The Invisibles, Vol. 4: Bloody Hell in America

My second—and very likely last—exposure to Grant Morrison's writing. I love Phil Jimenez's art and it was almost...almost...enough to help me forget a lot of the dumb stuff Morrison had the characters jabbering on about.

There's a story in here somewhere, but you have to hack at all the self-indulgent crap that Morrison throws in—pop psychology examination of movies, discussion about bleeding edge tech (he tries to out-Warren Ellis Warren Ellis and fails...no one talks tech like Ellis) and he populates the Invisibles with edgy characters (he tries to out-Garth Ennis Garth Ennis with out there characters and fails...no one writes edgy characters like Ennis).

Overall, for such a slim volume, despite the gorgeous art, I had far too show more many "get on with it" moments over the pages and pages of Morrison trying to show how clever he can be.

Decades ago, I read Morrison's Arkham Asylum and remember loving it at the time. This time around, not so much. show less

[b:The Invisibles, Vol. 4: Bloody Hell in America|22401|The Invisibles, Vol. 4 Bloody Hell in America|Grant Morrison|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1309400462l/22401._SX50_.jpg|23427] is the shortest and probably the least satisfying volume of The Invisibles. The back cover describes it as, 'the ultimate introduction to one of the most provocative series in modern comics', which offers some explanation. It jumps forward a year to the team recuperating from the events of [b:The Invisibles, Vol. 3: Entropy in the U.K.|22398|The Invisibles, Vol. 3 Entropy in the U.K.|Grant Morrison|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1309399965l/22398._SX50_.jpg|1414863] in a show more luxurious American safe house. This mansion is owned by Mason, a rather tiresome millionaire who is convinced he was abducted by aliens as a child. On the bright side, we also meet the awesome Jolly Roger and learn more about Ragged Robin, who was my favourite character when I first read the series.

The main event is an attempt to steal the cure for AIDS from a secret military base, which rapidly goes wrong. The most striking spreads are nearly-colourless representations of the Other Side, where the Archons come from. These reminded me of the intensely creepy visuals in the John Carpenter movie They Live. The military base has an eerie futuristic design that contrasts neatly with the locations the Invisibles inhabit. The battle of chaos magic vs interdimensional authoritarianism proceeds with explosions and dramatic fight scenes. Although it isn't as substantial and thought-provoking as the rest of the series, volume 4 is still compelling and distinctive.

Oh, I almost forgot. The introduction states that the apocalypse will happen on December 22nd 2012. You have to admit that would explain a lot about the last ten years. show less

The jacket copy on this fourth collection of Morrison's The Invisibles suggests that readers might profitably start reading the series here. Perhaps that's so: it lacks the narrative hand-holding offered by the naive Jack Frost in the early issues centered on his recruitment, but readers likely to get much out of this series never really needed that in the first place. This shortish volume collects a free-standing plot sequence and showcases the principal characters without surplus exposition.

The four issues collected here are actually the beginning of the second Invisibles series as published in periodical comic book format. Although the trade paperback bears the title Bloody Hell in America, the individual parts are the commencement show more (and completion?) of the story arc "Black Science." The cinematic violence that is a mainstay of the series is on abundant display here, along with the themes of mind control and spiritual coercion. The conspiracy at stake is pretty humdrum for a post-X-Files readership, although Morrison raises the metaphysical stakes somewhat.

To the extent that there is character development in this volume, it is focused on Ragged Robin, but by the final page her backstory is still pretty opaque. (It does appear that she gets to encounter her childhood self very briefly.) A couple of new accessory "good guys" are added, in the form of Jolly Roger (a dour dyke who was King Mob's colleague in martial arts) and Mason (a rich American on a po-mo grail quest). show less

Lovely!

Finally, we're getting more Ragged Robin. In this issue, we were introduced to the US portion of things. The AIDS virus being manufactured in a mysterious underground lab. We got LSD trips, the story of what crashed at Roswell, and hints of the future. The Archons were further explained, Quimper had a bigger part, and everything is moving faster than you'd expect.


Can't wait for more Rags, dear lord am I attached to that character.

Kind of a misfire as far as this excellent series goes. CIA Area 51 shit with the occasional hint of shoggothery, and is Mr. Quimper just supposed to work as the creepiest villain because his face looks like a sex mask? I dunno, this seems like kind of a lull.

Morrison seems always to be over-extending himself. The fellow simply does better when he sticks to something more simple. His greatest downfall is always his attempts to be meaningful. Morrison seems to always hover around the same level of meaning, the result of which being that the more he tries to be meaningful, the more his ideas become overt and tautalogical.

He also tries to fit in too many sources and concepts without streamlining them, which often results in incorrect facts. He followed the old wive's tale about bats being blind in Animal Man, he Misquotes Oppenheimer in this series, and also indicates that Byron would have known of Blake's work. I know there are some others I can't recall, and perhaps it is the nature of the show more fast-paced script writing, busy schedule, and ill-health of Morrison which resulted in such oversights, but it breeds little confidence in a reader to give him the benefit of doubt. show less

Now the body count *really* starts to climb.