I compared James Blish's prose
fantasies, Black Easter and The Day after Judgement, with the
Justice Society, Justice League, Swamp Thing, Hellblazer,
Sandman and Lucifer graphic fantasies by, variously, Roy Thomas,
Alan Moore, Mark Millar, Jamie Delano, Garth Ennis, Neil Gaiman and Mike Carey (see
here). All
these works share the fantasy premise of the literal existence of supernatural
beings. Such beings may be gods, angels, demons or new fictitious characters, in
particular Gaiman's "Endless," who are anthropomorphic personifications of
aspects of consciousness. Some of the Endless - Destiny, Death and Dream - have
been personified before but never as well as here.
The graphic series listed are of two
kinds: superheroes - the Justice titles; dark fantasy - the rest.
Further, Hellblazer is not only dark fantasy but fantasy horror. Superheroes is
a composite genre incorporating fantasy:
the origin stories of Wonder Woman and of
Captain Marvel refer to classical gods;
Superman's origin is extraterrestrial, therefore science
fictional, but he coexists with WW, Cap and other characters whose
powers are magical, not scientific;
the earlier Hawkman's origin was not extraterrestrial but
reincarnational;
the Spectre and Deadman are ghosts.
In addition, Thomas'
Last Days of the Justice Society of America features the Aesir and
Millar's Justice League: Paradise Lost features the angelic host which is
why these two works are listed here.
In Black Easter, we are
told that the demons are winning Armageddon because God is dead. In The Day
After Judgement, Satan has become God but offers Godhood to mankind. In
Gaiman's Sandman, Lucifer Morningstar retires as Lord of Hell. Thus, both
Blish and Gaiman show us the Devil after he has ceased to be the Adversary,
although they are different versions of the Devil. Blish shows us the Dantean
Satan, albeit in a changed context, whereas Gaiman's Lucifer, especially as
developed in the sequel by Carey, is dedicated to self-will, not to malice.
Blish's two fantasies refer to
the Bible, Dante, Milton and CS Lewis. Moore and Gaiman also make scriptural and
literary references. Additionally, the publishing schedule of comic books
generates an indefinitely prolonged narrative that can become merely
self-referential. A single company publishes several interconnected monthly
titles for many years or, in some cases, decades. In the few works mentioned
here, a continuous narrative stretches from the Spear of Destiny, which pierced
Christ's side on the Cross, to a new universe with no Hell. Hitler uses the
Spear to conjure Ragnarok. The Justice Society, merging with the Aesir,
endlessly re-fights Ragnarok, thus indefinitely postponing its expected outcome,
the destruction of this universe. Or so they think. That is where writer Roy
Thomas leaves them.
Gaiman reveals that the
endlessly re-fought Ragnarok, with its versions of Odin and the other Aesir, is
a simulation in a transparent sphere held in the hand of the Odin who
co-exists with the title character of Sandman, Dream of the Endless.
Lucifer has retired, expelled the damned from Hell and given the Key of this now
empty realm to Dream. Odin and others want the Key. Odin hopes that Dream will
exchange the Key for the miniature Ragnarok. He is puzzled by the intrusion of
human heroes into the sphere but hopes that Dream will be interested because one
of these heroes is the earlier, very different, version of Sandman.
In Lucifer, the retired
Lucifer must cope when God also retires and is succeeded, after some confusion,
by his granddaughter who abolishes Hell. Thus, a fictional continuity with three
authors - Thomas, Gaiman and Carey - indirectly links the Spear to the new
universe. However, it is not necessary that anyone notice this. The reader of
Lucifer need not remember or even have read Thomas' story. Events of
comparable magnitude, like an attempt to destroy Heaven in Moore's Swamp
Thing or the Swamp Thing becoming God in Millar's Swamp Thing,
have
occurred between the Second World War and Carey's Second War in Heaven
but these also need not
be remembered.
Each story is worth reading in its own right and they
present an
interesting sequence if read successively but that sequence is very much
in the
background and for immediate story purposes might as well not be there. I
have
summarised some interconnected narratives that I have valued but they
have been
left behind by subsequent events that I have not read. Lucifer has gone
but
there is a new Dream and something else is happening with Swamp Thing.
Comics
continue and I might revisit them in future but for now I am re-reading
Moore, Gaiman and Carey whose stories at least are of lasting
value.
