There was a Ninja, some woman with green hair named Gertrude, probably my sister Vengeance, and Lord Skywalker. You know. The one that likes to snorkle.) colabed on a story! WHAT IS THE MOTHER F***ING DEAL HERE?! Patreon reward for nuclearcore ! · 6:49am Mar 1st, 2018
Heya readers!
First off, if you missed it and want to summon up a demon to make you wiser or screw it up and get everyone you know and loved killed, feel free to check out my last blog about Baal.
Now, then on to the current topic. Nuclearcore requested I write about the DC Vertigo comic that’s near and dear to my heart, Warren Ellis’s comic Transmetropolitan, which is somewhat ironic as I’m running late with my blog posts this month! Given the subject matter, if you’re sensitive to strong language or being yelled at and insulted via the interbutts, I advise you discontinue reading this blog post. No, seriously. There will be a lot of cussing and insults and I won’t give an eff. You have been warned.
…
Okay, are they gone? Good.
Listen up, Fuckwits, because I’m about to inject a metric ass-load of knowledge and truth into your fucking eyeballs. Transmetropolitan serves as a possible glimpse into a fucked-up future that mankind has personally screwed right up the asshole yet provides some rather poignant (and oddly topical still, despite its age) political commentary. I recommend it to anyone with a pulse and also the undead, including vampires, Lich’s, Mummies, and even Zombies fortunate enough to be literate.
This was requested as a general overview, so let’s start with some basics, like the main asshole this comic centers around.
That’s Spider Jerusalem. He’s pretty much like that all the fucking time.
Spider Jerusalem is a journalist, which hopefully you know because you actually read the image above and aren’t blind. He’s angry. Like, really, really, really, motherfucking angry!
He’s based off late hard drug using, chain-smoking, gun enthusiast gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson. If you don’t know who that is, maybe figure out what fucking Bill Murry or Johnny Depp movie you need to watch to get a clue, jack-ass.
Pictured: Fucking nothing. You should know how to work a search engine and Wikipedia! Why are you like this?!
If I was giving half a damn about how I talk about comics, I would have started with the art, but I didn’t because fuck all the rigmarole. The art is good. It works pretty much all the time and there are some damn fine panels.
Spider is on a quest for truth and to share the ugly light of truth on the ungrateful masses of the planet earth by shoving a flashlight directly into their eye sockets. No one can hide from the fucking truth while Spider is around, no one! If you think you can hide prepare to be kicked in the balls and eject everything in your digestive system into your underwear because Spider isn’t taking ‘no’ for a fucking answer.
Spider is joined by on his quest to make everyone fucking deal with reality by his filthy assistants, Yelena Rossini, a college student who is learning the grim-realities of gorilla journalism most via following in Spider’s footsteps and Channon Yarrow, who is one of the last fucking people in the planet you want to screw with (unless she wants to screw you).
Together, the three of them and Spider’s two faced mutant cat who likes to pee on things will run rampant through the City, exposing all its dirty little and fucking huge secrets as well as explore transhumanism and… whatever the opposite of Transhumanism is.
Spider also has an editor named Mitchell Royce who helps him get his ass in gear when he’s behind on deadlines or too drugged up to get his shit together… He just seemed important enough to mention.
There are 60 fucking issues and some specials of mostly unholy great-goodness and you should read all of it, okay? But the main plot that sets in about a quarter through the comic is the literal worst person on the planet wins the Presidency of the Fucking United Fucking States of Fucking America and Spider and his crew seem to the only three with the balls to dig up all his dirty secrets so America can get its act together and maybe make that person not be the leader of the fucking free world.
Spider was not allowed to write the word “fuck” eight thousand times when ‘The Smiler’ got elected. Mostly because he already pulled that stunt with the previous president.
Pictured: A fuckwit with a pretty apt nickname. Also, one of the evilest mother fuckers you’ll ever have the displeasure of knowing.
Look, I’m going to post one fucking page from this comic now, and if it doesn’t convince you that you should consume this whole series like an ugly, fat sex-crazed hooker going down on her first and probably last John of the night, get the fuck out of my blog.
On that note, onto the things that maybe aren’t super great. Like, obviously… the comic is not big on subtlety. Then again, maybe Mr. Ellis knew what he was doing as some of the “hit you over the fucking head with a chair-leg” parts of the comic still ring true two fucking decades later.
Spider also is a staunch atheist and rails against organized religion in an issue and here or there, and while “haters are gonna make some good points”, it doesn't really fit into the over-arching narrative at all and feels a bit more mouthpiecey than even the rest of the comic. Now, while this might be more of a personal issue, this can be contrasted with Spider’s apparent acceptance or even love of tribalism or animalistic religious views which seemingly culminated in a great deal of ink being applied to his body as well as a scene in one issue where he talks about a program where people willingly have their minds wiped and genetics altered to live like Mayans until they all die from poisoning their own water supply by throwing the heads of the sacrificed in it. This is all apparently to teach the humans of the world not subjecting themselves to this insanity and a bigger note regarding the harsh lessons about religion and environment… and just…
Spider fucking Jerusalem and Warren Ellis by extension, if you don’t think people can just read about this stuff and maybe figure it out for themselves why are you writing fucking columns or making this comic?
There’s probably a few other things that didn’t quite hit the mark in all the material present, but Transmetropolitian as political commentary is top notch. Again, inject it into your fucking eyeballs already!
And that is fucking that! Thanks to nuclearcore for the topic and his support. If you want to get in on these blag fun, check out my Patreon here. Now, I get to read a book about a girl and her bear for another blog that I’m late on!
Catch you fuckers in the comments.
Is it wrong to read the main portion of your blog hearing Johnny Depp's imitation of Raoul Duke (AKA H.S.Thompson) in my head?
This was a glorious read.
Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail was an interesting exercise in exposing the truth via a grotesque disregard for mere facts. I'm still not exactly clear on which bits and pieces of that book were straight up fabrication, but I know that at least some of it was. The section on Muskie was staight up textbook defamation, but it might have been the point that everyone was defaming Muskie, and Thompson was just throwing his particular drug-fiend spin on the 'lets-lie-about-Muskie' press-train.
And all of the blog was read with the voice of Patrick Warburton, and it was glorious.
Never heard of the series before, honestly. It looks good, but holy Hera, subtle isn't in Mr. Ellis' stratosphere, is it? Still will probably pick up a few copies. :)