Alejandro Jodorowsky

An intellectually self-absorbed, incontinent university professor serves as the protagonist in this mystical adventure with themes of messianic apocalypse, and eventually psychedelic initiation. Supernatural elements are introduced very gradually, and at first it is easy for the reader to join Professor Mangel in dismissing them. There's a lot of sex, as Mangel struggles with the reintegration of his carnal consciousness, and his companions foster the revolutionary cult of the god-goddess show more Jesusa. As in other stories by Jodorowsky, such as his Incal tales, the skeptical ignorance of the protagonist drives much of the plot and its tension.

This collection makes for a good, self-contained read. It should be avoided by those who don't appreciate explicit sex, mystical blasphemy, or controversial politics. show less

This American publication collects the first two bandes dessinées in a series of eight. A blank page joins the two originally separate volumes. Under this cover is the immediate pre-history and first generation of the Metabarons--the line of warriors whose descendant features in the Incal space operas of Jodorowsky and Moebius. The artist for The Metabarons is Juan Gimenez, whose work is quite capable, but lacks the luminosity of Moebius' illustrations.

The story is framed as a recounting show more from one robot to another, as they serve in the "Metabunker" home of (presumably) the Metabaron of the later Incal period. These two are set as camp characters, irritating each other and exhibiting displays of exasperation, and they add no real value to the narrative proper.

The main plot and setting elements are, it saddens me to say, mighty unoriginal. While there have been cosmetic changes and some shuffling of tropes, almost every element of note here is derivative from Herbert's Dune. For "epiphyte" read spice. For "Shabda-Oud" read Bene Gesserit. There are space-magical features of the type found in Dune, but actual mystical symbolism of the sort that Jodorowsky emphasized in The Incal is much less apparent here.

The original Metabaron Othon has a little family of indigenous slaves: Ikku-Tta and his two daughters. These have their noses painted black. In some panels, this makes them look like puppies, and in others skulls. I wonder if the ambivalence was deliberate.

It's possible that the translators are at fault, but I suspect that Jodorowsky himself is to blame for the excessive indulgence in exclamation points! I don't think there's a plain period at the end of a sentence in the entire book! Although there are occasional ellipses ...

Maybe this series picks up in later volumes, but I wasn't thrilled with this one. show less

Enormously influential, wildly imaginative ... and utterly chaotic. I have a really hard time caring about any of the characters, nor do I have time to invest in a plotline before some enormous shift happens. They do lampshade this, particularly the protagonist antihero starts complaining a lot about how they never get a break, but that doesn't really remove the issue -- I rarely found myself having the time to enjoy the goings on. There are too many notions, too many underexplained show more character motivations, too many otherworldly cultures and agendas whose feuds we're dumped into the middle of with little to no explanation or backstory.

In spite of all of that, there _is_ a lot to like here. As I said, it's wildly imaginative, with everything from nihilist techno-zealots to psychic emperor-gods, underwater human societies to centre of the earth trips, human mutant subspecies and alien invaders, interplanetary intrigue and critique of the passive television-enslaved public. While my preferences would have been to explore some of these notions more, rather than gleefully hop from one to the next, it can't be denied it paints a rich and interesting world. While the frantic plot drowns a lot of the emotion, it does not drown it all, and there are many lovely moments of character and pathos interspersed in this six-volume collection. I also found the mystery the story was pretending to be at the beginning (before the pace and scale went insane) to be very engrossing, and the later chapters (when the pace is finally a bit slower again, and I'd learned enough of the world to contextualize and appreciate a bit more of the goings on) to be a step back up.

Considering its popularity and influence, this is clearly someone's cup of tea. But, unfortunately -- though I did get some enjoyment from it -- it wasn't quite mine. That said, my issues are mainly with the pacing and lack of contextual exposition, not the ideas and the plot points, and so I'd actually be very interested to see what else has been done in this impressively elaborate universe since. I hear that the next volume is a much more linear story (and a prequel), so that does sound promising. show less

This beautiful hardcover collects the six original books of Jodorowsky and Moebius's classic science fiction epic The Incal, originally published in French in the 1980s. A work as self-consciously mythic as this one is going to invite comparison to many other tales. But some of the lines of influence here are pretty obvious, with references falling outside the medium of comics into science fiction novels and films, as well as esoteric traditions.

Clearly, Frank Herbert's Dune played a major show more part, with the contention of corrupted factions in a galactic empire, framed by a mystical apocalypse. Qabalistic references include the "theta dream" of Tiphareth, succeeded by the "daath dream" ascending the Tree of Life.

While the influence of The Incal on Luc Besson's film The Fifth Element is so overwhelming as to incite accusations of plagiarism, it can also be traced in movies like The Matrix and its sequels. Jodorowski's antihero John Difool is not Neo, who could be compared to the messianic Solune. Instead, as we see in "Planet Difool," he actually bears closer comparison to the Wachowskis' Agent Smith!

The 10,000-light-year-view used in the narrative framing of The Incal leaves it open to accusations of stereotyped characters and perfunctory plotting. But this book occupies a pole diametrically opposed to literary realism; it is mystical allegory, in which the characters and factions represent spiritual orientations and capabilities. Moebius's art is perfectly suited to its task here, and the revolting panels of the nightmare sequence near the book's end are only rivalled by the exaltation that follows them.

Enjoyable in their own right, the contents of this volume are a landmark in the development of the graphic story medium and the science fiction genre. show less