Legion World Forums LEGION COMPANION Dr. Gym'll's Cultural Rarities Marvelman/Miracleman

Never mind the London issue, what about... ah well, you'll see. Or perhaps you won't...

Hang on. That's the door. Hello? Sorry? Blatant Teasing is a felony? Who knew...

I've read the majority of Moore's other work, so this is a special treat.

From what I understand, the print issues thus far have been censorship free (thankfully!). Hopefully that continues.

Picking up on Moore's facets of omnipotence, I'm struck at how much his stories seem rooted (bad pun, bad) in a number of the Superman stories in that golden age of imaginary tales.

He captures the essence of those stories. What if Superman couldn't die? What if Superman settled down and had a family? What ifs made more real. Moved from throwaway issue to centre stage. Expanded to capture all the emotions, causes and effects that such imaginary tales would have in a slightly more realistic world.

So the infamous birth issue was an eye-opener. Having witnessed the real thing before, I saw it as beautiful and powerful. But I can imagine a lot of 17 year olds flipping their shit!

By now Moore has picked up steam and has been joined by the excellent Rick Veitch. The series is quite good and I'm really worried about what will happen with Liz now that the baby is clearly not a normal baby.

Wait til John Totleben takes over!

Ooh, I had no idea he was part of Miracleman too! Nice!

The Annual came out today, featuring the lost Morrison story from the 80's drawn by Marvel's EIC and a Milligan story drawn by Allred.

Despite the impressive pedigree all around, it's mostly a throwaway pair of stories that read somewhat like the Apocrypha series back in the day.

The Morrison story is definitely him channeling Moore to tell a story of Johnny Bates early days after escaping the project. It's an OK little piece but it's basically just a nod to how evil Johnny is.

The Milligan story is set in Angelo times, but obviously in the Moore continuity, as Miracleman begins to notice the incongruities of the superhero lives they lead, but eventually gets snapped back into the fantasy completely.

You're right. it does sound exactly like the apocrypha series. Actually, I thought these were reprints but I think the evil bates story was a james robinson one way back when (pretty unpleasant).

The Miracleman realises that there are issues in his super hero world, sounds exactly like another story back then. I'm not sure if that was in the apocrypha mini or not.

So this morning I wrapped up my reading of the Alan Moore era of Miracleman. I'm glad I got to read these stories finally, even if I paid the crazy price of $4.99 per issue to do so.

I can't say this is among my favorite work of Moore's, though I can certainly appreciate its importance. Clearly, without Miracleman, there would never have been so many comics that followed suit in the 1990's and 2000's, chief among them Stormwatch and the Authority, which in turn have greatly influenced the Justice League, Avengers and other mainstream stalwarts. All of this has the opposite effect of making me like it more, which of course isn't fear to the original work itself. But there is a very pessimistic view of super-humanity in this story and while it was probably very cutting edge in the 80's, it feels old hat to me now.

That being said, there are some wonderful things going on here. Chief among them is the gorgeous artwork, which was capped off by John Tolteben drawing some mind-blowing layouts. But even from the very first issue, the art was stellar.

Another great thing is you can see from #1 onwards how Moore evolved during the 1980's as a story-teller, specifically his narration and dialogue. Moore is clearly a master of the English language, which most his work conveys greatly. But in the earliest issues, published in the early 80's, it was all a bit clunky. By the final issues, published at the tail end of the decade, Moore is sizzling with every word. Even when he's at his most wordy, the narration rolls off the inner monologue's tongue as poignant or biting or lyrically appealing.

I'm glad I read it, and I'm equally excited about Gaiman and Bucky's issues which should come out later this year. Miracleman certainly doesn't rank in my top 5 or even 10 Alan Moore works (and I hate ranked lists, so I'll never create such a list) but it was clearly very influential and inspired a lot of what came after. On its own, it's a strong, solid comic book story.

It's interesting to view it in hindsight. "Olympus", like Moore's other work at the time, became hugely influential, but probably not in the ways he intended.

Olympus is all about Michael starting to lose touch with humanity and what the consequences of their "benevolent" dictatorship really were. So of course, what people took out of it tended to be "Wow, what if Super heroes took off the kid gloves and caused massive carnage, and what if they weren't opposed to executing their opponents in sick and wonderful ways!"

Now, of course, Moore wrote the Bates in London issue and it was pretty extreme (especially at the time), so he can't be too shocked that people missed the larger point when they are distracted by Johnny raining severed hands and feet down on the city, but the real meat of the story is all in the aftermath.

I think you'll really like Neil's run at this next, as it zigs where Moore zags, but still maintains the integrity of the narrative. Hard to believe we might get to finally finish this thing.

Yeah, the whole time I kept thinking: wow, everyone really missed the point! The entire last issue is incredibly sad and tragic, as Miracleman justifies all the things he's done to make the ultimate fascist state.

It's one of the saddest endings of all the Moore stories I've read, and I definitely walked away feeling bummed out.

Moore once said something along the lines of, "It's hard to deal with the fact that so many bad comics came about just because I was in a bad mood during the 80s."

It's official:

http://www.comicbookresources.com/a...gaiman-buckingham-official-for-september

I will be reading it, which should be interesting for me as I generally dislike Gaiman (except for the original Books of Magic mini-series, which I loved.) The issues that were printed sound rather like Astro City, with focuses on the citizens of the supposed Utopia that was created at the end of the Moore run.

One for the pull list. The initial ones were different, but then it moved towards a darker edge again before the end.

As it should be IMO. Too many consecutive dark issues can be unpleasant.

Unless the title of the comic is Li'l Depressed Boy, then you shouldn't be too surprised.

LOL

Is that from the same creative team as the Weeping Gorilla?

LOL

The gorilla does have a point there...for a change.

"The Golden Age" stuff is really good. Not to spoil for Cobie and the rest, but the synopsis is correct, in that we get out of Michael's head and get several one-offs from the POV of various people living in the post-London MM world. Some from the regular folks, some from those on Olympus, and my favourite, from one of the dead. I wouldn't say they are all happy-go-lucky, as even the "lighter" ones have an ironic edge to them, but it was certainly a bold change of direction at the time. I may crack open the TPB and re-read these myself.

I know you guys are joking--and I love me some Weeping Gorilla--but Lil' Depressed Boy is actually a really great comic! It isn't at all like it sounds...which I guess would be like Weeping Gorilla.

It's an actual comic?? LOL

I thought Thoth had made the title up.

There may even be a review of an issue over on the Random Review Thread.

I'll have a look. Thanks, Thoth.

Sooooo...I read the reprint of the first Gaiman/Bucky issue, about four people making a pilgrimage to meet Miracleman. Aaaaand...it feels to me that it's not The Gaiman I Like, but rather the Gaiman I Dislike -- mean-spirited, pessimistic, wallowing in unpleasantness for its own sake, and making his super-characters deeply unlikeable (or too much like us mere mortals, take your pick.)

HOWEVER...it's obvious that Gaiman has an overarching plan for what lies ahead, so maybe it'll grow on me and hold my interest. I'll give it til the end of the Golden Age arc.