The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1941: Afterlife with Archie #1, December 2013

For information on stopping the spread of COVID-19, and on what to do if you are quarantined, have a look at the World Health Organization site.

Let's just put it out there, shall we? I'm no fan of Riverdale. I thought the first season was a touching tribute and melding of Twin Peaks and Archie Comics, two giants in the establishment of American media. I do not like the direction the show went with Jughead, though creator Roberto Aguiree-Sacasa, today's featured writer, has a history of making Juggie's story a strange one. Witness Afterlife with Archie.

Now, I should also say that I have emotions surrounding this series as Mr. Aguirre-Sacasa left us, mid-story, to go and work on the aforementioned Riverdale and it's increasingly dubious seasons. Mid-story. That's a tough one to forgive, especially given it's the success of this comic that helped him to secure the position of Chief Creative Officer at Archie Comics. It gives me the same feeling as when Neil Gaiman all but abandoned comics after Sandman. Now, it is possible that, in Gaiman's case at least, he had told the story he wanted to in comics, and good enough. Admittedly, his occasional returns to comics haven't ever quite had the same magic as The Sandman. But it's the mid-story bit that really gets me with this series.

And let me be clear: this is easily one of the best series I've ever read. It proves that the Archie characters can translate believably to any genre, as far as I'm concerned, and Mr. Aguirre-Sacasa and his artistic partner-in-crime Francesco Francavilla pull it off beautifully. There's just enough Cthulhu stuff, blended nicely, with a great premise that, despite what I said earlier about Jughead stories, is really perfect. Who else but Jughead, with an appetite to shame the gods, is better suited to be a flesh-craving zombie? It's a truly creepy and inspired piece of writing, though I have been told by people from other countries that it didn't impact them as much as it might those of us who grew up reading Archie. In a lot of ways, it's a comics readers' comic.

So where do I end up standing? Mr. Aguirre-Sacasa, who brings his talents as a playwright to these comics we love dearly,  writes great comics. He's been involved in some projects I've enjoyed, amongst them my beloved Man-Thing, but I'd really like to know how the truncated storyline, "Betty, R.I.P." turns out. Understandably.

More to follow.

Further Reading and Related Posts

If you're interested in more of Mr. Aguirre-Sacasa's work, have a look at these posts.

And if you're an Archie fan, here's all the stuff I've had to say about that venerable gentleman and his publishing empire.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1094: Nightcrawler #12, January 2006

Sadly, I think this is basically a truncated version of what would have happened had this title been given a chance to see a proper run. Nightcrawler is visited by Mephisto, who wants the Soulsword, and offers to resurrect Kurt's brother in exchange. The previous issues have hinted that there was a greater power behind the various things that had happened to Kurt, and they don't come much greater on the side of evil than Mephisto. I can imagine that the confrontation between the two, had we had much more build up, would have been wonderful, as would the resolution to the Kurt/Christine conundrum.

But, alas, that's not what we got. What we did get was a really great three stories, a taste of how things might have been, and further proof that Roberto Aguirre-Sacassa is one of the best writers working in comics right now. (If only he'd get another fucking issue of Afterlife with Archie out.)

And any time you get to read an extended run of Darick Robertson's art, you should do it. He understands this medium (and, if I'm correct, this character in particular) very well.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1093: Nightcrawler #11, December 2005

We come now to one of those disappointing moments in the curtailed life of a cancelled series. It's obvious, from the dialogue and from the lack of closure in the story, that there's more to the mystical war that is being set up. Sadly, tomorrow's issue is the last one, and as far as I can tell, Aguirre-Sacasa never continued the story he was setting up here.

A pity - a good, novel take on the X-Men, or on an X-Men character, is rare. It's what ended up driving me away from that section of the Marvel U - it never seemed that the situation of the characters changed very much. Yes, they moved from base to base, city to city, but it was always the persecution angle that drove the stories (as far as I could see, anyway). And while that is a vital part of the franchise, it can't be the only thing. Setting Nightcrawler up as the resident mystical investigator for the X-Men added some wonderful nuance to the team and their part of the shared universe. Whether his propensity for the outre lasts into other incarnations, I don't know.

