Comics' magna opera: Part One - the quasi-masterpieces

In comics, we speak of "runs" by creators that imprint themselves indelibly on the minds of readers. These are usually linked to a certain writer, or perhaps a writer/artist team, but rarely specifically to an artist. These are comics that, I would argue, everyone agrees upon as masterpieces - that's not to say that they are universally loved. We can agree that "Hamlet" is Shakespeare's masterpiece even if we don't like the play, right? What I want to examine in this post is the masterpieces of modern comics, and in a somewhat more general context, what happens after you write one?

The idea of a magnum opus in comics is a relatively new one, I would think. Bear in mind I'm not a comics historian, so I could be horribly wrong-headed, but I don't think so. In the early years of comics, they were completely disposable entertainment, and often creators didn't even get credit for the work they were doing (Bill Finger, anyone?). This practice continued in mainstream comics for years, and even after the situation was rectified, the creators didn't own their work and weren't compensated too well for it. The idea that the creators would conscientiously sit down to write a masterpiece (I know, no one decides that, but again, bear with me) wasn't part of the program in comics. We can speak all we want about Lee and Kirby's remarkable run on Fantastic Four, but does it constitute a masterpiece? Maybe. But reading those issues, although they are important from a comics point of view, it doesn't feel like Lee and Kirby were trying to form a coherent whole with their work. They were just cranking out an issue a month, and over the years, it became, perhaps, their masterpiece.

So, in comics, what does constitute a masterpiece? Well, that's a good question. I have made it no secret that I am far more likely to pay attention to the writing side of comics rather than the artistic, simply because I can break down the written part better than the art on any given book. So when I consider masterpieces in comics, my definition will tend toward something that is written. In my mind, a masterpiece has to be a highly regarded work by a writer (or, again, a writer/artist team) on a book for a given length of time, which means that it should be longer than six months or so. Of the masterpieces I am thinking about, only one (Watchmen, which I'll consider in the next installment) is twelve issues. The rest span several years, which gives them a strength and staying power that shorter runs lack. I also don't know if I can consider a graphic novel - one and done - as a masterpiece. We'll see as we go through this. Maybe one will pop up. A magnum opus should also do one of two things: change the way we look at comics OR reveal something about the creator. With this in mind, I want to look at comics that might not be the absolute best work by the writer (Planetary is not Ellis' masterpiece, for instance, although that has as much as it not being finished as other reasons), but the work that best shows us his view of the world and personality (for this reason, Ellis' entry here is Transmetropolitan). You can argue with my definitions, but of all the masterpieces I can think of in realms other than comics, it seems like it's also very often the artist's most personal work. Again, I could be wrong.

So, when do comic book creators shift from being wage slaves to auteurs and we can begin to consider whether what they're working on is a masterpiece? Ah, a fine question. And the easy answer is: the 1970s.

Consider Bernie Wrightson. Or Steve Gerber. Or Jack Kirby. I haven't read the early Swamp Thing issues or Howard the Duck or the Fourth World saga, but it seems that many people consider them seminal works in the creator-driven comics world we now inhabit. Perhaps we should call them proto-masterpieces. But the 1970s saw a shift toward this idea of comics as a long-running novel or mythic epic, and writers and artists began treating them more like stories that fit together in a more cohesive fashion. Granted, Lee and his Marvel ilk had done this in the 1960s, but not to the extent that later writers did. So in the late 1970s and early 1980s, we had the early masterpieces. These were created within the framework of comics' corporate culture, but are still able to transcend those constraints.

So what are a few of the epics? In this installment (this is a long post, so I thought I'd split it up) I want to look at what I would call quasi-masterpieces. They are works that we associate most readily with a certain creator, but they are still corporate characters, and therefore the creators could not do what they may have wanted completely, and of course the characters continue after the creator is done with them. Therefore, as great as the runs of these titles were, I don't know if they can be considered true magna opera - there's just too much editorial control. This can be a good thing (as our first case shows), but it can also curb the infusion of the creators' personality into the work and also make sure that the character cannot follow a true realistic arc, simply because he or she can't die. They are, however, the best these creators could do under the circumstances.

