inside the traffic cone, Switzerland is still on the flat edge.
I thought of this fanwank while I was on the loo.
Beyond that I loved the Wonder Horn (definitely echoes of the Horn of Jabreel from Vinmanarama, and also of Boy Blue’s horn from Seven Soldiers). I didn’t catch the ur-primality of it until it was mentioned here. To me it was Giger-tech. Alien god-technology in a distended organic shape.
February 4th, 2009 at 8:38 pm
Ain’t nothing off message, Mick. I disagree with your analysis, but only just…
February 4th, 2009 at 8:50 pm
Always good to have you front and centre, Triplets.
Cap, it’s no good appealing to the actual facts of reality – we all really enjoyed this comic, despite the problems. There’s lots of reasons for this, hopefully I’ll touch on some in part 2 (due tomorrow)
My ideal Batman is just a naked man with a dead bat sellotaped to his forehead.
Thrilltone, I fucking love you, man.
Papers, as ever, I feel your pain
February 4th, 2009 at 9:18 pm
It was far from incomprehensible, which a lot of people on the internet are claiming in angry tones. Surely the ‘channel-hopping/collage/whatever’ approach can be navigated by anyone who has seen a film trailer, or even a ‘last time on Buffy’ section, or anything in the entire world that isn’t completely linear or describes every single thing that happens in minute detail.
Marry me.
But really, honestly, it’s a good point — is it really that difficult? It wasn’t incomprehensible so much as it was a good depiction of me trying to watch two or more shows at once while the commercials are invading (“Oh, fuck, it’s an AQUAMAN ad. Switch it switch it to Darkseid, yes, good, we’re back from the break…”).
Meanwhile, I love love love that Secret Invasion has been reduced to “the previous Bendis event book.”
February 4th, 2009 at 9:47 pm
Triplets, you mad mad madman, I’ve contributed nada to this one other than a vague questioning “What happe- and then did he- d’y'all think they…?”.
But c’mere anyway and gimme a hug.
Say! Talking of prismatics, is it too early to start warbling on about how Earth-Zero has just ascended to FifthWorld status, the age of Men as Gods! And how all the other Earths, being that they are supported by Earth-Zero at the bottom of the pyramid, are now just pale reflections of it, which is why the New Gods have new avatars on Earth-Zero? Shilo – Miracle, obvs. Super Young Team – Forever People, course. But who else?
February 4th, 2009 at 10:32 pm
Ray – Lightray, if you squint a whole lot.
Tattoed Man is prolly something, it’ll come to me; I thought att one point he might be the silvery Metron that he looks like in #4 somehow, but I can’t make it work.
I also, see commetns above, have fanwanked Batman – Orion, but I came up with a brilliant extrapolation further which is: what is the Orion star constellation, what is it famed for? Eh? EHHHH???! And then shot back into time, “the battle never ends”, I’m getting quite into this actually.
Although:
My ideal Batman is just a naked man with a dead bat sellotaped to his forehead.
I just deleted the duplicate comments featuring this, the greatest expression of fandom anywhere, ever for mere neatness’ sake. I wonder, now, if that wasn’t a terrible mistake.
February 4th, 2009 at 10:36 pm
Oh, not to mount a massive defense of Brian Daniel Bendis or anything, but I do like some of his comics (though emphatically not Secret Invasion) and he’s – you know – a Jewish art school kid, so I think, maybe, just maybe he was conscious of who the invading force parallels in his (look, if he didn’t, pretty fucking racist) last event comic.
February 4th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
Lightray, squint, good one.
Orion – go on, Bots? What is it famous for? I’m not well versed on stars. Disappearing for a couple of months?
February 4th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Oh come on, Neener, I’m not going to spell it out. Use the google – it is a thing for which Batman is also justly famed, and has a certain prominence in the last two or so panels of FC.
February 4th, 2009 at 11:11 pm
Having a belt?
Being featured in lots of cave paintings and apparently is the first constellation mankind charted?
And hey, Batman is disappearing for a couple of months whilst they knock out battle for the cowl.
February 4th, 2009 at 11:37 pm
WTF, don’t say I’m from Barbelith, that was a secret.
To be fair, I didn’t read much of Secret Invasion, while I read all of Final Crisis. At least the first 6 issues of FC are gold, every issue of Secret Invasion is a waste of time.