But let's not seal it up quite yet. Still one more issue to go, and, who knows? Maybe we'll get some closure yet.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1092: Nightcrawler #10, November 2005

Kurt's odyssey continues, and the secret he glimpsed in the throes of his coma is revealed.

I admit, I was a bit confused at this point. I haven't followed the X-Men for a long, long time, and even though this is a 14 year old comic, it's still an era of the team with which I'm not familiar. So I wasn't sure why the Soulsword wasn't with Illyana or Kitty, or how old Illyana was meant to be at this point, and then when did Amanda Sefton take control of Limbo - is is even the same Limbo that Illyana ruled? Probably, given the Soulsword link.

Anyway, I had questions for about a minute, then I just let it wash over me and accept that I can't know all things. Sometimes reading an X-Men comic is very Zen.

Oh, and Man-Thing is in the comic. I hope he's in tomorrow's too!

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1091: Nightcrawler #9, October 2005

One of the things I really appreciate about Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa is that he appears to love Man-Thing as much as I do.

I kind of just want to leave it at that.

Of course, what I mean is that poor old Ted Sallis shows up in this issue, which means next issue should be even stranger than the last couple, and that these issues are potentially going to have to be relocated to my Man-Thing collection. Man-Thing is one of those characters who has only had sporadic ongoing series since his creation, but has appeared in a vast amount of titles. Usually he acts as a proxy for the hand of the universe in guiding heroes, which is how, in his own title under Steve Gerber, he always functioned best. I'd always thought it might be cool to read Ted Sallis's long, strange career through those guest appearances, and get an idea of what kind of "ongoing" adventures he's been through.

I'll be adding this issue, and presumably tomorrow's, of Nightcrawler to the list.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1090: Nightcrawler #8, September 2005

These last couple of issues have been strange, but not for the reasons you might think. Yes, there's some hallucinatory madness in the prior issue, and this one is dotted with flashbacks, but it's the actual context for the story that's strange. And not even really the context, but our exposure to it. Nightcrawler is attacked and made ill by Vermin, a particularly gruesome creature. We come in after the attack, during Kurt's delirium and, in today's issue, as he travels to Germany to uncover something hidden about his past. With Christine Palmer and Wolverine in tow. It's strange that we don't see the battle that pushed the hero on this kind of journey. It's a relatively common superhero trope - the hidden history, but we're often given the context of a battle in which the secret is teased to the hero. Here, instead, we skip the battle because Kurt comes upon the secret in the aftermath.

Let me put this to you, as it's just occurred to me:

The second book of Edmund Spenser's Faerie Queene features a character known as the Palmer, a guide and companion to Guyon, the knight who emblematizes temperance. Kurt, here, is accompanied by a woman whose last name is Palmer and a man who isn't encased in metal, but who has metal inside rather than out. Are Aguirre-Sacasa and Robertson riffing on The Faerie Queene? Or am I an ex-Grad student who misses analyzing texts?

You Decide!

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1089: Nightcrawler #7, August 2005

Sorry I've been dropping the ball so many times. Life is a bit weird at the moment.

A surreal trip through Kurt's mind, X-Men via David Lynch, perhaps? I'm excited to return to the Aguirre-Sacasa/Robertson Nightcrawler. This is a great series.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1053: Nightcrawler #6, April 2005

Nightcrawler's brief adventure in the New York subway system comes to a less-gruesome or depressing end than one might expect. We actually see some conscience being demonstrated by a politician, the mayor of New York city to be precise, and there's only one minor bought of fisticuffs in the issue that basically turns out to be a misunderstanding between the living (Nightcrawler) and the dead.

At one point in this issue, Kurt notes that something that the ghosts are doing is just like something out of the film The Grudge. Whether he's talking about the original or the Hollywood remake, I'm not sure, but while the scene might well be similar, the tone definitely is not. There is nothing of Japanese horror to this series, which is fundamentally a horror-superhero series. In Japanese horror, for the most part, the afterlife, or other world, or however we might consider it, is in no way sympathetic to the living. I've yet to see a Japanese, or Japanese-inspired in the case of the remakes, film in which the ghosts are actually just misunderstood and basically friendly. No, inevitably, they're angry and remain angry, and destroy all the living who cross their path. It's a good thing, I guess, that Nightcrawler can teleport out of that path.

