Somnopolis

The debut novel of Austin Grossman is a strange beast. It’s a novel that at its heart is a love letter to comic books, the bastard cousin of the more refined print-based artform, criticised in the past as a childish interest suitable only for illiterates. Grossman himself is feted as a newcomer to genre fiction, although a quick wiki reveals his father is a poet, his mother a novelist, his twin brother also a writer, his sister a scultor – and Grossman himself well-known in the computer game industry for his involvement in

• Ultima Underworld II
• System Shock
• Deus Ex
• Thief: Deadly Shadows
• Tomb Raider: Legend

Plot based Role-Playing Games for the most part, hardly the usual first-time author juvenalia. He’s even written for the New York Times! Then there’s the promotional artwork of Bryan Hitch that features in the book, the comic-book artist credited with inventing the ‘widescreen’, aesthetic that has allowed comics to further ape the visual excesses of big budget summer blockbuster movies. Not the typical amateur cover art then.

Thankfully Soon I Will Be Invincible carries the weight of expectation ably. Its knowing title is a clue to the awareness Grossman brings to the comic book tropes on show. The story focuses on two first-person narratives. Doctor Impossible, a twelve-time imprisoned supervillain who has a horrible habit of blurting his secret plans and blames his villainous behaviour on a personality disorder; and Fatale, a new superheroine plagued by self-doubt in the typical Modern Age fashion, whose tragic origin allows for that other great trope of contemporary comics, the fetishizing of the female body courtesy of her cybernetic implants. Star Trek: Voyager’s Seven-of-Nine meets Brian Michael Bendis’ Alias.

Doctor Impossible, the arch supervillain who just will not quit trying to take over the world, is the stronger character of the two. Given the title I suspect the original draft may have solely focused on his attempts to defeat the hero team The Champions. Perhaps Grossman felt this was too narrow. In any case courtesy of the two POV characters we follow the progression of the plot, with the heroes attempting to stop Doctor Impossible following his latest jailbreak and solve the mystery of their colleague CoreFire’s disappearance.

We are invited to sympathize with the villainous Doc, despite his continued efforts to takeover the world. Even he is unable to explain exactly why he acts as he does. He appears to be of the opinion that his vast intellect actually drives him to be evil, that to see the world as he does predestines supervillainy. In that he follows the Stan Lee tradition of villains who are at times misunderstood, occasionally even noble. Doctor Doom may be a totalitarian dictator whose hatred of Reed Richards is spurred on by vanity – but he also is a bereft son, whose study of the occult was undertaken to rescue his gypsy mother from demons. In Kevin Smith’s Mallrats Lee makes a cameo appearance and delivers dialogue he wrote for the Spider-Man villain the Vulture, which revealed a vulnerable side to the costumed criminal another writer may have ignored.

Grossman’s Doctor Impossible is also not a world away from Joss Whedon’s Dr Horrible, or The Venture Brothers’  The Monarch – both ultimately delusional romantics who have been left disillusioned by the world. The heroes to them are merely the next stage in development of the schoolyard bullies they grew up with. CoreFire’s invulnerability lends him a smugness that’s similar to Whedon’s Captain Hammer: Everyone’s a hero in their own way / Everyone’s got villains they must face / They’re not as cool as mine / But folks you know it’s fine to know your place

The post-Marvel Age, post-Watchmen deconstruction trend allowed writers to re-examine superheroes with regard to their motivations and true intent. Batman became a psychopath, the X-Men child soldiers in a battle of ideologies, Superman a fascist boyscout and the Incredible Hulk a victim of abuse. Grossman plays with this exaggerated comic book ‘realism’, but undercuts it with genuine affection for supers.

At one point Fatale even wonders self-consciously if we have entered a ‘Rust Age’, in keeping with the classifying of different comic book periods as Golden Age, Silver Age etc. The general rule of thumb is that the earlier comic books represent a more hopeful era. Comic book historians have to turn a blind eye to the prevalent racism and misogyny to maintain such a claim, but it’s one that still holds some currency. Fatale herself, with her badgirl look and militarised powers is firmly in keeping with the modern era’s blending of sex and violence. Grossman has her repeatedly question her origins though, obscured by a convenient bout of amnesia and in that query the treatment of characters like Fatale, who are oftentimes designed to titillate rather than exist as independent female superheroes. That this all becomes a function of the plot itself displays just how much Grossman intended the book to be both a critique and a homage to the comics he loves.

Soon I Will Be Invincible I was gratified to discover is much more than a printed version of some gamer’s Champion’s campaign. It’s quite possibly the most entertaining book about comics since Michael Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay.

Mr Chick is a man I first heard of in Trinity college ‘98. A Christian cartoonist with what some might call controversial views regarding his faith (I would choose the phrase ‘batshit crazy’) he has issued various comics out to subscibers depicting his ‘take’. There was a time when most of it was available on the internet – his piece on the evils of D&D was a particular favourite of mine – but that is no longer the case to the same extent as, last time I checked, people are willing to pay for this bilge. I even remember a note on which schools were in receipt of these ‘religious magazines’.

Anyway, rant over. I’m including a wiki on the man below, but first! A sketch that apparently represents a previously unknown collaboration between Chick and Stan ‘the Man’ Lee.

Ye gods, is nothing sacred. It’s times like this I wish I could speak Yiddish. Stan, I’m so disappointed :O

Anyway,

http://www.yourmomsbasement.com/archives/2006/11/galactus_is_com.html

And the wiki

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Chick

Radiation guilt?

Just a notion and perhaps others can point me in the right direction, but I was thinking the other day about how Manga/Anime has dealt with Hiroshima and Nagasaki. It echoes through most of the dystopian storylines produced by Japan. There is a recurring story trope of nuclear holocaust ushering in a darker civilization, be they demons, vampires, religious zealots or the Akira dystopia.

In the sixties in the states we had veterans like Kirby illustrating and writing comics. As a member of the Marvel stable, he was among the contributors who created characters whose ’superhero’, identities were the result of radiation. The Hulk is exposed to gamma radiation and becomes a creature of unfettered strength. Captain America is dosed with radiation in order to stimulate his body to become enhanced. Spider-Man is bitten by a radioactive spider, mutants were originally the first generation to be affected by ambient radiation I believe (in keeping with the novel ‘Children of the Atom’), though now we are led to believe it was due to evolution. Even Daredevil receives his powers due to domestic toxic waste.

So were these comic superbeings created in order to assuage public guilt over the atomic bombings? Not in a conspiratorial sense – men in a dark room deciding to brainwash the children of America with Atomic Propaganda – no, I mean more in the sense of cultural synchronicity. There was a general sense of unease over the use of atomic weapons and fantasies were constructed that used atomic power in a beneficial way.

However, being constructed as fantasies this may well have been a self-reflexive admission of ‘guilt’.

Now European comics, as well as Jodorowsky, Bilal etc….don’t see this ‘atomic dystopia/enhancement’, theme so much. DC comic characters acquired before WW2 are aliens, magicians, master strategists and vigilantes. With the ‘Marvel Age’, we have the power of the Atom being employed.

Just curious myself.

Review of Serenity to follow shortly.