Comic review: Miracleman #1- Neil Gaiman and the Perpetual 80’s

Writer: Neil Gaiman
Artist: Mark Buckingham
Publisher: Marvel Comics
Released: 2nd September 2015



I didn’t read Alan Moore’s Miracleman series when it was first released in 1982. I was around at the time, but doing something else, probably obsessed with American football, or just plain old football, I expect. I was reading 2000AD though, irregularly, and this new Miracleman #1 by Neil Gaiman very much reminds me of that time period in my life.

This new book has a narrative starting date of 1987. It’s a future parallel world 1987 with a God like superhero and a destroyed, then rebuilt London, but it’s a very familiar 1987. It’s a 1987 that is very, very 1980’s. It’s a 1987 that could have been written in 1985, at least, that’s how it reads.

Perhaps it’s just me, but whenever I read anything by Neil Gaiman it has that 1980’s feel about it. I get the sense that he doesn’t really care about the contemporary neoliberal world. His narrative universe is the late 1980’s, and so he is the perfect choice to be the writer on a book that is set in a parallel universe 1987. He doesn’t have to deal with anything that has actually happened in the real world for the past twenty eight or so years, he can build his cocoon in the late 80’s and he can go back to the past, a place where he very evidentially feels most at home.

The narrative itself in Miracleman #1 is instantly accessible. It’s easy to follow and brings the reader straight into the world, telling a story from the point of view of a man with hope, seeing him through a difficult journey, and concluding with a revelation of either hope realised, or hope destroyed. I won’t spoil it. The story is okay, it’s enjoyable, and I think that it’s worthwhile you getting the book to enjoy it for yourself.

The art has a bit of a Watchman feel about it, mixed with some of the recent stuff I’ve seen in Jeff Lemiere’s Trillium, and in the art by Matteo Scalera in Rick Remender’s Black Science. The faces are a bit sharp, very pointy noses and high cheekbones, and very blonde, and the colouring has an unreality to it that screams ‘sci-fi comic’ of the 1980’s, but in colour. I don’t have any problem with it. I’d term it as ‘old fashioned new’ if that makes any sense, and it’s perfect for this kind of book.

Let’s sum things up then. Do I have a problem with Neil Gaiman being stuck in a perpetual 1987 world? No, of course not. He’s a successful, talented man, and his work is always enjoyable.

However, I’m the self-appointed (self-important) post 9/11 false flag/ NWO/Neo-liberal/Globalist comic book reviewer. So what I am after is never going to come from somebody like Neil Gaiman who doesn’t want to get out of the late 80’s, well at least from what I’ve read of his work anyway.

That’s cool man.

Miracleman#1 is a good book. I enjoyed it. The very last part confused me a bit, but I’ll be back for issue #2, and hopefully it will make some sense there.

Get the book if you enjoy Neil Gaiman’s late 80’s worlds, and yes I know he’s just continuing a series left off in the 80’s, so he has a good excuse for doing it here. If all you’re after is a decent comic book with a 1980’s nostalgia feel about it, then this one is a lot better than most of the other mainstream junk that’s being pushed onto the masses today. Check it out, put on those old 80’s records, and go back to a time when the Internet didn’t exist, Thatcher was killing off all working-class resistance and the BBC still had an aura of truth and respectability about it.


Rating: 7/10 (Back to the late 80’s with Gaiman, and why not?)

Comic review: Midnighter #4- Starring (or not) Cecil, the Vampire Lion

Writer: Steve Orlando
Artist: Stephen Mooney
Publisher: DC Comics
Released: 2nd September 2015



If you’ve read any of my previous reviews you’ll know that I’m a bit of a reality junkie. I like my comic books to be controversial, to be edgy, and to say something about the world as it is today.

'Yo man, where's that vampire lion at?'

DC and Marvel are brilliant at avoiding reality, and mainstream corporate consensus is writ large all over the pages of their books. These comic books help to prop up the legitimacy of the corporations and governments that own the western world.

Their writers are not brave, or edgy, or controversial. They might be talented, but truth-tellers they are most certainly not. They write what they are allowed to write, and the best and most celebrated comic book writers of our times push mainstream programming narratives without even realising it.

I’ve taken it upon myself to buy these books, these neoliberal vehicles of New World Order consensus, and to talk about the programming they are feeding into the minds of their readers. This doesn’t make me very popular, but that’s okay.

If you want to read a review that talks about how good the stories and art are, go somewhere else. My reviews are not about how ‘cool’ the characters are, or how ‘cool’ the art is, or how ‘cool’ the plot twists are, or how ‘cool’ the references to previous books are. I talk about the socio-political assumptions that the books are making. That’s what I do, and that is the only reason why I review daft comic books like Midnighter #4.