If I'm honest, and this is certainly not to be derogatory, the series is like a superpowered version of Scooby-Doo. Thus far, including Kurt, we have three characters who are what I would term "main cast," all of whom are involved in some way in the mysteries that Nightcrawler is tasked with solving. Though, so far, there's no talking dog.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1052: Nightcrawler #5, March 2005

Another short one I'm afraid. Reeling from some medication side effects this evening. Some cool bits in this little ghost story that Aguirre-Sacasa and Robertson are putting together, not least of which is the revelation that Wolverine really digs musical theater. Honestly, the rest of the issue could have been blank and that one little exchange between him and Storm would have been perfect.

Again, I'm really enjoying the heck out of this series. I just seem to be reading it at a time when my body is going to crap.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1051: Nightcrawler #4, February 2005

What is it about Darick Robertson's art? It's at once cartoony and macabre, and off-putting combination, though perfect for the tone of this Nightcrawler series. Robertson manages the stylization of someone like Kelley Jones merged with the superheroness of John Romita circa The Avengers, a style that just slightly caricaturizes (almost) everyone in the book. I say almost because Nightcrawler himself is portrayed with almost an angelic, innocent beauty about him, a very interesting choice to make considering his demonic appearance. Nightcrawler himself makes an interesting case for us in refuting the Socratic (?) idea that one's outward appearance reflects one's inward. Of all of the X-Men, Kurt has long been the focus of this kind of metaphoric use - Othering through visual differentiation. A huge part of his narrative arc, which we also see in this series with his use of an image inducer to hide his true appearance. Is there some way we could theorize this through ideas surrounding drag. But rather than release a flamboyant person within, Kurt's drag disguises that very person. In his Nightcrawler "form," he's swashbuckling, gallant, acrobatic. In his normative disguise, he's very plain. There's actually a story in the first issue of Girl Comics that has Nightcrawler portrayed in a very feminine manner. I'll have to think on this a bit more as I read through the series - is Nightcrawler a feminized character? What exactly does that mean, and why?

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1050: Nightcrawler #3, January 2005

I'm afraid you'll have to forgive a short post tonight. I've done something horrendous to my wrists, and it's amazing how many things you actually need those for.

This issue was every bit as good as the previous two. I'll have a few things to say about Darick Robertson's art tomorrow, when I (hopefully) feel better. Getting older sucks.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1049: Nightcrawler #2, December 2004

Aside from a daring underwater sort-of-rescue, this issue is a bit slow. I muse fairly often on idea of seriality, and how that either helps or hinders a story. In this case, the space between issues seems a bit of a hindrance. Though we do have the little cliffhanger at the end, just enough enticement to bring the reader back next month, I think these first two issues would have worked much more effectively as a double-sized issue. Kurt travels to Limbo to see Amanda Sefton (who is routinely described in secondary sources as his "lover/foster sister," which is a little off-putting) when he suspects that there might be something magical involved in the killings. There's a nice moment where Kurt displays his ignorance of magical knowledge as he asks if the killings might be magical or...perhaps the occult. Sefton says she doesn't know what he's talking about. Much of the magical theory I've read holds to the idea that the force itself is not good or bad, just the use to which it's put. That is, the magician is the one who decides morally how the force is going to be used. Which sound a lot like I'm talking about Star Wars now.

Despite its slowness, I'm really loving this series. The mixture of Robertson's semi-stylized art and Aguirre-Sacasa's talent for dialogue and narrative is really quite fantastic. It's a pity it only lasted 12 issues, but I will definitely be tracking down more of RA-S's work. He's a pretty fantastic writer.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 1048: Nightcrawler #1, November 2004

A few weeks back a friend of mine was looking to part with his comic collection, and, of course, thought of me. Thus I have inherited a huge collection of X-Men comics, which is really very exciting. And when you come across a series written by the mind behind Afterlife with Archie and illustrated by Darick "Transmetropolitan" Robertson, you just read it. You don't even question.

