The Matt Signal Advent Calendar 2014 Day 10: Transmetropolitan #14

Transmetropolitan #14, October 1998 

“Home entertainment system: Give me fire. Give me information.” Give me every single issue of this wonderful futuristic tale, please. 

I admit to being a flag-flying member of the Merry Marvel Marching Society, but I’ll read any series with great characters, great concepts and quotable word balloons. Warren Ellis’ writing had already made me a fan of Excalibur, but this series made me a fan of Warren Ellis.

And that Darick Robertson splash page – with gonzo journalist Spider Jerusalem sitting in a room on metaphorical fire in front of a dozen TV screens filling his brain with news feeds – that, my friends, is good comics.

Vertigo’s Transmet is the first “indie” series I read from beginning to end. Y the Last Man and Ex Machina followed, and I plan to finish Saga and Chew as well. (Can you smell the pending Brian K. Vaughn post?)

Jerusalem was the perfect protagonist for me: a cranky writer with no respect for authority, endless supplies of drugs and a pair of “filthy assistants” at his beck and call. That’s me up until the no respect for authority, drugs and assistants parts. (It should be noted that issue 14 marks the first appearance of one of said assistants, Yelena Rossini, who on Day One tells Spider, “Shut up. You’re horrible. I hate you.”)

The Jerusalem figure Matt bought me many moons ago still features prominently among my shelf porn, complete with bowel disruptor.

For more on Ellis’ contributions to comics, from Transmet to Global Frequency to Moon Knight, click here.

Oh Warren, You and Your Ideas

Writer Warren Ellis launches a new volume of Moon Knight for Marvel this week, with art by Declan Shalvey. In many ways, Ellis is the perfect writer for this character, whom he previously worked with in a six-issue run on Secret Avengers in 2011. Ellis is a man who loves throwing high-concept, futuristic, pseudoscientific ideas at the wall to see if they stick, and Moon Knight is the vessel of vengeance for an Egyptian moon god or something. In a recent CBR interview, Ellis said of writing MK, “You can get really weird. Also, you can provide, as an entire plotline, the sentence ‘punching ghosts,’ and nobody bats an eyelid.” Stop. You had me at hello, I’m Warren Ellis.

As we look to Moon Knight’s future, let us also look to the past, to but a small sampling of Ellis’ most outré ideas:

The alien race that killed its own god (Excalibur): In 1994, Marvel gave Ellis the then-third-tier X-book Excalibur to infuse with his dark, distinctly British sensibility. Among his first acts was creating the snarky but haunted spook Pete Wisdom and teaming him up with not-a-girl, not-yet-a-woman Kitty Pryde. Together they discovered Wisdom's employer, Black Air, was experimenting on an alien race called the Uncreated, self-named because they killed their own deity as a means to conquer their inferiority complex. After doing so, the race traveled the stars looking to exterminate any lifeforms that did not embrace their atheism. Ellis next used the Uncreated in 1995's Starjammers miniseries, in which the titular space pirates defeated the nasties by projecting an image of their god, leading the Uncreated to commit seppuku. (For more on Ellis’ Excalibur run, read Matt’s Recommended Reading column from last May.)

The most obvious visual representation of Darwinism ever? (Storm 1-4): Ellis and Terry Dodson did a four-issue Storm mini in early 1996 that picked up a few dangling Morlock/Gene Nation plot threads from earlier in the ’90s. Storm is shunted into an alternate dimension run by Colossus’ brother Mikhail Rasputin, last seen flooding the Morlock tunnels and disappearing with the undercity dwellers. In Rasputin’s pocket world, where time moves in erratic patterns, the Morlocks were trained to become Gene Nation terrorists by climbing The Hill. Literally, every denizen of this world had to scale and survive a giant hill to prove their fitness and worth to Rasputin.