I couldn’t believe how Marvel went to absurd lengths to ground their universe in reality in Civil War (people actually realize, ‘why do we let human WMDs run around in masks without regulation?’), only to do a complete 180 by saying “SKRULLSLSSSSS! Alienssssssss! hiding for YEAAAAARssssssss!” and “Spiderman makes deal with the devil, whole world forgets he’s peter parker!” Seriously, what happened in between Civil War (which was pretty good, IMO), and Secret Invasion?
On the other hand, the ending to Final Crisis was really unsatisfying, whether or not you choose to ignore the ‘actual facts of reality’. Batman’s not dead, Morrison’s been selling me the idea that Batman will really seriously for real not joking die for months. Only that was a bold faced lie. I mean, I would have read RIP either way, but Morrison never delivered on the epic Batman death he promised, because, well, Batman’s not dead.
Don’t curse me Morrison, I still love you and your amazing bald head.
February 4th, 2009 at 11:44 pm
Did he?
I thought that for months both Morrison and DiDio have been pretty upfront in saying that he’ll be back; and that he’s not going to die, it’ll be a “fate worse than death”.
February 4th, 2009 at 11:45 pm
Morrison’s been selling me the idea that Batman will really seriously for real not joking die for months
I think, should you try and find referents to support that, you’ll probably find it’s not the case?
First item, Neon – it’s like the most famous thing about the constellation; your other facts, which I did not know, are fuel to my fire, grist to my mill.
Batmanthrorion.
February 4th, 2009 at 11:54 pm
I completely stepped over the belt thing, Bots, until I looked at the last couple of pages again and went “…oh. Yeah, they’ve both got bloody obvious belts.”
Meanwhile, google turned up the cavepaintings! So, yeah. Batmanthrorion.
Himon – Detective Chimp. No real reason, I just want Detective Chimp to be a New God avatar.
February 5th, 2009 at 12:06 am
YES.
There’s an odd kind of mirroring with Himon & Metron/Mokkari & Simyan that may be utterly insignificant, but I just want to point out I noticed it. I am the noticer.
February 5th, 2009 at 12:09 am
All I know is “Batman ‘REST IN PEACE’” is a bit misleading (IMO) when Batman in fact does NOT rest in peace. Nope, he’s still alive! Psyche-out!
February 5th, 2009 at 12:14 am
The Tattooed Man. I think he could be a Metron avatar/analog actually. He’s a baddie who’s moved to the side of good. He’s got both sides in him, and Metron’s concept is that he stands outside such distinctions. Fair enough, Tattoo Man is a card carrying member of the goodies now, while Metron tries to remain ambiguous (although, he’s ultimately a good force), but it could be a fit.
February 5th, 2009 at 12:22 am
Triplets – do it. Metron=Tattoed Man. Add in the fact that he was carrying Metron’s circuit around, and he did indeed turn Metron-enamally, and it’s good to go.
I mean, it’s not like Geoff Johns or any other author is ever going to pick up these concepts and run with them, so no-one’s ever going to prove us wrong.
Big Barda – I’d prefer Black Canary over Wonder Woman, but I don’t really have anything other than “They’re women. And they’re handy in a scrap.”
February 5th, 2009 at 2:54 am
Neon Snake – Big Barda and Black Canary are both agressors (Diana is more of a peacenik who begrudgingly fights on a regular basis – that’s my story and I’m sticking to it), and are both known for being in wedded pairs: Big Barda/Mister Miracle, Black Canary/Green Arrow.
February 5th, 2009 at 1:54 pm
So the final page was the editorial request after all.
February 5th, 2009 at 3:46 pm
mrbretteron – Yeah, Black Canary does work better than Wonder Woman. I’m just wondering if there’s someone better, other than me just picking the first two *women* that sprung to mind.
AndyG – Yup. I’d like to see Morrison’s original idea for the page, since it seems that all they asked was to make it less “ambiguous”.
lolSnake sez I can haz part 2 now?
February 5th, 2009 at 4:08 pm
‘while Metron tries to remain ambiguous’
That’s very true – so then Morrissey is an avatar of Metron too, I guess
February 5th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
Y’know, I think I like Frankenstein as Orion, all things considered.