I haven’t read the book before, and I’m not familiar with the characters. Before purchasing the book all I knew was that the story involved Russia, and that it has vampires in it.

The book begins with a sub-heading- Moscow, the Forty-Forties.’ That’s already confusing. Does it mean the real world 1940’s or some comic book time period that never existed? By the end of the book I was still unsure about that. Anyway, the plot is a comic book critique of those rich people that go on Big Game hunting safaris. In the real world there was controversy over some dentist bloke shooting a lion called Cecil. He thought that he was allowed to shoot it, so he did. However, he wasn’t actually allowed to shoot poor old Cecil, the tour guide had deceived him, and now he’s a figure of worldwide hate. Humans are very odd. Shoot a lion and they get very upset, kill a million cows, and the same people couldn’t give a s***. Oh well, that’s the madness of our times.

Midnighter #4 replaces animals with vampires, with the rich people paying to kill a vampire, as opposed to a big cat. The book shows a group of men partying, killing a chained up vampire and feeling all macho about themselves for doing so. The heroes in this tale are two pretty boys who are going to give those evil vampire killers what they deserve. One is the Midnighter, and the other is Grayson. I couldn’t tell them apart, as they look the same, have the same physiques, and both engage in the same quips and smart-ass action hero banter.

Here come the tough guy heroes.

The book follows these two heroes as they beat up the cowardly vampire killers, and the people who set the vampire kill up for them. The two heroes are extremely violent, use torture like it’s cool, and have a great time quipping and high kicking as they inevitably defeat the evildoers and end up having a celebratory drink in that big creepy UN building in New York.

Do they work for the UN? Probably, because as we all know, the United Nations are the good guys, cough Rockefeller funded Zionism. Err, aren’t they? Of course they are. Don’t question the programming, enjoy the book, wow, it was so cool, did you see that punch and quip, and oh yeah, hunting is bad, eating meat is okay.

The book concludes, as all good comic books conclude, with a seeming defeat for the villains, and with the evil mastermind behind it all laughing and declaring that his plan is going just as he envisioned, and that the heroes don’t know what’s in store for them next, ha ha ha ha ha.

So yep, Midnighter #4 is just another comic book. The brave and daring libtard message is that hunting is bad, and that you shouldn’t kill defenceless animals. It’s a comic book that you can safely enjoy at McDonald’s with a Big McCancer burger whilst feeling good about yourself. If the two heroes were either vegetarian or animal welfare workers then it would have helped to clarify the meaning in the book, and it would also have given it all a sense of moral legitimacy, but there was no mention of vegetarianism or animal welfare anywhere within the narrative. Hey man, the message is confused, of course it is, that’s DC for you. They are parroting the popular lies of our times, and as lies are always contradictory, that’s what you get in books such as this.


Rating: 4/10 (Stupid quips and punches comic book that replaces Cecil the Lion with pretend vampires, oops was that a spoiler?)

The Comfortable Cage of Sweet Routine: A Day Interrupted in Swindon Town Centre

Poem by: Mark.A Pritchard (aka Rorshach1004/Swindon Poet)
Date: 3rd September 2015


Sweet routine, you comfortable little cage, on tracks I roll, going where I always go, but suddenly, leaves, a red stop sign, the comic book shop has a little notice on it’s closed door.

‘Gone for an emergency, back before 12:30pm at the latest.’

So I’m waiting in a coffee shop, not the vulgar ‘Friends’ type, the old fashioned type, the type where you sit at a little wobbly table, brush the sugar away, and watch for wasps.

I sit eating a brown bread cheese and onion toasty, with coffee.

The coffee is black, and much nicer than I thought that it would be. It shocks me into wakefulness, banishing the routine, the dream, this is reality now, and I’m forced to stop, stare and think about it.

The shoppers fly past, ignoring me, as they ignore each other, this is society, no communication, just little tracks of routine still running.

I watch the routines fly by as my own tracks are delayed, thinking back to mornings five, ten, fifteen, twenty, twenty-five, thirty years ago.

I have changed, but am still the same, sitting alone as I always did, not because of any reason, it's just the way that things are, and I do not question it now.

I finish up my coffee and there is a little smiley face at the bottom of my cup. He’s smiling at me, wishing me a pleasant day. I smile back, is this communication?

I sit up, the Polish waiters talk amongst themselves, and it’s almost 1pm. The comic book shop should be open by now.

I walk for two minutes, it’s open, the stop sign turns to green, and I’m back to my old routine again.