The bowel disrupter (Transmetropolitan): “Now, what setting? Watery, loose … prolapse.” One of Ellis’ greatest triumphs and crazy-idea farms is this 60-issue Vertigo series starring Spider Jerusalem, a futuristic Hunter S. Thompson whose work for The Word uncovers the dirty deeds of one president after another and puts a big old target on his back. It’s a near-future world in which people fight for the right to change species and there’s a children’s show called “Sex Puppets.” There’s also a gun that makes people poop themselves, which Jerusalem uses to threaten stripper turned “filthy assistant” Channon Yarrow and actually uses on the president known as The Beast in issue #4 in 1997.

Superman and Batman as a gay power couple (The Authority): Ellis ported Superman analogue Apollo and Batman analogue Midnighter from Stormwatch to The Authority. In their new book, the two were revealed to be a gay couple. Back in 1999, this didn't happen all that often, and so the book received a GLAAD award. Arguably these two paved the way for other gay couples in comics such as Northstar and Kyle Jinadu, Batwoman and Maggie Sawyer, and Wiccan and Hulkling.

Right-tool-for-the-job expert-dispatch service (Global Frequency): This 2002-04 Wildstorm book may be the best example of what happens when Ellis favors concepts over characters. Global Frequency was a 1,001-member organization (about on par with Jonathan Hickman’s Avengers cast) of the world’s foremost experts in their field, who are called in as crises warrant based on field of expertise and proximity. In a way it was like a super-serious version of G.I. Joe, with a mix of military, intelligence, scientists, ex-cons and the like all working to save the world, except the characters didn’t stick around long enough for anyone to decipher who the Shipwreck and Roadblock analogues were. Even the artists changed from issue to issue. Also it was almost a TV show.

The guy who buggers cars (Two-Step): In 2003-04, Ellis wrote a quickie three-issue miniseries for Wildstorm with Amanda Conner and Jimmy Palmiotti about a bored, cheeky London camgirl named Rosi and a zen gun-for-hire named Tony who run afoul of a gang whose trademark is having artificially large wedding tackle. Among their number is a Baby Huey of a man named Ron who enjoys having sex with cars to the point where they explode. According to TLC’s My Strange Addiction, this is a real thing.

Having Iron Man inside you (Iron Man: Extremis): In 2005-06, Ellis got to tinker with Iron Man's origin, tying the creation of the first Iron Man suit to the war in Afghanistan as part of a six-issue arc that introduces the concept of Extremis, a nanotech virus that allows fir the constant healing and enhancing of the body in the latest attempt to re-create the Super Soldier Serum that transformed Steve Rogers into Captain America. Tony infects himself with Extremis and in so doing becomes one with Iron Man, allowing parts of it into his bones and give his brain a complete upgrade. Elements of the Extremis story were used in the Iron Man movies, including the updated origin story.

Supervillain marketing (Thunderbolts 110-121): Ellis took over Thunderbolts after Civil War in 2007-08. During that period, the ’Bolts were Colorado’s Initiative superteam and were run by a Tommy Lee Jones-looking Norman Osborn. Osborn used his business acumen (when he wasn’t using his crazy acumen) to market the team through Saturday morning cartoon commercials, brainwashing kids into rooting for psychotic killers like Bullseye, Venom and the Strucker twin who was in love with his dead sister.

Honorable mention: Warren’s novel ideas (Crooked Little Vein, 2007; Gun Machine, 2013): Ellis’ two published novels are every bit as idea-rich as his comics. Without going too deep into either, it should be noted that in Crooked Little Vein, the two main characters inject saline into their genitals to artificially swell them and then have sex, and in Gun Machine, a Wall Street financier explains that the key to the future of financial-market real estate is pingback, the time it takes information to transmit from a given location, to ensure the fastest, most competitive buying and selling.

Hey, Do You Remember That Time: Political Ambitions Edition

Happy almost-George Washington’s birthday (even though Presidents Day was two days ago and under the Julian calendar his birthday was Feb. 11)!

In honor of our first president – who recently came back from the dead to lead an army of his fellow zombie presidents against humanity – here’s a short sampling of classic characters who have run for or were appointed to American political office.
 