This series kicks off nice and dark with the deaths of 13 children. I find that these solo X-Men series are pretty good for stuff like this, touching on the darker aspects and areas of the Marvel U. The main X-Men series is a bit too popular for dark stories like this one, but a Nightcrawler series is perfect for it. Given his demonic look, Kurt is a good fit for this story, which seems to have some ritual aspects to it - do the X-Men often interact with the mystical side of the Marvel U? Tangentially, perhaps, but not to as great an extent as they used to. I also think that a psychiatric facility for children has to be one of the most creepy settings possible - something that the New Mutants film that's coming out this year seems to be embracing.

Storm sends Kurt off to investigate, giving Nightcrawler a chance to shine outside of his team-based adventures, a welcome chance, I think. I'll be reading the first 6 issues of the series this week, then we'll take a break for a bit and then read the last 6 issues. The collection rearrangement is just about done - everything is now arranged by publisher so I don't have to go through every single box to find the things I'm looking for.

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 805: Riverdale One-Shot, FCBD edition, may 2017

I think every Free Comic Book Day for the last few years, I've lamented the days when I used to be able to come home with a stack of 20 comics that were all pretty fantastic, and spend a week or so pouring through them for the inevitable treasures. These days, FCBD is little more than another way for comic shops to make money, and not from side-purchases when one goes to get the free stuff.

Anyway, today's comic is really pretty good. I think Riverdale surprised everyone by being not only very, very cheesy, but also very, very compelling. I've been trying to figure out how much of that is based on prior knowledge of the characters and the shock value of seeing them put through this kind of story, but the fact that people who have little or no exposure to the long history of Archie comics also love this show really just means that it's doing something right. With the new Twin Peaks mere days away, and shows like Sense8 telling strange stories that we need to see, there's a new propensity in television for the strange, and Riverdale is giving us our teen-angst dose of that strangeness.

Some nice background bits in today's comic, though nothing that we actually haven't been made aware of from the show. With one possible exception: Hiram Lodge's desire to not have Veronica witness his downfall. It's pretty clear (SPOILER ALERT) that we're going to see Hiram soon in the series, if not in the final episode of the first season then at some point in the second. All we've heard of him in the TV series so far paints a very grim picture. But there's one panel in this issue in which he demonstrates some shame over his predicament, shame associated with his daughter maintaining a particular image of him. That's a very humanizing quality for a character that could have come in and been a stereotypical mustache-twirling villain. And that, I think, is what Riverdale has managed to do which distinguishes it from a lot of the other angst-y shows with which is shares an ostensible genre. It takes the stereotype and adds to it a dash of difference, just enough that we are left guessing, rather than knowing full well what a character is likely to do in a given situation. Further, given that Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa helmed this issue and helms the show, that little aspect of Hiram is very likely to carry over.

Though, honestly, I'd put up with a less well-rendered show if Mr. Aguirre-Sacasa woud just grace us with another issue of Afterlife and Chilling Adventures. Those comics are fucking mad!

To be continued.

The 40 Years of Comics Project - Day 277: Secret Invasion: Fantastic Four #1, July 2008

I'll admit, I'm drunk while writing this.

I'd meant to post Chase #1000000 today, but eleven o'clock rolled 'round, and after much wine and whiskey, I decided it would be best if I blogged a comic I'd read earlier, rather than trying to read another one in my current state.

I picked up the trade of this series today, so this first issue is actually contained in the book. I'd avoided most of the Secret Invasion crossovers, except for the Runaways/Young Avengers one, but it was cool so see this little interregnum in the story, and I look forward to rereading it the next time I make my way through the Secret Invasion story.

Both M. Aguirre-Sacasa and M. Kitson do a fantastic job (pun fully intended) on this series. Kitson really is an unsung hero of the superhero genre. His lines and depictions are always amazing.

That's all I have in me right now. Hopefully Chase tomorrow.