A brief thought on Grant Morrison's "Animal Man"

[andrewducker]

I just re-read the entire of Grant Morrison's run of Animal Man.

More than anything else it reminds me of Synecdoche, New York. Not for plot, but for the way it illustrates its creator's uncomfortableness with fiction, and life, and the relationship between them.

As an actual story, it's laughably weak. As a musing on comics mythology, fiction, and the relationhip between the author and their character it's marvellous.

I'm now looking forward to the release of Flex Mentallo, which (IIRC) builds on this idea.

On the other hand, I'm also glad to Morrison grew out of this, and that his more recent comics largely valued plot over existentialism (particularly for things like We3 and All-Star Superman. Obviously Seaguy is still heavy on the subtext. I'm hoping that gets finished at some point.)

Comments

[khbrown.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's pretty batshit insane. But I don't know if Alan Moore is necessarily more sane, even if his politics are more acceptable. It's like Steve Ditko - I can enjoy his comics and the Objectivist idea(l)s they entertain even if I in no way agree with them.

[andrewducker]

Alan Moore is certainly crazy, but seems to at least be self-aware enough to know that the things he's saying are not concensus reality, and admit that a lot of it is metaphor that he enjoys taking too seriously.