PRESIDENT LEX LUTHOR: A new millennium brought a new president to the D.C. universe in the form of Superman’s most hated enemy, Lex Luthor. Luthor became president mostly so he could mess with Superman and Batman, having masterminded the earthquake that turned Gotham City into No Man’s Land, framed Batman for murder, brought about the destruction of Clark Kent’s hometown, divided the Justice League and attempted to blame Supes for a kryptonite meteor headed toward Earth.

PRESIDENT CAPTAIN AMERICA: In the early 1980s, Roger Stern and John Byrne (Hey, that rhymes!) wrote a story in which Steve Rogers considered running for president but ultimately turned it down as he considered his superheroics to be apolitical. Roughly 30 years later, in 2012, Cap was elected in the 1610 “Ultimate” universe, accepting the job in the pages of Ultimate Comics: The Ultimates in a story by Sam Humphries and Luke Ross. He has since been killed by good old 616 Galactus.

PRESIDENT GARY “THE SMILER” CALLAHAN: Spider Jerusalem, the bowel-disruptor wielding, cranky journalist star of Warren Ellis’ brilliant Transmetropolitan, starts out antagonizing a president he’d unaffectionately nicknamed The Beast. Enter the devil he doesn’t know. The Smiler becomes Spider’s main nemesis for the run of the series after admitting flat-out that he became president to oppress and punish people and going so far as to have his political director and his own wife and children killed to earn sympathy in the polls. Also, he kinda looks like Paul Ryan.

PRESIDENTIAL HOPEFUL GRAYDON CREED: Creed first appeared as one of the Upstarts, a 90s cabal of mutants (and one mutant-hating human) who got points @midnight-style for assassinating 80s targets like the Hellfire Club, the New Mutants and the Hellions. Starting in ’95, the X-writers put him on a path toward the White House, backed by head Prime Sentinel Bastion. Proving that almost all the good X-ideas were Chris Claremont’s, however, the writers get their Days of Future Past on and have Mystique kill her own son. (P.S.: The DOFP reality was supposed to be last year. And yet here we are: no sentinel overlords, no mutant hounds, no hoverboards.)
 

NEW YORK CITY MAYOR MITCHELL HUNDRED: In Ex-Machina, the superhero known as The Great Machine was elected mayor of New York City after he saved one of the Twin Towers on 9/11. Some of the best stories in the Brian K. Vaughn series weren't the ones where Hundred uses his powers to talk to machines in green font, but when he deals with everyday issues such as private school vouchers, gay marriage and the death penalty. He makes you wish he was your mayor, you know until the end (no spoilers).
 

NEW YORK CITY MAYOR J. JONAH JAMESON: After years of lambasting Spider-Man in his rag, The Daily Bugle, JJJ received an opportunity to kick his single-focus Spider-bashing into overdrive as mayor of the greatest city on Earth. That said, the odds were stacked against him, what with Spider-Man being an Avenger and all, and other city officials resigning because of his over-dedication of city funds to hunting the wall-crawler. And in the biggest sign that his decades-long quest is a fool’s errand, he ends up giving him a key to the city.
 

DEFENSE SECRETARY DELL RUSK: Long before he became DC’s Green Lantern guy (then Aquaman guy, now Superman guy, maybe next Plastic Man guy?), Geoff Johns had a stint writing Earth’s Mightiest Heroes. Part of his run involved a mysterious plague that turned people into crimson corpses. The plague was ultimately linked to Defense Secretary Rusk, who turned out to be the Red Skull in disguise (spoiler, schmoiler, he’s right there on the trade cover). The late, great Disney XD cartoon “Avengers: Earth’s Mightiest Heroes” adapted the storyline in the brilliantly condensed manner it adopted most Avengers storylines, managing to work in the Falcon, the Winter Soldier and the Red Hulk for good measure.
 

