Sometimes orgies go wrong.
Just typing the phrase "orgies go wrong" makes me (and I suspect any of the few people who have seen the movie as well) think, "Eating Raoul". The synopsis of the movie is "Buck Henry kills swingers and then eats a guy in a surprise twist final scene that was blown by the title." I don't think Buck's wife ever eats Raoul's ass when they begin having an affair but that would have gone a long way to obfuscating the reason for the title and make the ending a little more surprising. Maybe.
The next four issues comprise a story called "Brave New World." That's a line from Shakespeare's The Tempest, something about a brave new world that has such people in it. But more people probably think of it as a referent to Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, a book that I should remember better than I do. There's definitely people in it but I don't think that's why Huxley chose the Shakespeare quote as his title. I remember there was something about people not conceiving children in the regular way, and they took loads of drugs and maybe fucked freely a lot? And then this guy born from an actual vagina comes to visit their little temple and begins smashing tables and screaming a lot? It ends in — get this — an orgy gone wrong.
Having looked at the covers, I know the next three issues of this story take place on an alternate Earth or with an alternate Authority, based on the various characters and a nice graphic design element where The Authority logo on the next three covers does not use a bar over "Authority" which fills the space after "THE". Instead it uses a triangle. Does that mean that, judging by this cover, Jack Hawksmoor will become the savage who enters a new world and realizes the dystopian nature of what the populace believe to be a utopia? Will Jack take the role of both Miranda, first enthralled by the people of another world he never knew about, only to revert to the "savage" of Brave New World and attempt to tear it down?
Or was Mark Millar just all, "That sounds like a cool title for The Authority checking out another dimension!" Probably not that. Even for writers whom I disrespect (and, to be clear, I don't disrespect Millar's writing. Sometimes I disrespect Millar himself, or his mother, or the size of his penis. But never his writing (also if you find evidence of me disrespecting his writing, it was an, um, joke! For comic effect!)), I would never suggest that they are not aware of the literary references they've built their story upon, especially when they're European! An American writer, I might think, "This guy is too stupid to live." But a European writer? I've got my tongue out and their pants down before I even begin reading their shit!
One of my favorite genres of tumblr post are the ones where young people first discover major literary foundations in the wild and become fucking gobsmacked by a thing they had been reading one way only to realize, upon discovery of a new thing, what the author was referencing. I say "young people" because old people just can't get up the energy to be surprised by anything anymore. They read something new that changes the context of some other piece of literature they'd been familiar with and they just go, "Yeah, okay. I get it. Interesting." All periods, man! Not an exclamation point to be seen in the life of a fucking oldie!
That's probably why I use so many exclamation points. As camouflage for my elderly status!
The next four issues comprise a story called "Brave New World." That's a line from Shakespeare's The Tempest, something about a brave new world that has such people in it. But more people probably think of it as a referent to Aldous Huxley's Brave New World, a book that I should remember better than I do. There's definitely people in it but I don't think that's why Huxley chose the Shakespeare quote as his title. I remember there was something about people not conceiving children in the regular way, and they took loads of drugs and maybe fucked freely a lot? And then this guy born from an actual vagina comes to visit their little temple and begins smashing tables and screaming a lot? It ends in — get this — an orgy gone wrong.
Having looked at the covers, I know the next three issues of this story take place on an alternate Earth or with an alternate Authority, based on the various characters and a nice graphic design element where The Authority logo on the next three covers does not use a bar over "Authority" which fills the space after "THE". Instead it uses a triangle. Does that mean that, judging by this cover, Jack Hawksmoor will become the savage who enters a new world and realizes the dystopian nature of what the populace believe to be a utopia? Will Jack take the role of both Miranda, first enthralled by the people of another world he never knew about, only to revert to the "savage" of Brave New World and attempt to tear it down?
