Marville
Bill Jemas's tour de force comic miniseries Marville has been unjustly neglected after its publication and it's easy to see why: the comic's heady blend of philosophy, biology, satire, surrealism, theology, and experimentalism flew right over the head of most comic readers at the time, and it continues to enjoy an unjust reputation as a terrible comic amongst anti-intellectuals of many stripes. But above all, it was Marville's own optimism and Blakean innocence that doomed it.
Beginning as a timely satire, Marville begins with a future Ted Turner and a Jane Fonda who looks fresh of the set of Barbarella sending their son KalAOL, along with his dog, AOLstro, to our time to escape a meteor. KalAOL's unlikely origins mirror the comic's own origins in a bet, and our own origins in cosmic chance, not the last time that Jemas moves from a macro to micro perspective with fractal attention, but perhaps the most subtle and important. The first issue is a gentle comedy, with KalAOL(quickly renamed "Al") stumbling into a great amount of money through sheer happenstance and meeting a young women named Mickey who serves as a cynical viewpoint for the audience's own reluctance to go along with Al's happy-go-lucky life.
If Jemas were to leave off on there, he would already have created a work that stood over the best efforts of lesser authors like Frank Miller, but it is his turn to the contemplative side of things with the third and following issues that make this comic a true classic.
Beginning as a timely satire, Marville begins with a future Ted Turner and a Jane Fonda who looks fresh of the set of Barbarella sending their son KalAOL, along with his dog, AOLstro, to our time to escape a meteor. KalAOL's unlikely origins mirror the comic's own origins in a bet, and our own origins in cosmic chance, not the last time that Jemas moves from a macro to micro perspective with fractal attention, but perhaps the most subtle and important. The first issue is a gentle comedy, with KalAOL(quickly renamed "Al") stumbling into a great amount of money through sheer happenstance and meeting a young women named Mickey who serves as a cynical viewpoint for the audience's own reluctance to go along with Al's happy-go-lucky life.
The second issue is harsh and biting in it's satire, giving us Mickey's experienced view of the world. The second issue is a laser-precise condemnation of our justice system, and a self-critical examination of the superhero genre and the racism, fascism, and classism that permeates the worst examples of it as much as the best. Spike Lee, Rush Limbaugh, Batman and Spiderman alike rub shoulders and join in on this Swiftian indictment of our worst creations. A policewoman named Lucy, who, in a hilarious shot at the sexism in the superhero genre, dresses up as a hooker for a wacky scheme by Al joins the cast and becomes the moral center of the Mickey/Al/Lucy trio.
If Jemas were to leave off on there, he would already have created a work that stood over the best efforts of lesser authors like Frank Miller, but it is his turn to the contemplative side of things with the third and following issues that make this comic a true classic.
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