Comments on: 31 Days of Seven Soldiers, Day 22 - Mister Miracle #2 http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/ Comic Book Resources Presents... Comics Should Be Good! Sun, 22 Nov 2009 20:59:09 -0800 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Tuomas http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/comment-page-1/#comment-709889 Tuomas Fri, 13 Mar 2009 19:02:05 +0000 http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/#comment-709889 About the signifigance of the name Rimbaud: Arthur Rimbaud was a poet who stopped writing poems at the age of 20, and apparently wrote nothing at all (except for letters) for the last 17 years of his life (he died at 37). So the connection between him and Miss Rimbaud, who's desire to paint Dezard utterly destroys, is pretty obvious. About the signifigance of the name Rimbaud: Arthur Rimbaud was a poet who stopped writing poems at the age of 20, and apparently wrote nothing at all (except for letters) for the last 17 years of his life (he died at 37). So the connection between him and Miss Rimbaud, who's desire to paint Dezard utterly destroys, is pretty obvious.

]]> By: MarkAndrew http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/comment-page-1/#comment-27958 MarkAndrew Wed, 27 Dec 2006 15:36:25 +0000 http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/#comment-27958 Hoy Shit RAB, that was awesome. Hoy Shit RAB, that was awesome.

]]> By: RAB http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/comment-page-1/#comment-27039 RAB Sun, 24 Dec 2006 18:45:45 +0000 http://goodcomics.comicbookresources.com/2006/12/23/31-days-of-seven-soldiers-day-22-mister-miracle-2/#comment-27039 Someone mentioned my name! Truly, this is the merriest Christmas of all! God bless us every one! I posted a rebuttal to Jog in the comments section of his review of this issue that you mention above, and I'll stand by it. As a major Kirbyhead well known for taking the Fourth World series far too seriously, I haven't had a lot of use for what writers after Kirby have done with those characters and concepts -- but in this miniseries, Morrison has grasped Kirby's original intent better than any subsequent writer has done, and wisely applied his own spin to it rather than just repeating what's been done before. The fundamental idea of the New Gods was neither to create new pack of superheroes nor to make them totally obscure and unknowable...but to go back to the roots of mythology as the personification of human drives and impulses. <i>What would our gods look like if we created them today?</i> If we created an embodiment of modern warfare in anthropomorphic form, he would be a figure of technology...and our conception of the warrior isn't someone who takes joy in the glory of combat, but a deeply conflicted soldier who often feels troubled by the things he has to do and maybe even hates the side of himself revealed in battle. From this we get Orion. If we created a god of Light, he wouldn't be an archaic pastoral figure of sunlight...he'd be <i>photons!</i> He'd be tricky and deceptive and manipulative -- the light we use to create movies and television. And this gives us Lightray. What was the greatest evil of the 20th Century, the force that filled us all with dread? Fascism...embodied in Darkseid. The best friend of fascism? Torture and sadism...call him Desaad, after the man whose name is associated with those practices. In Morrison's view, we've become alienated from perceiving these forces and drives for what they are: we've lost touch with the epic and mythological in our own nature. So for him, our Gods are reduced to living as homeless street people, unrecognized, while the forces of badness try to keep us from reconnecting with our innate power. And the force that says "Wait, there's more to life than this, let's get out of the box someone else has stuffed us into, let's live the lives that we choose" is Mister Miracle. The point is, Morrison is using Kirby's characters to make a statement about humanity...exactly as Jack intended. Someone mentioned my name! Truly, this is the merriest Christmas of all! God bless us every one!

I posted a rebuttal to Jog in the comments section of his review of this issue that you mention above, and I'll stand by it. As a major Kirbyhead well known for taking the Fourth World series far too seriously, I haven't had a lot of use for what writers after Kirby have done with those characters and concepts -- but in this miniseries, Morrison has grasped Kirby's original intent better than any subsequent writer has done, and wisely applied his own spin to it rather than just repeating what's been done before.

The fundamental idea of the New Gods was neither to create new pack of superheroes nor to make them totally obscure and unknowable...but to go back to the roots of mythology as the personification of human drives and impulses. What would our gods look like if we created them today? If we created an embodiment of modern warfare in anthropomorphic form, he would be a figure of technology...and our conception of the warrior isn't someone who takes joy in the glory of combat, but a deeply conflicted soldier who often feels troubled by the things he has to do and maybe even hates the side of himself revealed in battle. From this we get Orion. If we created a god of Light, he wouldn't be an archaic pastoral figure of sunlight...he'd be photons! He'd be tricky and deceptive and manipulative -- the light we use to create movies and television. And this gives us Lightray. What was the greatest evil of the 20th Century, the force that filled us all with dread? Fascism...embodied in Darkseid. The best friend of fascism? Torture and sadism...call him Desaad, after the man whose name is associated with those practices.

In Morrison's view, we've become alienated from perceiving these forces and drives for what they are: we've lost touch with the epic and mythological in our own nature. So for him, our Gods are reduced to living as homeless street people, unrecognized, while the forces of badness try to keep us from reconnecting with our innate power. And the force that says "Wait, there's more to life than this, let's get out of the box someone else has stuffed us into, let's live the lives that we choose" is Mister Miracle. The point is, Morrison is using Kirby's characters to make a statement about humanity...exactly as Jack intended.

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