The beautiful image at the top of this poem is ‘Alone In the Crowd,’ by US artist David Derr. You can find his work here: 
http://fineartamerica.com/featured/alone-in-the-crowd-david-derr.html

Comic review: Our Friend Satan (the first seventeen pages)- A review of a Kick-Starter Project

Read comic here:
http://ourfriendsatan.com/comics/


Kick-Starter Page:
https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/imagomedia/our-friend-satan-graphic-novel



Why would Satan be depressed in 2015? The west has gone secular/atheist and the middle east is a Hell on earth with the west bombing it and funding, arming and training Sunni Muslims (ISIS) terrorists in order to take control of any country that is not part of neo-liberal western hegemony. Throw in the Ukraine and the western intervention there, and you have a world of chaos, no Christian God in sight, demonic Sunni Muslims beheading people on the daily news and a refugee crisis that gets worse by the hour.

A spooky beginning.

No, Satan wouldn’t be depressed, he’d be bloody, hellishly delighted. Satan has won, he was right, God was wrong. Humanity is dumber than ever, they cannot stop murdering each other, and millions of people don’t even believe in the immortality of the soul, and have been taught that humanity is nothing more than a bunch of over evolved monkeys that live, breed, fight and die. This is what Satan said in the very beginning. He argued that humanity was unworthy of the gift of life that was bestowed from the creator, and who would argue with him now?

That leads me to this kick-starter Graphic novel titled, ‘Our Friend Satan.’ The concept is that Satan is depressed. That intrigues me. How do you write a book where Satan is depressed when all you have to do is look around you to see that things couldn’t really be going better for the old red devil? What is going on here? I have to know more.

Let’s take a look.

The book begins with an evocation to the Devil, the art is very cuddly, the Devil appears, and he’s just an old, bald bloke in slippers. He's depressed because the Catholic Church are making him out to be far scarier than he actually is. Okay then, it’s not going to be a serious book. Instead it’s a book that’s going for laughs. The art is great by the way, very colourful, very professional, top drawer really, and a lot better than quite a lot of the haphazardly thrown together deadline chasing material that you get in Marvel and DC.

Then the Devil shows up, and the tone is set.

The setting is the future, so there’s no mention of anything contemporary, so scrub any mention of what is going on in Syria and Libya right now. That’s a good way to avoid controversy, and I don’t really like it.

I see it all of the time in mainstream comic books with characters like Captain America being sent to different dimensions where he can safely beat up some alien Nazi’s or something safe, thus ensuring that he doesn’t have to deal with the contemporary US foreign policy of arming terrorists and invading countries in order to maximise profits for western banks and corporations.

Captain America should say something about US corporate imperialism, but as long as he is safely hidden away in BattleWorld, he doesn’t have to.

I see the same thing happening here in ‘Our Friend Satan,’ but that doesn’t mean that it’s a bad comic. It’s a safe comic, and the villains are the future Catholic Church, so yep, it’s the Christians again who are getting it, and that’s disappointing, but not surprising. In this neo-liberal world of corporate consensus you are allowed to criticise the Catholic Church, to mock them, to make them look silly, or evil, and you’ll get no pushback at all.

The villains in the book are the Catholic Church.

If you mock Islam or Judaism then you’ll be in a whole heap of trouble, so comic book creators prefer to play it safe and leave them alone and attack and mock the one religion that it’s safe to mock. That religion is Christianity, the religion of the dying west, the religion that has been demolished by secular atheism and is currently being demolished by US backed Islamic terrorists in the middle east.

All of the villains in ‘Our Friend Satan’ are white, middle-aged men. That’s also something that you are allowed to do in 2015. What you don’t do is have women, or women of colour, or homosexual women of colour (that would be the worst thing to do) as villains. Keep the villains white, middle-aged, male and straight, and you’ll be okay with the PC brigade. Does that annoy me? It used to, but now, it just bores me, and tells me that the writer and artist are obediently ‘progressive’ in their world-views. I don’t hate it. I expect it.

‘Our Friend Satan’ then is a happy, colourful, playful, funny, well-drawn, cosy, PC, neo-liberal book about a comedy Satan and a cartoon evil future Catholic Church, in space. It’s not terrible, but it’s not really my thing. Lots of comic book readers will love it, and who am I to shoot it all down? I wish the creators all the luck in the world, and if you enjoy cute and cuddly comic books that come from the neo-liberal, progressive centre of what you are allowed to say in contemporary comedy, throw them a couple of quid, as I’m sure you’ll love it.