DEFENSE SECRETARY TONY STARK: If a man who literally wraps himself in the flag can be elected president, surely one of the nation’s top weapons manufacturers can run defense. Tony took the job to keep an eye on how his products were being used by the U.S. military but ended up being ridden out on a rail during Brian Michael Bendis’ Disassembled storyline when the power-overloaded Scarlet Witch made the recovering alcoholic Stark appear drunk and belligerent during a press conference. Residents of the Marvel Universe must have short memories, though, as just a few years later he became director of SHIELD after Civil War. SHIELD continued its commitment to questionable leadership after Secret Invasion, when Stark was ousted in favor of a man who chases Spider-Man around in purple pajamas.
 

SEN. ROBERT KELLY: You know the old saying: If at first you don’t assassinate, try, try again. Kelly’s death was first foretold as part of Chris Claremont’s Days of Future Past storyline in 1980. In that storyline, Kitty Pryde, possessed by a future version of herself, saves the senator from taking an arrow through the neck from Destiny. Kelly next almost died in 1989 at the hands of the Sentinel Master Mold but was saved by his wife, former Hellfire Club waitress Sharon, who did die. In 1997, Cyclops saved the senator from Bastion’s Prime Sentinels during Operation Zero Tolerance. Not long after, Pyro, who was dying of the Legacy Virus, attempted to redeem himself by preventing the senator from being killed by Mystique’s Brotherhood of Evil Mutants. But after all those attempts on his life by pissed-off mutants and robots, who should kill him but some pissed-off flatscan named Alan Lewis. FUN FACT: In the 1990s X-Men cartoon, Kelly is elected president, replacing a woman who used a treadmill in the Oval Office.
 

HONORARY MENTION: KANG/KODOS: Yeah, I know I’m  getting off-medium, but who doesn’t love “Citizen Kang,” the 1996 Simpsons’ Treehouse of Horror vignette in which Kang and Kodos run for president as Bob Dole and Bill Clinton, dooming the human race to slavery regardless of the outcome? “Don’t blame me, I voted for Kodos!”

Dan Grote is the author of Of Robots, God and Government and My Evil Twin and I. He and Matt have been friends since every 25^th issue came with a foil-embossed cover, a hologram trading card and free pogs.

The Beginning of a Bold New Era!

Or would it have been better to say "The Old Order Changeth!" Or maybe, "Welcome Back to The Matt Signal, We Hope You Survive the Experience!"

OK, so again I fell off the face of the Earth, and for that, gentle reader, I apologize. Real life kind of kicks you in the butt sometimes, not in a bad way, but in a butt kicking sort of way. But, I'm back, and I'm committing myself to getting back on track. Two posts a week, the normal two, for the next couple of weeks, and then starting in March, alternating weekly features on Thursday or Sunday (I haven't made up my mind on which). One week will be a post celebrating Batman's 75th anniversary, since, shocking to anyone who has never read this blog and not at all to anyone who has, I love Batman, and this is a big anniversary. And the following week, there will be a post celebrating Star Wars comics at Dark Horse before the license moves to Marvel. But have no fear, to paraphrase The Bard, I come not to mourn Star Wars but to praise it.

But more than that, I'm gonna give you some extra bang for your non-buck. Because there is also going to be a weekly column written by someone else. Yes indeed, look forward to midweek columns from my good friend Dan Grote, novelist, journalist, and all around great guy. The first of those will pop up tomorrow or Wednesday, but first here are his answers to the same three questions I answered when I started this blog.

1) What is the first comic you remember reading?

The first comic I can remember reading was a STAR MadBalls comic, I want to say.

2) What is your favorite comic/series of all time?

Favorite series is Brian K. Vaughn's Ex Machina, with Warren Ellis' Transmetropolitan a close second.

3) What is it about comics that you love?

Comics are the closest thing humans have to immortality. Characters like Superman, Batman, Spider-Man and Daredevil have been working for 50 to 75 years without a break, and their penetration across multiple media platforms ensures their continued employment and vitality for decades to come.


So that's the news around these parts. If you've been reading for a while, thanks for sticking around, and if you're new, welcome! It's going to be an exciting time here at The Matt Signal.