Or was Mark Millar just all, "That sounds like a cool title for The Authority checking out another dimension!" Probably not that. Even for writers whom I disrespect (and, to be clear, I don't disrespect Millar's writing. Sometimes I disrespect Millar himself, or his mother, or the size of his penis. But never his writing (also if you find evidence of me disrespecting his writing, it was an, um, joke! For comic effect!)), I would never suggest that they are not aware of the literary references they've built their story upon, especially when they're European! An American writer, I might think, "This guy is too stupid to live." But a European writer? I've got my tongue out and their pants down before I even begin reading their shit!
One of my favorite genres of tumblr post are the ones where young people first discover major literary foundations in the wild and become fucking gobsmacked by a thing they had been reading one way only to realize, upon discovery of a new thing, what the author was referencing. I say "young people" because old people just can't get up the energy to be surprised by anything anymore. They read something new that changes the context of some other piece of literature they'd been familiar with and they just go, "Yeah, okay. I get it. Interesting." All periods, man! Not an exclamation point to be seen in the life of a fucking oldie!
That's probably why I use so many exclamation points. As camouflage for my elderly status!
Oh no! Midnighter is dead!
Midnighter is probably not dead. But that's how the comic book begins and I wanted to try to be an earnest reader reading earnestly. It's been so fucking long since I felt anything!
I thought that was Midnighter's mask in the sand but apparently it's snow because it was found in Antarctica. Now when I look at the vast panels full of this beige-colored whatever, I just think it looks like mashed potatoes.
A group of seven people trek across Antarctica to their new base. They are not The Authority. They may be the "new" Authority. One of them certainly has wings like Swift. But they're all drawn too small to really work out who they might be.
I thought that was Midnighter's mask in the sand but apparently it's snow because it was found in Antarctica. Now when I look at the vast panels full of this beige-colored whatever, I just think it looks like mashed potatoes.
A group of seven people trek across Antarctica to their new base. They are not The Authority. They may be the "new" Authority. One of them certainly has wings like Swift. But they're all drawn too small to really work out who they might be.
Some of them look familiar, right?
I just glanced at the next few issues of this comic book and discovered I'm probably wrong in my assumptions. The next four issues with the triangle in the name are all written by Tom Peyer rather than Mark Millar. So it seems like this four part story will be interrupted by Peyer's four part story? Will it be a kind of flashback story within a story, a little Scheherazade action in The Authority? Should I stop guessing at shit and just read the comic book?
It seems this new group were promised a base on the moon but were instead given The Carrier as their new base, since The Authority seems to have all been killed (or gone missing or pretending to be dead or decapitated). We'll find out what happened to them soon because after a double page splash of just The Carrier sitting partially buried in snow, the story does the whole "One Week Earlier" thing. Because if there's one thing you can count on in a comic book, the notion of "in media res" just gets doubled over and cream pied until it comes spastically, passes out, and the story eventually begins right at the beginning anyway.
One week earlier, Jack Hawksmoor was giving an interview defending The Authority's policy of destroying genocidal governments and threatening aggressor nations.
It seems this new group were promised a base on the moon but were instead given The Carrier as their new base, since The Authority seems to have all been killed (or gone missing or pretending to be dead or decapitated). We'll find out what happened to them soon because after a double page splash of just The Carrier sitting partially buried in snow, the story does the whole "One Week Earlier" thing. Because if there's one thing you can count on in a comic book, the notion of "in media res" just gets doubled over and cream pied until it comes spastically, passes out, and the story eventually begins right at the beginning anyway.
One week earlier, Jack Hawksmoor was giving an interview defending The Authority's policy of destroying genocidal governments and threatening aggressor nations.
The Doctor has Jack snowed. All of that disaster was caused by The Doctor so he could get in Angie's nano-panties!
Meanwhile, something bad is happening on board The Carrier. Angie feels it but Apollo and Midnighter are too busy bickering to feel anything. They seem to be housing resentments towards each other based on one being a guy everybody loves and one being a guy everybody fears. Their argument's interrupted by a pizza delivery person (yes, delivering to The Carrier on her motorbike) who goes through her entire pregnancy right before their eyes.