Rating: 5/10 (Politically correct neo-liberal consensus comedy book that features superior artwork)

Comic review: 2000AD-PROG 1946: Fire ain’t supposed to be so wet

Writers and artists: Various
Publisher: Rebellion
Released: 2nd September 2015



I began the day so inspired, bursting with creativity due to a musical experience into sweet, dark atrophy, begat from seduction, led through conformity, ending with a sigh as the masses dig their own graves, as they do. I was inspired, crazy with passionate, emotional drive, and I put down the words, the review, and it’s here, on the blog, for all to see.

I’m talking here about my review of Aphotic by Jupiterian. I really enjoyed both the album, and the review. The music was great, and the review came easily. But now it’s time for PROG 1946 of 2000AD, and all I feel is tiredness, and an urge to get it over and done with. Statism, collectivism, conformity and hiding under pretty pictures, throw in some disregard towards Christianity and reality, and that’s all there is here. Oh well, let’s get it over and done with.

Tharg begins with info about the new big hitter in 2000AD, ‘Dreams of DeadWorld.’ He talks it up, making it sound like something that you can’t afford to miss, but what is the reality? Read on, and I’ll let you know.

First off is Dredd, and its all about ice monsters and the Judges that are shooting them. The ‘dead’ Dredd returns as a hero, of course he does, and that’s it.

I talked about the sweet art in ‘The Alienest’ last week. It’s still good this week, but what of the story? A Christian relies on his faith to save him. He dies, and is called an idiot. Nobody will comment about this. Nobody will even care. I’m not a Christian, but I’m not an idiot. Making Christians look like fools is very PC in the west today, and I don’t like it. Christians are not fools. Atheists are fools. Believing in nothing is idiotic, but when are atheists made to look like fools in mainstream comic books? Does it ever happen? No, of course not, because atheists believe in the new ‘God’ of science, and if you don’t believe in their new God then you are to be mocked and scorned.

Well, here’s a message to the faithful followers of the new God of science. Your heroes are government-funded tools, and you wouldn’t know truth if it hit you over the head with a signed copy of the bloody God Delusion by his holiness Pope Dawkins. You are dimwit dupes, and you don’t even realise it.

Apocalypse Anonymous settles down into the story that I feared it would be. It’s set in Syria in 2015, but there’s no reality here. US Special forces are now fighting monsters. By ‘monsters’ I don’t mean ISIS, I mean comic book monsters, demons from a different reality that have been drawn to Syria because of the (western backed) fight against the Syrian government.

How do you make US Special Forces that are fighting to take down the government of a sovereign country look good? Easy, you chuck in a monster and make out that they are saving the world. Is the monster an allegory for ISIS? Perhaps it’s a clever tale where it will be shown that the US created said monster (accidentally, cough, cough) and are very sorry for doing so, and will now do all they can to defeat it? That would have been a good story, don’t you think? It would have been, but that’s not what you are getting here. What you are getting here is quips and monsters. Oh dear, next story please.

That next story is Grey Area, and apart from some casual blasphemy it wasn’t exactly memorable this week. Jokes and people sitting around chatting, that’s all you getting, but it’s a calm before the storm moment in the ongoing narrative, and it’s been a pretty decent series so far.

So, here we go, onto the main event story, the Tharg pushed, ‘Dreams of DeadWorld- Fire.’ The art is sweet, dark, painted gothic nastiness. It looks ill, diseased, unwell, sickly, and as coal black as a Goth falling down a well, on Halloween night, in a Graveyard. The story though is a bit threadbare, and it doesn’t hold together as an analogy. It follows a character called ‘Fire.’ He’s a bit of a lovesick teenager, experiencing rejection and concluding with an emo moan about feeling ‘nothing.’

That’s not how fire feels. Fire feels hunger, the need to consume, the need to destroy in order to sustain itself. Fire doesn’t do emo self pity. Fire exists to consume.

Fire is me on a perfume bender (I love perfume, did I mention it?) looking for the new flacon, but never satisfied, submerged in capitalism, hating the need, the desire, but feeding on it, and feeling alive whilst doing so. If fire feels nothing it dies, and it’s no longer fire, it’s soggy wood, so nope, it didn’t work for me. The art was great, but the story, fizzled, and the writer took the concept of fire and instead of doing something interesting with it, turned it into a depressed, damp, dull and dreary teenage boy. That’s not hot, that’s wet, very wet.

Wow, what an epic moan. How did I manage to say so much about so little? I amaze myself sometimes. Okay then, 2000AD PROG 1946 wasn’t exactly great. None of the stories shine, and the only noteworthy, or commendable aspect about the entire book was the artwork in ‘DeadWorld- Fire.’ That’s the thing about 2000AD. Sometimes it’s great, and other times it’s the absolute pits. Get it if you want some cool Gothic artwork, but if you are looking for a decent story, sorry guys, there’s very little on offer this week.


