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Leatherjack

Started by Colin YNWA, 16 July, 2010, 09:20:00 AM

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Colin YNWA

Well another year done and another John Smith work of genius.

When I started reading 'Leatherjack' I had this horrible feeling John Smith's work was suffering from what I call 'Stereolab syndrome'. Let me explain, I love Stereolab they are a fantastic band and amazing live if you ever get the chance, I digress. When I heard 'Cobra and Phases' however, their 6th studio album for those who don't know the band, I was just so done with them. Its not a bad record by any stretch of the imagination, if it'd been the first, second or even fifth Stereolab album I'd heard I'd probably have loved it but as it was I was just done with Stereolab, I'd heard just about enough Stereolab albums to last me a life time and have never got back into any of their newer stuff. They are still creative, different and brillant, just my head is as full of Stereolab stuff as it can get.

This is how I felt starting out reading 'Leatherjack', it was so very very John Smith. It had all the John Smith things in it, all his stuff. Crazy imagination, wonderful word play, a gazillion idea's a second, strong complex central themes, great characters, a real sense of a world at a slight angle to our own yet utterly compelling and believable. BUT I wasn't getting into it and a cold chill struck me. Was I done with John Smith, had my head got full of as much of John Smith's writing as it could take. Had John Smith jumped the moog (Stereolab reference for those that know).

No.

Thank christ for that.

As I got into the story I was so utterly pulled in, so entirely engrossed in the world he'd created and the creature's he's populated it with that my head just grew more space for John Smith and embraced this utterly brillant story. Really this has everything you'd expect from a John Smith story and its brillant. So much so that when I read the comment by Tharg suggesting that you read Paul Auster's 'New York Trilogy' and compare the themes and ideas I wanted to go back and read it again to do just that being a big fan of Paul Auster too.

John Smith is immune to Stereolab Syndrome, John Smith just makes your brain grow more space. And that is why he's a chuffing genius. I've waxed lyrical about the man before and was a bit self conscious about doing so again knowing that he's been around these parts of late but what he heck the man deserves it, he's chuffing brillant.

I've gone on to this extent and not yet even mentioned the fantastic Paul Marshal art... well there you go its fantastic. I get hints of Cam Kennedy from this work of late and I think this is the first strip (chronologically not by my reading) where that is apparent. Not in a way that takes away from his own unique style but just enough to enhance it even more. Great stuff.

In summary I liked this

Word/lab

Emperor

I had a nose through Leatherjack the other and it struck me I should really buy the trade as it really deserves to be read as a whole where you can take it all on as ideas are arriving so fast you need to take it slow to get everything.

I am also surprised that, while Paul Marshall, has had steady work in 2000 AD (and quite a good run on Dredd) he has never broken out into being a big name, despite his work on Leatherjack being excellent.
if I went 'round saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!

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radiator

Picked up the trade for £2 last year, and only just got round to reading it.

Was pretty good.

Hoagy

I do hope the Review guys will join in your flagship reviewing Colin. It may perk them up a little.
"bULLshit Mr Hand man!"
"Man, you come right out of a comic book. "
Previously Krombasher.

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Emperor

Leatherjack came up on the Wednesday chat this week - it was originally going to have been a Vertigo series with Chris Weston on art. Now that would have been something.
if I went 'round saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!

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O Lucky Stevie!

#5
Quote from: Emperor on 12 August, 2010, 09:15:56 PM
Leatherjack came up on the Wednesday chat this week - it was originally going to have been a Vertigo series with Chris Weston on art. Now that would have been something.

Almost. It was originally commissioned by Stuart Moore for DC's short lived SF imprint Helix.

Being the original home for Transmetropolitan.

They also published Lucius Shepard's wonderful Vermillon, as well as the first Bloody Mary mini,  a piece of tosh by Howard Chaykin & some others has reached mimetic escape velocity completely.

Aha, here we go: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helix_(comics)
"We'll send all these nasty words to Aunt Jane. Don't you think that would be fun?"

O Lucky Stevie!

Addendum: Looks like Helix lasted long enough to publish both of series of Garth & Carlos's Bloody Mary. Guess Stevie was thinking of the eventual trade which was under the Vertigo imprint.

Going through the list he can't remember anything of Pollack & Weston's Time Breakers bar the art was bloody gorg on nice paper so can't comment on the story itself.

He can't help but wonder if the long gestation for Leatherjack was actually in it's favour; allow the concepts to marinate further in the pressure cooker of John Smith mind plus Paul Marshal is just faultless.

Quote from: Krombasher on 11 August, 2010, 06:03:56 PM
I do hope the Review guys will join in your flagship reviewing Colin. It may perk them up a little.

Hear hear, even if Stevie does disagree with Colin's comments re: Stereolab, eloquently put as they are.
"We'll send all these nasty words to Aunt Jane. Don't you think that would be fun?"

Colin YNWA

The original plans for the story are certainly interesting and go some way to explaining why its as long as it is, which seemed strange in a time of stories normally lasting what maybe 8-12 episodes. Made it all the more powerful for me that it had this extra room.

Emperor

Quote from: O Lucky Stevie! on 13 August, 2010, 02:34:39 AM
Quote from: Emperor on 12 August, 2010, 09:15:56 PM
Leatherjack came up on the Wednesday chat this week - it was originally going to have been a Vertigo series with Chris Weston on art. Now that would have been something.

Almost. It was originally commissioned by Stuart Moore for DC's short lived SF imprint Helix.

Ah I can see where the Vertigo mix up could come from as series still ongoing segued to Vertigo, like Transmetropolitan so it makes sense Leatherjack would have been initially moved there.

