Tag Archives: Abel

Nov 26 2018

Middlewest 1 Hides Magic in Plain Sight

by Patrick Ehlers

This article contains SPOILERS. If you haven’t read the issue yet, proceed at your own risk!

I regularly make the claim that I “don’t believe in spoilers.” And that’s like 90% true – if a work can be “spoiled” by learning one detail of what happens in it, it’s probably not going to be a thing I enjoy anyway. There are exceptions to this, of course, and there are the odd movie or series that I wish I could revisit without any knowledge of what it’s about. Like, can you imagine how cool it would be to watch The Truman Show without any idea that Truman is part of a giant reality TV show? The movie so patiently teases both the character and the audience with the reality of the situation before blowing the doors off about 20 minutes in. Skottie Young and Jorge Corona’s Middlewest 1 takes a similarly patient approach to revealing the reality of the world of their story, but the hints are everywhere. Continue reading →

Mar 8 2017

Savage Things 1

Today, Michael and Drew are discussing Savage Things 1, originally released March 1st, 2017. As always, this article contains SPOILERS.

Michael: I live in Chicago, a town that is full of excellent restaurants. If you run a restaurant that doesn’t distinguish itself from the rest, you’re not likely to last long in such a competitive market. In this sense I like my storytelling similar to my restaurants: there’s gotta be something unique and original about it or you’ll probably lose my interest. Unfortunately, Savage Things doesn’t seem to be my kind of restaurant. Continue reading →

Nov 13 2015

The Goddamned 1

goddamned 1

Today, Patrick and Michael are discussing The Goddamned 1 originally released November 11th, 2015.

And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” Jesus answered them, “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. For whoever has, to him more shall be given and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. There I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.”

Matthew 13: 10-13

Patrick: God makes Adam and Eve. They defy God’s will and are cast out of the Garden of Eden. They have two sons: Cain and Abel. The sons don’t get along, so Cain kills his brother. God is furious with Cain, marks him as a cursed man and sends him out to the land of Nod away from his family. My summary of the Cain and Abel story right there is about as long as the actual text from Genesis. That book is nuts – it can spend paragraph rattling on about lines of succession, but burn through two deep betrayals and the first murder ever in a scant few sentences. If there’s any meaning to be found in that story, it must be extrapolated out by the reader – that’s why people go to church every Sunday: so someone can try to explain the “meaning” of the stories to them. But even those explanations are hard to understand. Take Jesus’ answer to “why do You speak to them in parables?” above. The point of the stories isn’t to understand them necessarily, but to experience them. Jason Aaron and r.m. Guéra’s harrowing first issue of The Goddamned sets out very specifically to be experienced rather than understood.

Continue reading →