February 5th, 2009 at 4:33 pm
Can has part 2 late tonight/maybe tomorrow at the latest
February 5th, 2009 at 5:10 pm
With “BatmanOrion” being the case…that whole “Son kills the Father kills the son kills the father and so on” endless cycle really shines now eh?
February 5th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
It is probably the most winningest theory of history, I think.
February 5th, 2009 at 11:48 pm
Then again, Batman may indeed be indeed resting in peace. Bruce ditched the cowl in Consensus reality (RIP) and JLA-Godform Batman got hit by the quantum madballs of the Omega Sanction (FC), leaving a cowl-less Bruce Wayne struggling with no city, no cowl, and no coherent place in time. Bruce has that great constant struggle, Living as he is, while Batman gets a chance to rest his patagia on the upside-down Lay-Z-Boy in his cave and watch Designing Women at his leisure, at least until everyone starts going bonkers and pulling on his hat for the next six months.
I guess this is another angle of the Prism, filtering Batman’s polarized rod-cell light this round rather than Superman’s colorized cone-cell light.
Just for argument’s sake, I personally like the synch of Wonder Woman and Barda as reformed Furies, changed by love. Barda’s Love was the astrological 7th house pairing sort, while Wonder Woman’s seems more 11th/12 House universal. On that, Hell, Iris West could be Barda.
February 6th, 2009 at 12:53 am
“Then again, Batman may indeed be indeed resting in peace. Bruce ditched the cowl in Consensus reality (RIP) and JLA-Godform Batman got hit by the quantum madballs of the Omega Sanction (FC), leaving a cowl-less Bruce Wayne struggling with no city, no cowl, and no coherent place in time. Bruce has that great constant struggle, Living as he is, while Batman gets a chance to rest his patagia on the upside-down Lay-Z-Boy in his cave and watch Designing Women at his leisure, at least until everyone starts going bonkers and pulling on his hat for the next six months.”
This assumes Bruce won’t be back in the cowl, doesn’t it? Rest in peace for a year or two, then back on the job, it should have been called.
February 6th, 2009 at 2:38 am
The New Gods won’t have fifth world avatars. Man is the new new gods. Similarities are just that. One of the points of FC was to put the fourh world to bed.
The reincarnated new gods was shot down some time ago back when Firestorm/Lightray was an idea.
The forever people/ super young team connection was only made to represent that they are kids of our time like the Forever People were for the flower children.
In other news, who remembers Superman/Batman #25 with Myx and Darkseid and the line “From the fourth world to the fifth dimension.”
How much did Loeb know before he left for Marvel?
February 6th, 2009 at 9:31 am
Loeb knew everything
Everything!
February 6th, 2009 at 9:47 am
Sooo…Loeb=Monitor, then?
On Batman: RIP – if all I knew was that an upcoming arc was going to be called “RIP”, there’s no part of my comic-loving brain that would ever assume that Batman/Bruce would be properly-for-real killed. I might guess that he would appear to be dead, to us the readers, or to Alfred, Robin, Nightwing et al, or something to make the title relevant, but I wouldn’t think “they” were going to kill him off. He’s Batman, best-selling DC franchise, etc etc.
But the interviews, wherein we found out what Morrison was intending to do with the tale, did quite specifically say that he wasn’t going to kill him, he was going to send him to a fate “worse than death”. DiDio has also repeatedly stated that Bruce will be back at some point.
February 6th, 2009 at 10:56 am
Loeb be the prophet.
February 6th, 2009 at 10:59 am
Don’t know why you’re posting here, you naughty man.
Don’t you have a Final Crisis post you could be working on!?!
February 6th, 2009 at 2:23 pm
[...] Final Crikeysis #7 – All foreground, all the time! (part 1 of 2) [...]
February 9th, 2009 at 1:57 am
[...] of all, Dan DiDio has apparently noticed the widespread (although not universal) discontent with Final Crisis, and has wasted no time in openly mocking the [...]
February 11th, 2009 at 1:32 am
[...] Part One. [...]
February 15th, 2009 at 11:12 pm
[...] not a living, exactly…) the rising crescendo of deferred action, the world all foregrounded and all climactic, suspended and vibrating: the glimpse of the sublime that organizes our reading, [...]
May 24th, 2014 at 8:22 pm
Even if Morrison wasn’t implying it with the title “Batman RIP,” I would say not to discount the resurrection. Many who sleep shall awaken; Batman (Bruce Wayne) would come back.
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