Does pregnancy always end with the woman exploding into green goo?
Just in case the reader thought this alien exploded out of the woman's stomach, Frank Quitely draws the woman's torn underwear across the alien's back. Just to make sure the earnest reader knows exactly how this alien tore itself out of this woman. That's BodyHorrorWang!
Are there easier ways to sneak yourself onto The Carrier? Possibly but not when Mark Millar is writing the series. The only other way I can think Millar would have an alien sneak onto The Carrier is by exploding out of somebody's butthole. Or urethra!
Are there easier ways to sneak yourself onto The Carrier? Possibly but not when Mark Millar is writing the series. The only other way I can think Millar would have an alien sneak onto The Carrier is by exploding out of somebody's butthole. Or urethra!
"Bursting out of a woman's vagina just isn't shocking enough," thought Millar. "What if the alien declares they're a pedophile too?"
You might have noticed Apollo lying on the floor with his head and face on fire in that previous panel and been confused because I didn't mention how the first thing the alien did after pointing out that it didn't use a rubber (which means it came itself into this woman? How does that work? Did it turn inside out through the tip of its penis to wind up inside the woman?) was try to blow Apollo's head off. I'm assuming it didn't work or else I'd have brought up the Decapitation Counter.
I apologize for scanning this but I've been documenting how casually Millar loves to have characters taunt Apollo and Midnighter with homophobic slurs so I couldn't miss this huge one.
Don't get me wrong. I don't think Millar should be tarred and feathered for that panel. It would be nice if he'd left this out, sure. But for some reason, Millar seems to think the only way to show that a villain who just raped a woman, killed her by exploding out of her vagina, and then declared itself a pedophile is by having it call Midnighter a faggot. Okay, I guess this alien is a super-duper baddie? Because guess how Millar and Casey, in the Annual, felt they had to show bad guys being bad guys? By calling Apollo and Midnighter Marys and Queens and Poofs and Girls and Liza. It just never stops. It's almost as if Mark Millar and Joe Casey only cared about having gay superheroes so that they could have the bad guys use gay slurs.
I've definitely had my edgelord days. I'm a white heterosexual male. Of course I did! But reading vastly different types of literature in college, especially Victorian novels written by women, really helped tone that shit down. A lot of it still lingered for many years, in that way that "I'm joking!" types of shit continues to exist. And I still write some shit that's downright vulgar and tasteless and offensive. But usually I'm making a deeper point while looking as shallow as hell. It's a thing I do! But what I mostly stopped doing was using satire to lampoon terrible ideas and people by pretending to be one of those people. I still do it on occasion but in a way where I spell out exactly what I'm doing and how stupid it is. One of the main things that made me hyper aware of satire being done irresponsibly was The Colbert Report. I never really watched it much because I gave up cable around 2002 and never went back. But whenever I was some place that had cable, I'd watch one of two channels: The Game Show Network and Comedy Central. One time I was staying at a hotel in Los Angeles with my old, old, old friend Bobby Henline (you might know him as the Burnt Comedian now, or something like that). He was there to get another major eye surgery after being nearly burned alive in Iraq and I was there to support him in that and in his first attempt at stand up comedy. We had adjoining rooms and just kept the door open between our spaces. I was watching The Daily Show and laughing my ass off when Bobby came in and was all, "What the hell are you laughing so much about? I'm in my room watching Fox News and you're over here having fun!" So he sat and watched with me a bit and while he did, he said, "I really like the guy after this. That conservative guy." And while I didn't say anything, I just thought, "Does Bobby think Colbert is fucking serious?" And my mind just went, "Shit." I often say how anybody reading what I write who votes Republican is stealing because I don't want them reading my shit. I certainly don't want them thinking that I believe the terrible shit they believe so I try to stay away from satire. Like if I made a joke satirizing lazy, asshole husbands by saying, "Get in the kitchen and make me a sandwich!" To me, I'm laughing at the idiot who actually believes that kind of shit. But to people who believe that shit, they just read it, laugh, and say, "Right on, brother!" But I am not their brother and do not want to be thought of as their brother! They can go to fucking Hell!
