The Incal

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 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 show more 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 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 show more 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

The Incal is a glorious romp through Jodorowsky's supremely screwy cosmology, as lowly class R detectivie John Difool stumbles into a plot of galactic invasion, treason to the perfect hermaphrodite Emperoress of Humanity, the foul machinations of the Technopope, and a spiritual battle against ultimate darkness.

The illustrations of immense scifi vistas by Moebius are of course a delight, but the story lacks the oepidal resonances of The Metabarons. Pretty good, all told, if you know what kind of weirdness you're getting into.

This comic series is like the film “The Fifth Element” but made by people who were doing weird drugs. The film was clearly inspired by this comic, but the comic is trippy, hippy, digressive, excessive, and at times incoherent. That incoherence is its greatest flaw; the plot often jumps around nonsensically, much of the dialogue is awful, and the tone bounces from slapstick to serious philosophical inquiry without any sensible rhyme or reason. It is clear that the story was written collaboratively by a dreamer and a drawer, without any overarching structure.

In spite of all that, it still manages to be fun to read most of the time.

At its core this is a brightly-colored Noire detective story. The private detective in question is a show more lowlife who neither wants to be a hero nor attempts to do the right thing very often, but who is driven and pulled into heroism against his will. He’s petty, self-centered, obsessed with sex, and not very bright. He’s a typical likeable rogue. The setting is a dystopic Space Opera featuring a rigid class system, human-animal amalgams, mutants, featherless birdmen, and various cyborgs and robots.

If you can handle the excesses and would like to see the comic book inspiration for the weirdest SciFi movies that have somehow gotten big budgets, give this a whirl. show less

What is The Incal? I’ve read and adored this story a bunch of times now and frankly – like its protagonist, John diFool – sometimes I’m still not sure. As far as I can figure, The Incal is a godlike entity with the power to unite the population of the universe against the invading forces of the Great Darkness. Sometimes it takes the form of a pyramid-like object small enough to fit in the palm of your hand, but sometimes it’s a spaceship. Sometimes it speaks as a character in the story; sometimes it remains silent, but its very presence can change people’s behaviour, lives and appearance in ways that they (and the reader) could never have imagined or expected.
What I’m certain about is that The Incal is also over three show more hundred pages of inspired Sci-Fi lunacy: a wildly imaginative and occasionally saucy ride touching on themes of spirituality, meditation and tarot symbolism while also being packed with adventure, action, explosions, monsters and gleeful madness.
In the rest of Europe The Incal is rightly considered a comics classic. In the UK, inexplicably, it’s been out of print for years: I was only able to read it before due to luckily picking up an incomplete selection of volumes from the series secondhand, long ago. But now – thanks to publisher Self Made Hero – the whole story is available in English again, in a single and very handsome volume, with all the colours of Jean ‘Moebius’ Giraud’s extraordinary artwork painstakingly restored to their original eye-sizzling glory.
Writer/creator Alejandro Jodorowsky’s The Incal is a rare, raw jolt of imaginative genius. If you’re up for something unusual I heartily, heartily recommend you check it out. show less

I thought it was a huge, huge letdown. While there is some truly great & imaginative scenography in this book, it doesn’t redeem the juvenile and at times pompous story, a story that never has any urgency because of its randomness, a randomness which makes it hard to connect and invest in any of the characters – resulting in boredom. On top of that, the dialogue & prose is lifeless, and reeks of artificiality. Jodorowsky’s attempts at spirituality felt ludicrous to me.
The letdown was even enhanced by the fact that I loved the first five or six of The Metabarons series when I read it back in my early twenties. The final installments of Metabarons weren’t as convincing, but still entertaining. Because of my experience with The show more Incal, I’m now afraid to reread Metabarons, 20 years down the line. Taste evolves, and that’s a wonderful thing.

More speculative fiction review on Weighing A Pig Doesn't Fatten It show less

Dunno where all the gushing praise for this graphic novel comes from. The artwork is far from Moebius's best, the writing is mediocre, the ideas almost banal.

The story is grand in scope, to be sure. It's a standard cosmic epic of white/light/life/good versus black/darkness/death/evil (fans are going to pretend Jodorowsky invented this, but come on - it's even in the Dead Sea Scrolls). There is an amusing bit towards the end, the Jondiff situation, and there is some enjoyable social commentary throughout.

The characters are pretty well thought-out, but inexcusably one-dimensional in practice. There comes a point where many major characters will speak in the same panel, and it's impossible to tell which word-balloon goes with which show more character - because they all act, talk, and think the same. There's an obvious attempt to make the protagonist stand out, but again this is done in a one-note way; there's no nuance, no character development, no attempt to have these characters do anything but explain the plot.

And explain they do. Major battles happen off-screen, time passes in between two pages with no indication other than dialogue ("phew! what a tiring four months it has been! we're finally done"), and even easily-depicted in-panel events are described by characters rather than shown ("it's getting darker!", "this way, to the telewhathaveyou control room!", etc). Write a radio play, why don't you?

All in all, not a total loss. Can't really recommend it, though. Like Jodorowsky's films, it is simple and heavy-handed: so certain you don't get its childishly simple concepts that it keeps hammering away with yet another example, yet another explanation. Tiresome. show less