Rating: 4/10 (For Dave Kendall’s art in Dreams of DeadWorld-Fire)

Extreme Metal- VIDEO REVIEW- Aphotic, by Jupiterian: Will You Follow the Dark ...

Extreme Metal- REVIEW- Aphotic, by Jupiterian: Will You Follow the Dark Collective?

Genre: Doom/Black/Death/Heavy Metal

Released: 14th August 2015

Label: Caligari Records

Listen here:
https://caligarirecords.bandcamp.com/album/aphotic

Purchase here:
http://caligarirecords.storenvy.com/collections/277955-all-products/products/14066142-jupiterian-aphotic-cal-037



Aphotic is a call to join the Dark Collective where five songs of dense, sludgy, snarling, guttural, melodic, slow, terrible beauty lead you through a life spent lost in sweet, honey dripped poison.

Opening track ‘Permanent Grey’ introduces the Phantom Piper, the Happy Ghost of the Dark Collective. He takes your hand and welcomes you into the land of swamp thick dust and dreams where absinthe slick, hypnotic, seductive groves of sweet, sweet poison deliciously choke the air.

It’s dense here, very dense, the fog is almost impregnable, but the poison is so honey sweet, and it leads you through the darkness, seducing you into an awakened slumber. It feels safe here, so warm, so carefree, and you allow yourself to follow, to follow, to follow, and to be lost within the dream. You are entranced now, and the Piper no longer has to take you by the hand. You want to follow, you need to follow, and he leads you laughing, dancing, and skipping merrily into the Dark Collective.

‘Daylight’ shows the dawn, the light of truth. You wake, startled by the Sun, your eyes squint, but the poison honey, it’s still there, and you turn from the aggressive solar blast of the day, and back to the sweet coo of the Piper. You walk onwards, following, the trance still compels, and the journey continues.

Onto ‘Proclamation’ where the energy of the Sun is dampened, the fog descends, and the march onwards continues. Light struggles to emerge now. Energy is sapped, heads are low, and it’s turning funereal.

The Piper no longer laughs, no longer plays, no longer skips, his flute is a weapon now, he waves his followers on, threateningly, you’ve gone too far, and to stop would be to be lost in the dark, vulnerable to what hides in the fog. You follow not because of the sweetness in the air, but because fear compels, because you no longer have a choice. The time for seduction has passed. The bride is in chains now, and all that is left is the onwards, inevitable march of time.

The eternal child that is within begins to cry. Why is the Piper not smiling anymore? He used to dance, he used to play, he used to sing, but now all he does is point, and order, and scowl. You are scared. The Dark Collective no longer sings in sweet, hypnotic joy. They look at the ground. Together, individualism has been defeated. Low guttural sounds of terror, self- pity, surrender and despair has become their discordant song now. They sing it alone, walking side by side, but strangers all.

The Piper looks your way, reads your mind, and he smiles. You see his teeth now, and they are black stumps, worms crawl through the decay, sweetness has rotten away what once was pure, sweetness has destroyed the purity that came from God. The light of the Sun was there, offered, but rejected. Replaced by sweetness, you devil, the self-inflicted rot of prosperity, of a dulled, idle decadent complacency, sweet hypnotic rot, you will kill us all.

‘Aphotic’ is the end of life, the end of all hope. It’s a grinding halt, a STOP sign. You stare at the nothingness, the damp soil, lines and lines of defeated lost souls. You see shovels, and the Piper barks his last words. They are orders, and you must obey. Hands grasp handles, digging, digging, and digging. The air still fogged, sweetened not with honey, but with sod, the mud of the ground, from dust we became, from dust we shall return, wetted with damp soil, eaten by worms, we prepare our future, entranced by sweetness, defeated by prosperity, we dig our own eternities.

‘Drag Me to My Grave’ is the final plea, not for mercy, but for the end, for the nothingness that is to come. A life spent following the Piper, from the seduction of our senses, chasing the sweetness, joining the Dark Collective. We have allowed ourselves to be marched to the Graveyard, to the mud, to the shovel. Why do we chose to be lost in the fog, to follow the sweet, poison embrace of the Dark Collective, to lose ourselves, to stumble into fear, into routine, and so quickly into decay? We dig our own graves, and hypnotically, silently, jump into forever.



Rating: 10/10 (The sweet, terrifying choices that we make, the choices that lead to eternity)