I've definitely had my edgelord days. I'm a white heterosexual male. Of course I did! But reading vastly different types of literature in college, especially Victorian novels written by women, really helped tone that shit down. A lot of it still lingered for many years, in that way that "I'm joking!" types of shit continues to exist. And I still write some shit that's downright vulgar and tasteless and offensive. But usually I'm making a deeper point while looking as shallow as hell. It's a thing I do! But what I mostly stopped doing was using satire to lampoon terrible ideas and people by pretending to be one of those people. I still do it on occasion but in a way where I spell out exactly what I'm doing and how stupid it is. One of the main things that made me hyper aware of satire being done irresponsibly was The Colbert Report. I never really watched it much because I gave up cable around 2002 and never went back. But whenever I was some place that had cable, I'd watch one of two channels: The Game Show Network and Comedy Central. One time I was staying at a hotel in Los Angeles with my old, old, old friend Bobby Henline (you might know him as the Burnt Comedian now, or something like that). He was there to get another major eye surgery after being nearly burned alive in Iraq and I was there to support him in that and in his first attempt at stand up comedy. We had adjoining rooms and just kept the door open between our spaces. I was watching The Daily Show and laughing my ass off when Bobby came in and was all, "What the hell are you laughing so much about? I'm in my room watching Fox News and you're over here having fun!" So he sat and watched with me a bit and while he did, he said, "I really like the guy after this. That conservative guy." And while I didn't say anything, I just thought, "Does Bobby think Colbert is fucking serious?" And my mind just went, "Shit." I often say how anybody reading what I write who votes Republican is stealing because I don't want them reading my shit. I certainly don't want them thinking that I believe the terrible shit they believe so I try to stay away from satire. Like if I made a joke satirizing lazy, asshole husbands by saying, "Get in the kitchen and make me a sandwich!" To me, I'm laughing at the idiot who actually believes that kind of shit. But to people who believe that shit, they just read it, laugh, and say, "Right on, brother!" But I am not their brother and do not want to be thought of as their brother! They can go to fucking Hell!
Young Bob and me on that same trip. I was giving him bunny ears since his were burned off. Come on! He'd find that funny since 95% of all of his jokes are about his having been blown up and burned.
The alien kicks Midnighter in the stomach and he's out. I guess he was too surprised by the explosive birth to run the battle simulation through his mind computer one million times to figure out how to win the fight.
Also this "alien" is a redneck born of eight counts of incest, just in case y'all weren't shocked enough!
I guess this guy isn't an alien but some malformed experiment used as an assassin by world leaders who hate The Authority flexing their muscles on the international stage. I say "world leaders" but I mean "American president" because who else would use a redneck from . . . well, you know what state I'm thinking of. The one where incest is legally defined as "fornication between one hot ass family member with another." I don't want to get in trouble on picking on anybody specifically after I just ranted about picking on people specifically, so I will not mention the West Virginia I'm thinking of. I mean state! I said state!
Seth takes out The Doctor off-panel because Mark Millar just wrote a four issue story showing how impossible The Doctor is to beat. What the fuck could Millar possibly show in a fight between Seth and The Doctor that would get readers who just read "Earth Inferno" to believe The Doctor could be beaten in that specific way? Best to just do it off panel so readers could make up how it happened in their minds. Although it looks like he just riddled him with bullets. Doctor 1967 survived his body exploding and getting his brains punched out on the sun. But Seth takes out the better and more efficient Doctor by shooting him.