I had a look for more information on the background of the series and Chris Weston has a blog post on it with his interpretation of the lead character:

http://chrisweston.blogspot.com/2006/09/leatherjack.html

Are all John Smith's ventures across the Pond cursed? Discuss. ;)
if I went 'round saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!

Fractal Friction | Tumblr | Google+

O Lucky Stevie!

Quote from: Emperor on 13 August, 2010, 05:19:44 PM
Are all John Smith's ventures across the Pond cursed? Discuss. ;)

Aha! This may shed some light onto why.

Speaking to the seemingly ubiquitous Grant Goggans (man, is that boy keen?) for Class of 79, John has the following to say about DC:

Future Helix editor Stuart Moore says, "I'll have some of that":

Quote
I'd actually been one of the writers (along with Garth and I think Warren Ellis) who pitched to take over the book after Jamie Delano left. I'd already met Karen Berger by then and I submitted this huge sprawling outline with the next 2 or 3 years worth of stories laid out but I never got the job. DC probably just remembered my stuff from there and Stuart Moore asked me to do a fill-in while I was developing 'Scarab' (which was Doctor Fate at that time). He asked me to pick one of the single issue storylines from that original 'Hellblazer' proposal so I chose "Counting to Ten"...

Karen Berger says, "I'd rather not, actually":

QuoteI think Vertigo had overestimated their own selling power and a lot of their new titles just didn't get the advanced orders they expected and from what I understand Karen Berger just said: "No. Chop it down to a miniseries." Which, you know, considering it started off as a monthly 'Doctor Fate' comic...

I've since heard she hates my stuff anyway. There were lots of censorship problems and strange directives issued by Karen Berger and all my enthusiasm kind of fizzled away the more I was forced to change stuff. I mean, ditching all these supporting characters, ditching the continuing subplot that tied all the storylines together – it was just doomed to failure from the start.


From http://www.2000ad.nu/classof79/website.htm

DC's loss is most decidely  2000ad's gain says Stevie.


"We'll send all these nasty words to Aunt Jane. Don't you think that would be fun?"

Colin YNWA

Quote from: O Lucky Stevie! on 15 August, 2010, 06:17:03 AM

DC's loss is most decidely  2000ad's gain says Stevie.


I'll say. Thats very interesting stuff. Particularly the idea that Karen Berger might not like John Smith's stuff. From the outside that seems so strange he seems so perfect for the type of stuff she and Vertigo do so well but you never know what thought processes go into Karen Berger's decision making or indeed personal tastes.

Emperor

Quote from: Colin_YNWA on 15 August, 2010, 07:47:23 AM
Quote from: O Lucky Stevie! on 15 August, 2010, 06:17:03 AM

DC's loss is most decidely  2000ad's gain says Stevie.


I'll say. Thats very interesting stuff. Particularly the idea that Karen Berger might not like John Smith's stuff. From the outside that seems so strange he seems so perfect for the type of stuff she and Vertigo do so well but you never know what thought processes go into Karen Berger's decision making or indeed personal tastes.

Indeed - Vertigo would seem the ideal venue for him to really expand his US profile, as so many other British creators have. Granted we win in that he gets to stay at 2000AD but it also means we didn't get high-profile creator-owned series or even a John Smith run on a more mainstream American comic book character - Warren Ellis has made a name for himself rebooting characters and something like his Druid series seems like the kind of thing John would have excelled. In fact Marvel's horror line is in need of a reboot and surely some titles would benefit from a sprinkle of Smithean magic, and, yes I am thinking what you're thinking - who wouldn't want to see John Smith's Man-Thing? ;)
if I went 'round saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!

Fractal Friction | Tumblr | Google+

The Corinthian

#12
Oh, I have more horror stories about Karen Berger than you could shake a shamanic stick at but am sworn to secrecy.

John Smith: he really is the one writer who's made 2000AD his natural home. Pretty much every other major scripter on Tooth has had a comfortable time finding big projects from other titles and companies, but John Smith is the only one whose core work has appeared almost exclusively in Tooth and her sister titles. Which is not to disrespect him, but to marvel at the weird fecundity of a comic that can nurture and sustain such a talent.

Vertigo was built on Gaiman's Sandman, but that was always going to be a finite thing and so there was a tussle between the direction it might take once Sandman was done. On the one hand you have the Gaimans and the Milligans who I regard as 'The Mad Mod Poet Gods', and then there were 'The Lads' - the Morrisons and the Ennises and the Millars. And the Lads won, but I do wonder what might have happened if Smith had got a foot in the door, given that he kind of straddles both camps (who else could write a story about serial killers fighting each other with dinosaurs as a competitive sport then bookend it with 'Firekind' and 'Deus Ex Machina'?) Maybe this year's big comix flick from Matthew Thingy or Edgar Wright would have had fewer superheroes and more radioactive nuns (their masks oozing light and meat) rewriting palimpsestual reality as a nameless hero battles both obese gay sadist-aesthetes and the ineffable alien spiders who've laid their metal eggs in his brain? It would totally pwn 'The Expendables' anyway.

P.S. I also like Leatherjack.


Emperor

We do need more radioactive nuns, it is a shallow and beige cultural landscape without them.

Quote from: The Corinthian on 17 August, 2010, 08:51:22 PM
Oh, I have more horror stories about Karen Berger than you could shake a shamanic stick at but am sworn to secrecy.

Well bugger.

Could we perhaps tempt you onto Wednesday Chat with the offer of a biscuit?
if I went 'round saying I was an Emperor just because some moistened bint had lobbed a scimitar at me, they'd put me away!

Fractal Friction | Tumblr | Google+

The Corinthian

Sorry, but I have sources to protect!