What benefits sprout from a trade collection of monthly
comic books? Comics best thrive in a serialized format, a publication sequence
that allows time to digest and ponder the story and its possibilities between
issues…a publication regime that doesn’t
overwhelm or burn out the reader…20 pages of Justice League Dark parceled out once a month are fine…200 pages of
Justice League Dark all at once would
be too much. Hence, the allure of a trade collection of monthly comic issues
never converted me.
All has since changed.
Prophet showed
trade collections exist as a second coming, a reissue of good news, for those
of us who missed the first opportunity at experiencing a rapture (plus there
excerpts from Brandon Grahams sketchbook with his initial Prophet designs are
included).
I’m converted.
Initially the cover of Prophet
21 intrigued, but I neglected to follow the series because a cursory glance
illicited a negative reaction to the art (the same disdain occurred when looking
at the first issue of MIND MGMT…surely
some lesson should have been
learned by now) and boredom arose at another tale of a lone man wandering an
apocalyptic landscape. Reading the tale in trade revealed that there was much
more lurking in the story than a man and his apocalypse. The trade transformed
that reaction. The Prophet story
reads well collected, and the experience of reading the issues back to back
allow for an immersion into this strange world that won’t allow readers to
reach escape velocity.
And what a world! I realize I’m boarding the Prophet bus (or rocket) late, yet still Prophet shatters any jaded
desensitization to tumbled earth empires with its redefinition of strange.
Aside from torquing one’s mind and weaving a captivating
story (as if these two points aren’t reason enough), what other machinations
could the oddness of Prophet exert on the human mind? In an excerpt from John
Dewey’s Art as Experience, the Vermont
philosopher/educator writes “The moral function of art itself is to do away
with prejudice, do away with the scales that keep the eye from seeing, tear
away the veils due to wont and custom, perfect the power to perceive.” Dewey here leans on “adherence to a
preliminary opinion or feeling without thought or experience” for an
understanding of “prejudice.” While someone may obtain some odd looks (and provocative
solicitations) if others hear them espousing appreciation for the moral
function of Prophet that banishes
stale depictions of a ravaged future earth. Part of the allure of the story
that simultaneously orients and disorients is Simon Prophet’s knowledge of this
future earth. Prophet holds more knowledge than readers, and we’re able,
slightly, oh so very slightly fellow and future-fellow Prophet followers, to glean some knowledge of location and the new
species that have evolved and some causes, or hints of causes, at the state of
this future-present earth. Yet, there is much that Simon Prophet doesn’t know,
or doesn’t reveal in his refreshing and much welcomed and appreciated lack of
laments or brooding on solitude or the harsh changes that beset his home
planet. The details occupying the background banish the prejudice of
an overexposed future earth’s devastation and offer readers a fresh visceral
experience of running free like a virgin in an alien-highjacked world.[1] The
organic mixtures of the non-human with the human and biological bondings give a
strange air to the book. The definition of humanity has slackened from the
physical and individual, and grasps at something else for the future of the
species. Simon Prophet’s bonding with the Dolmantle and an alien sex fiend,
consumption of human flesh, and utilizing a regrown-alien arm disrupts the
notions of humanity. Be warned however, if a Prophet Cookbook should ever be released, one would be wise to pass
on the gastronomical grimoire.
Oracles often precede prophets, so please treat the gathered
“Sayings for the Prophet” on each issue of
Graham and crew’s collected six issues as a call from the converted to follow
this Prophet.
A
A lyrical ballad altering the familiar to the strange for a copied
laconic questing knight birthed from a mechanized buried womb that emerged from
Mother Earth and unleashed its spawn in
a Darwin-ransacked land. Simon Prophet returns like a genetic remembrance
manifests in a world of crashed space ships and four-jawed Talnakas before brown,
red and blue color schemes.
B
Grey, tan, and brown color the Taza Caravan’s trek beneath the
power shell repelling flesh-hungry desert insects. Bug-evolved Oiiz and
time-altered caravaning elephants perform sacrificial kingly rituals while a
trophy-hunting sportsman bugs yields to a killing whim.
C
Tower reached. Quest complete.
Clones awake. Veil lifts. Story arc ends. The given conclusion generates
greater queries. The new earth empire rouse from its slumber.
D
Same name, different clone. New place, and a new plot within the plot accompany
the new artist. Radiation-rich atmosphere slowly balds and poisons the hero as
it corrupts his flesh, and the close simultaneously triumphs and fails in a
fight with himself after traversing the corrupting innards of an orbiting robot
city. Neonaught skin protects the lapsarian slip to an earth-empire mother.
E
A Jaxson robot (?) wanders for its Jung brother in a minimalist-hard-line
background while the empire ceaselessly beckons. Worm-hole rings usher the
wanderer to the light for transmission of the message: “John…It’s starting
again.”
F
An armed clone trinity defend an Arch Mother amidst
chromatic wizardry of browns, blues, and oranges. All die from the swift
fingers of a John Prophet who ascends to the Womb Ship and usurps the Arch
Mother’s crown. It has started again.
[1]
Possibly the first Iron Maiden/Madonna allusion back to back in the history of
comic book reviews!
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