#mnemoth

"The dawn train lurches me toward London rolling a sick, millestone headache around the bowl of my skull. My heart twitches like a dying best, crawled into the rank burrow of my chest to breathe its last. I'm cold, chilled to the marrow. I daren't even shut my eyes for fear of sleep and dreams. I feel like an old soldier, attending one by one, the funerals of war comrades. Ritchie was the last of the Newcastle team. Benjamin got it first-- from the Invunche, and me. Then Gary Lester-- from Mnemoth, and me. Now Ritchie's incinerated by the Tongues of Fire-- and me. Christ, it's been ten years-- will I never stop paying for that debacle?

HELLBLAZER #1

JANUARY 1988

BY JAMIE DELANO, JOHN RIDGWAY, LOVERN KINDZIERSKI, ANNIE HALFACREE AND DAVE MCKEAN

John Constantine returns to England and finds out that his old friend Gary Lester has freed a demon upon New York.

SCORE: 10

Wow. I had this comic-book in my hands for several years (although it was in Spanish), and while I found it attractive enough, I never gave it the chance, mostly because at the time, I couldn't find the following issues.

So now I read it and I am really impressed. This is the British Invasion at its finest (and Gaiman and Morrison were about to break into the American market as well). The issue is engaging from the first page, and this is a 40 page premiere... It's just too far away from other comics of the time. Sure Swamp Thing has the same level of sophistication, but I found Delano's take a little easier to follow than Moore and or Veitch stories.

It is also a product of its time. This was written, I assume in 1987, when the AIDS stigma was still high, and not too far away from the OXFAM campaigns of the mid-eighties. And those two are obvious influences in the story (OXFAM even shows up in a billboard).

So, what if famine had a supernatural reason to exist? The story doesn't imply that, but it the demon does come from Africa, where it was killing people with famine. And the bugs, walking over their eyes? Come one, that's very close to reality.

And then it hits America, where people are paranoid that this is the next big pandemic.

The issue also introduces new characters that will stay for a long time, Chas, Papa Midnite and... well... Gary Lester.

Now, John doesn't feel as much of a jerk here as he was in Swamp Thing, but it may be a question of time really. We spend most of the issue following the trail of this new menace and introducing characters and backstory, we don't really see John making his... characteristic decisions. But yeah, he is still a jerk.

A jerk with a responsibility.

"Stop going on about dope! Because you are a stupid, weak cretin who can't resist screwing himself up, we are on the verge of mass demonic possesion in one of the foremost population centers of the globe!"

"The drug has screwed me up royally. My guts are in an uproar but I get the feeling I ought to hurry. I wobble down the hill on legs like bits of rope. The old boy was shrewd, his shock tactics were a bit crude but they worked. I know what I've got to do. Yeah, no flies on him. The day after and I'm still hung-over. But it's up, up, and away to pick up Lester-- then on to the States. It's a game... ennit?"

A solid adaptation of the first story arc from the comics. It wasn’t the most faithful, and I feel like it was a bit more dilute than the original. But the sympathetic portrayal of Lester made Constantine’s choice all the more ruthless.