After being kinda disappointed with Batman: Gothic, I went through my recent spending frenzy on Comixology and pulled out the first collection of Animal Man, and it didn't disappoint. There's this really weird feeling to 80s and 90s superhero stuff that I can't quite articulate -- like people were butting up against the limitations of "a superhero comic" as it existed and still pushing -- and Animal Man has that in spades. Usually I find it kind of dull, but here it's fascinating. Morrison takes what could have been a pretty dull premise and mines it for the really good stuff deep down, which is why I enjoy him. Highly recommended. ( )

Animal Man is the story of a superhero from a long time ago that Grant Morrison was compelled to bring out of retirement and make him relevant again. Animal Man actually looks himself up in the library superhero encyclopedia and sees the sentence "Presumed retired".

And this means two things - 1. These comics were published before Google (the late 80's) and 2. Grant Morrison's great sense of tongue-in-cheek humor.

I had picked up one of the Animal Man comics while Morrison was writing it but I didn't really understand it or care for it so I never purchased any more of them. It's only been lately that I've thought that I need to re-visit Animal Man and read the entire 26 issue series.

It started off a little rough for me, but by the time I got to the end of this TPB, I was thinking "No, it ends on a cliffhanger ! No, don't do this to me! Aaaah!" Thankfully, it looks like I'll be able to get all of the issues at the library. Whew.

So at first, Animal Man is finding his voice, his mission, his passion. It turns out to be - well - animals. Animals as in animal rights. He rescues lab animals. There isn't much background to him in these stories - apparently, a space ship blew up in his face and he can pick up the special powers of the animals around him, but amplified. And he can fly. And he also puts on a jacket over his spandex suit - after all, he was just a little too spandexy (or something to that effect, when his wife mentions it.)

He's married. Two kids. He really wants in to the Justice League. Finally, his membership card appears in the mail. We also learn that if his house undergoes damage from aliens or super villains, the Justice League will take care of repairs within 48 hours. Good deal. (Here we see Grant Morrison's sense of humor which permeates this comic.)

Except - there's a problem that might prevent him from becoming a Justice League member. And that's where issue #9 ends. Sigh.

It's not all fun and games - there's some serious issues going on here. I'm glad it got better for me, glad I read it. ( )

Ok! So I'm a Morrison fanboi! But this early stuff was genuinely exciting compared to other comics. Not sure how I managed reading this without becoming vegetarian at the time (oh yeah, my Mum wouldn't allow it... :/ ).
Oddly having flashforwards to the Psycho Pirate bits though (probably the current nDCU soft reboot.) ( )

Really fun early series by Grant Morrison. Some of the episodes were more interesting than others (The Death of the Red Mask, and of course The Coyote Gospel). What I like most about this comic is Morrison's playful use of self-reflexivity, which I have read gets more and more theoretical (and supposedly abstruse) in later work. ( )

Really fun early series by Grant Morrison. Some of the episodes were more interesting than others (The Death of the Red Mask, and of course The Coyote Gospel). What I like most about this comic is Morrison's playful use of self-reflexivity, which I have read gets more and more theoretical (and supposedly abstruse) in later work. ( )