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Title: Planetary: All Over the World and Other Stories by Warren Ellis, John Cassaday ISBN: 1-56389-648-6 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 March, 2000 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.48 (25 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Revisiting childhood haunts...
Comment: Those people who know Warren Ellis' work on STORMWATCH and THE AUTHORITY are already familiar with the dynamism and imagination of his storytelling. PLANETARY exhibits a lot of these same qualities, but in addition shows Ellis' ability to take some of the most hallowed territory in the pop/comic/sci-fi genres and hold it up to a skewed mirror, resulting in work that is wonderfully inventive but still true to the roots it draws from. Through his "archaelogists of the impossible," Ellis takes figures of the pop culture mythos a lot of us grew up with (Godzilla, the Incredible Hulk, the Fantastic Four, and more) and presents them in forms that are at once familiar and strange. Admittedly, I got a lot of enjoyment out of comparing what my perceptions of these figures were to the treatment of them in PLANETARY, but even if some of the references are lost on a particular reader, the characters Ellis creates are strong enough to carry the book on their own. Ellis' talent for dialogue is well-exercised with all the acerbic exchanges between team members Jakita Wagner, The Drummer, and Elijah Snow. Snow, in particular, bears watching - not only because he's the POV character, but also because he's very cranky...always a plus in a protagonist. All in all, this is a very auspicious start to what promises to be a very interesting ride through the secret history of the 20th century. It also bears mentioning that the artistic team of John Cassaday and Laura DuPuy does a phenomenal job in providing pictures to go along with the words - just a great leap forward for all fans of sequential art (or if you rather, comic books).
Rating: 5
Summary: Best Warren Ellis material I've read so far
Comment: I'm not one to easily over-praise something I like. I mostly look at the things I enjoy as critical as possible to come to as much of an honest opinion as possible, so that my words really mean something instead of turning into a bold statement which helps nobody. With this title however I can do nothing else but expres how much I enjoy it. It's as close to "historical fiction" as a mainstream 'superhero'-title is ever going to be and it's done well. And the term "superhero-title" isn't exactly right either because it isn't a superhero title, but the main characters ARE supernatural.
About the story: Elijah Snow, a mysterious man who was born on January 1st of the year 1900 encounters a woman called Jakita Wagner (who is accompagnied by another man called 'the Drummer') and she invites him to be part of a supernatural archaeologist group called 'Planetary'. She invites him to be the third member of their field-team who's goal it is to unravel the 'secret history of the world'. They try to map events in history how they REALLY took place, not how the common public was told it all happened. Elijah gets offered a salary of one million dollars a year for the rest of his life and all other professional expenses will also be taken care off by an anonymous financial aid only known as 'the fourth man', a man nobody knows. Elijah accepts and goes on his way to see things common man has never known was there.
The great thing bout this title is that each detail, as little as it looks at first, turns into a mystery of his own in time. Each story in each issue seems to be a self-contained story at first, but later on turns out to be just a piece of the puzzle in the 'grand scheme of things'. There's very little going on that's useless information. What also is very nice is that the essence, the starting line if you will, of the series is reality as WE know it. It's about OUR reality (not one made up as a comic-reality), WE are 'the common public and the way things really happened occured behind OUR backs on things that are REALLY in our history (like the first man on the moon and such things). Think of it as having a little bit the mood like 'X-Files' and you'll know what I mean.
So finally I would like to advise this title to all people who are not strictly interested in superhero clashes but not neccesarily only into 'serious comics' either. It's a mix of the two and it's done very well with a good mixing of illustrating and text. None of the two factors is dominating, it's very well balanced and it makes for a very good experience. For me it's easily the best writing I've seen of Warren Ellis so far.
Rating: 2
Summary: Clever, Deconstructionist Meta-Fiction But Not Much More!
Comment: Warren Ellis is often touted as the heir of the Moore-Morrison-Gaiman throne as the new king of "mature" comic-book writing. Reading his "Planetary" comic, I have to disagree. And I'm not the only one. Check out some of the discussions going on at the Barbelith forum to see what I mean. Ellis comes from the cynical British fraternity of comic-book writers who think they are so far above "mere superhero-spandex books" but since the majority of American comics are in the category of the aforementioned "superhero-spandex" type, they are forced (reluctantly and with much disdain) to write within that genre. I'm not making this up. Ellis himself admitted to this in countless interviews and articles.
Therefore, Ellis had to struggle to acquaint himself with this whole mumbo-jumbo of the superhero esoterica. And to him, it's all about archetypes and formulaes (Batman as the Dark Avenger, Superman as the Christ-like icon, etc.) Having stripped the superhero myth down to its bare bones, Ellis attempts to write a story around them. Therefore, he introduce us to Elijah Snow, Jakita Wagner and The Drummer in "Planetary". Three "mystery archaeologist" who set out to figure out the whole superhero esoterica. In this first volume, we have an examination of the pulp-heroes of the 1920s/30s, we visit Japan for a look at the inspiration behind its famed monster movies (e.g. "Godzilla") and finally, we end up in Hong Kong for a John-Woo-type balladic bullets work.
The whole thing is very interesting but ultimately comes off as just a clever, deconstructionist piece of meta-fiction but not much more. It's ultimately very empty. It's almost like a writer who's not really trying hard enough to write a good superhero story so he deconstruct others' works into mere formulaes. In addition to all that, Ellis presents the whole thing from a very cynical mode through the three very obnoxiously unlikable main characters. That's "Planetary". Clever, pretentious and empty. I gave the book two stars mainly because of the fantastic art of John Cassady.
In closing, I'd like to say something about superhero comics. It's not just formulaes and archetypes. I mean, you can deconstruct anything, any genre, that way and then go off to brag that you've mastered the whole thing. Superhero comics is the great American myth and its characters have been with us for decades. Clark Kent, Bruce Wayne, Peter Parker, Alan Scott, Hal Jordan, Barry Allen, etc. It's about the romance of chivalry. It's about the soap-opera of relationships and loves. It's about values and people who still believe in them. I'm thankful that it's far richer than the insipid stuff presented by a self-proclaimed know-it-all like Warren Ellis.
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Title: Planetary: Crossing Worlds by Warren Ellis ISBN: 1401202799 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 April, 2004 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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Title: Authority, The: Relentless by Warren Ellis ISBN: 1563896613 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 May, 2000 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Authority, The: Under New Management by Warren Ellis, Mark Millar, Bryan Hitch, Frank Quitely ISBN: 1563897563 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 November, 2000 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: Authority, The: Transfer of Power by Mark Millar, Tom Peyer ISBN: 1401200206 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 October, 2002 List Price(USD): $17.95 |
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Title: The Authority: Earth Inferno And Other Stories by Mark Millar, Frank Quitely, Chris Weston ISBN: 1563898543 Publisher: General Pub. Date: 01 July, 2002 List Price(USD): $14.95 |
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