The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2143: Midnighter #7, February 2016

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Fucking Prometheus. I mean, it's only fitting that he show up, given that his defeat of Batman in Grant Morrison's JLA is one of the great defeats of the dark knight. Also given that Midnighter has very similar abilities to both Prometheus and Batman, this confrontation was perhaps inevitable. But how Prometheus sets our hero up is brutal. Truly, truly brutal. I loved it, and it firmly cemented Midnighter as one of the great characters in the DCU.

I know that the character of Prometheus has undergone a number of changes and shifts of identity in the years since Morrison introduced him (back in the late 90s), but this iteration of the character seemed to be the exact model that was first introduced, an anti-Batman so to speak, and I was glad to see that origin maintained. The New 52 was an interesting experiment, and it gave us some really excellent comics, but I also think it messed around too much with the origins of characters, and those origins, very often, are what define the character more than anything they go through subsequently. For instance, let's imagine that we actually knew the Midnighter's real name and origin. All of a sudden, rather than a forward-facing force for justice, Midnighter would be a backward looking character reacting to their origin. Batman, for example. To me, this would severely detract from the character. I hope we never find out. I was very much against the Wolverine: Origin series back in the day too - why do we need to know where the character came from? Isn't it what they do now, in "present time," that is important? A curious conversation. Do we need to know the origins of our heroes? If we transfer the question to our lived existence, the sad truth is that the more we know about our heroes, the less we tend to like them. People are, simply, people. But superheroes aren't always meant to be people - more often, they're meant to be legends. And the truth behind a legend is always going to be more disappointing that the legend itself. Just ask King Arthur. Or Jesus.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2138: Midnighter #2, September 2015

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The opening of the previous issue shows someone breaking into a satellite called The God Garden (I'm convinced it's the remains of the creature the Authority dispatches in #12 of the original series) where lots of scary technology is being kept. Said tech is stolen. Today's issue features someone who has somehow acquired some of that tech, and is set to take revenge on a corporation whose negligence resulted in the death of someone she loved. The Midnighter steps in to stop her, but, as it turns out, only because he disagrees with how she's doing it, not what she's doing. And once he stops her from killing the corporate leaders, he goes on to severely injure them, and offers the tech-enhanced woman help, rather than simply incarceration.

This is a nice twist. Basically, Midnighter is a violent, gay Batman. He's awesome and charming and very, very scary. But he also has a unwavering moral compass, not often present in pseudo-sociopaths (except maybe Dexter), and, somehow, a desire to help not just those who are recipients of crime but also the perpetrators. The Authority was always a very socially-conscious comic, and it's nice to see later writers keeping that aspect of the characterization.

Also, this issue features what I think is 100% the best use of Midnighter's computer brain that lets him famously see the outcome of any fight before it's happened. Sadly, it's during an argument with his partner.

More to follow.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 2137: Midnighter #1, August 2015

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 Warren Ellis' Stormwatch, in which The Midnighter makes his debut, and The Authority, are amongst my favourite superhero comics. Setting aside, for just the moment, the problems we now face in taking in Ellis' work, he and artists Tom Raney and Bryan Hitch created perhaps one of the best politically-inflected superhero books of the current era. Stormwatch uncovers, in a much different way than Ellis and Cassaday's Planetary, a superheroic history for the Wildstorm Universe (which is likely all moot these days, sadly), while The Authority depicts superheroes doing all of those things that I've never understood them not doing in less...um...brutal superhero stories.

Anyway, this series is great. I laughed out loud, I was surprised, I was entertained. Equal parts brutal superhero story and gay dating narrative, I'm saddened that it only runs 12 issues, but very happy that I have them all. This run was part of the large collection I bought last October, though I only opened up the chunk I'd set aside in the last few days. I'm intrigued at jumping back into this particular corner of the DCU, especially since my last exposure to this character was when he existed in a separate continuum from the mainstream DC heroes. I know he's had some run-ins with Dick Grayson prior to this series, but I'm curious to see him versus Batman (which I'm sure will never happen), or standing up to Superman. Or hitting on the Martian Manhunter. I think that'd be right up The Midnighter's alley.

More to follow.