Seth takes out The Doctor off-panel because Mark Millar just wrote a four issue story showing how impossible The Doctor is to beat. What the fuck could Millar possibly show in a fight between Seth and The Doctor that would get readers who just read "Earth Inferno" to believe The Doctor could be beaten in that specific way? Best to just do it off panel so readers could make up how it happened in their minds. Although it looks like he just riddled him with bullets. Doctor 1967 survived his body exploding and getting his brains punched out on the sun. But Seth takes out the better and more efficient Doctor by shooting him.
Is Seth the mascot of Comicsgate?
Do I need to mention how easily Swift gets taken out? And Angie just has her nanobots sucked out of her. Seth's still on his book tour for his autobiography, Who Am I? I Will Tell You as I Kill You, so he explains how the seven richest countries modified a hillbilly to become more powerful than the Earth, every Shaman, Space Daddy God, and every member of The Authority. Just one member left: Jack Hawksmoor. And just a little more explication for who Seth is and why he's killing them.
This motherfucker (literally?) got the super power to vomit up razor sharp Yu-Gi-Oh cards!
Seth opens up his torso and engulfs Jack Hawksmoor into it. Finally, he goes to eat Jenny Quantum (oh god please just eat her) but finds her stroller empty. That's because Midnighter was only faking having his neck snapped! He races off on the pizza delivery girl's motorbike with Jenny in his arms and flees out of Door, probably to return in four issues after the interlude story with the new, better, younger, more obedient version of The Authority.
Oh, also Seth calls Midnighter a faggot again. I wonder how many people read this and thought, "Jesus, Mark! Why have him call Midnighter that?" And then as they learned Seth was a hillbilly redneck, they were all, "Oh, okay. I get it now! Hillbillies and rednecks are just like that!", exposing their own bigoted ideas of the world while challenging another. Do you think that was Millar's excuse? "It's just natural hillbilly language! You have to publish it!"
Midnighter returns through the Door about thirty seconds later flying a jet plane directly into Seth. They crash through several walls before hitting something extremely volatile (probably not the Caged Baby Universe because that would rewrite the universe remember) and causing an explosion big enough to crash The Carrier into Antarctica. I'm guessing it didn't kill Midnighter or Seth. But we won't know because it's now a week later and we've returned to the new team, The Young Authority!
Oh, also Seth calls Midnighter a faggot again. I wonder how many people read this and thought, "Jesus, Mark! Why have him call Midnighter that?" And then as they learned Seth was a hillbilly redneck, they were all, "Oh, okay. I get it now! Hillbillies and rednecks are just like that!", exposing their own bigoted ideas of the world while challenging another. Do you think that was Millar's excuse? "It's just natural hillbilly language! You have to publish it!"
Midnighter returns through the Door about thirty seconds later flying a jet plane directly into Seth. They crash through several walls before hitting something extremely volatile (probably not the Caged Baby Universe because that would rewrite the universe remember) and causing an explosion big enough to crash The Carrier into Antarctica. I'm guessing it didn't kill Midnighter or Seth. But we won't know because it's now a week later and we've returned to the new team, The Young Authority!
O wonder! How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is!
The Authority #22 Rating: B+. It was action packed and thrilling! Sure, something in the world exists more powerful than The Authority who were more powerful than everything that was more powerful than everything else. But of course there is! Of course the people running the world have a creature like Seth! And of course they reward Seth for having killed The Authority (and not dying, of course) with "a harem of under-12s." I think in 2000, people were pretty skeptical of how much pedophilia was rampant in the halls of the rich and powerful. But we've seen some pretty gross shit over the years and I'm talking about real shit and not Pizzagate nonsense or Q-Anon finger pointing to distract from the actual conservative pedophiles. I mean Catholic shit and Epstein shit and Boy Scouts shit and Subway mascots! It's fucking crazy man! But ignoring that, this comic book was just kind of enjoyable seeing what the world's richest and most powerful would turn into a weapon that casually tears The Authority apart. And to think, "This is the guy enforcing all of the terrible shit in the world? This is why we can't have health care and living wages and equality for all?! This fucking incestuous, pedophile turd?!"
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