Chris Claremont and John Byrne's masterpiece: Uncanny X-Men #100-138, the Phoenix cycle, August 1976-October 1980. Well, Byrne came on a bit late (issue #108), so I guess part of this could be called Cockrum's masterpiece as well, but this is really Claremont's and Byrne's baby. Basically, Claremont wanted to use his persecuted mutants to tell the story of Jesus. Not too ambitious, is it? At the end of issue #100, Jean Grey uses her telekinesis to land the space shuttle that the X-Men are using to fly back to earth after their adventure in space. She is bombarded with radiation from a solar flare. The issue ends with everyone thinking she's going to die, and at the beginning of issue #101, the shuttle crashes into Jamaica Bay and everyone thinks Jean is dead. She rises from the water as Phoenix, however, and Claremont's epic begins. After Jean recovers from the trauma of her experience, the first fight she gets into is with Firelord, and then she saves the universe. Not too shabby. However, this presented a problem for Claremont: when you have a mutant who can, quite literally, stitch the universe back together, how do you come up with threats that she can't defeat? Claremont and Byrne came up with some ideas - mind control and when she thought the X-Men were dead so they could have adventures without her - but eventually they were going to have to address the fact that she was probably the most powerful mutant on the planet. This came with the Dark Phoenix part of the cycle, which, if we keep the Jesus metaphor going (and why not?) is when she descends into hell. No, she doesn't get crucified, but her mental torment and fall from grace, leading to the crime of killing millions of sentient beings, is hellish enough. Claremont and Byrne had worked themselves into a corner with this one, and despite the controversy over what should happen to Jean Grey, Phoenix's sacrifice in issue #137 is the only way, really, that the story could have ended - not because of editorial mandate and the fact that Marvel couldn't allow a mass murderer to continue as a hero on a best-selling book, but because thematically, it was what Claremont and Byrne had been working toward, no matter how much they try to deny it. Jean sacrifices herself to save the world, just as she was ready to sacrifice herself in issue #108 to save the world. In that instance, she was strong enough to do the heroic thing, but by issue #137, she isn't. The very nature of the Phoenix as well demands sacrifice. Jean "died" in issue #101 and was resurrected by the Phoenix. She dies again in issue #137. It's logical, and adds power to the Jesus metaphor that Claremont and Byrne deliberately set up. Issue #138 adds a strong coda, as Cyclops, a founding member of the team, leaves. The X-Men have been severed from their past, and this adds poignancy to the Phoenix saga as well. These two people, who grew up together and experienced the highs and the lows of being a mutant superhero, have "grown up," so to speak - Jean because she was able to make the ultimate sacrifice, and Scott because he was able to leave his "family."

So what happened next? Claremont continued to write the book for another eleven years, and despite some very strong work (even after Paul Smith left), he was never able to recapture the magic. I would argue that Uncanny X-Men #94-280 form one of the most satisfying pieces of literature you'd ever want to read, but I may be biased. The problem with Claremont is not that Byrne left the book, but that he just isn't all that good a writer. That's not to say he doesn't have his strengths - plotting and characterization (but not dialogue) among them - but his mythology that he created in those first 40 issues of the X-Men eventually took over and he became a self-perpetuating mutant mogul, concerned with the franchise more than the stories. Again, that's not to say they were bad comics - and Claremont has certainly done more with the X-Men as a mythology than any writer since, with the possible exception of Morrison. But when you've made a cornerstone of the Marvel Universe into an omnipotent being capable of re-imagining reality and then you kill her, you really don't have a lot of places to go but down. Claremont's limitations as a writer (his reliance on catchphrases, for instance, which I know is partly because of the serial nature of comics, but doesn't forgive it) made his post-Phoenix work somewhat hit-and-miss. Even in issues that I think are highpoints of his later X-Men (the Jim Lee Psylocke trilogy comes to mind), the actual words on the page are occasionally painful to read. Byrne, on the other hand, just went insane.

Doug Moench and Bill Sienkiewicz's masterpiece: Moon Knight #1-30, November 1980-April 1983. Those people who were mystified by the fan reaction (including mine) to the latest relaunch of Moon Knight have either never read these issues or read them with a cold, black heart. I'm actually a little wary about calling this a masterpiece - certainly I hold them in high regard, but I'm not sure if they hold up in terms of epic storytelling. It's certainly not Sienkiewicz's best work - he was still aping Neal Adams at the beginning of the run, and only slowly evolved into the master he was at the end of the run, but I'm not sure what his masterpiece would be, which is why it's hard to focus on artists for this post. Sienkiewicz's magnum opus could certainly be something shorter than the parameters I've set out - Elektra: Assassin or Stray Toasters or even Big Numbers, of which only two issues saw print. This is certainly the longest he's ever spent on a title, however, and the art is gripping and fun to watch as he gains confidence.

As for Moench, he's a guy who's been around forever but never gets quite the credit he deserves. Again, I'm not sure if this counts as his masterpiece - whether he even has one is another question. This and his mid-1990s run on Batman are probably his two best works, but with Batman, although it is a fine piece of comics literature, he was a mite too didactic, and this affected the work a bit. That's not to say comics can't teach us something, but too often in Batman, Moench made that his whole point. He created Moon Knight in 1976 and was given this opportunity to write the ongoing series, and that's why I count this as his grand work - it's a personal project to him, and he rose to the occasion.

The most fascinating thing about Moon Knight, of course, is his multiple personalities. Writers always hint around the duality of superheroes and their secret identities, but Moench took the next logical step and made Marc Spector a man with many personalities, of which Moon Knight was just one. This allowed him to shunt various aspects of his personality into these personae - Spector was the brutish lout who could kill without compunction; Grant was the urbane millionaire who charmed the ladies; Lockley was the sleuth with all sorts of street connections; Moon Knight was the avenger. Moench is best when showing how these personae conflict with each other - Marlene is constantly bugging Steven Grant to step up, but he often must remain in the background. The persona of a globe-trotting mercenary beholden to an Egyptian god allowed Moench to tell adventure stories, such as when Spector fights Bushman, but the persona of a street-smart cabbie allowed him to tell gritty, tough stories set deep in the darkness of New York, too, such as the Stained Glass Scarlett story and the domestic abuse story, "Hit It," in issue #26. Moench, like Sienkiewicz, got better as the series went on, as he began to bring in more and more of his own thoughts and theories about the world - I've mentioned before that Moench loves paranoia and mysterious government agencies running things, and these begin to seep in a bit toward the end of this run, especially in issues #29-30, when Jack Russell shows up. It didn't take over the stories (like it did in the two Moon Knight mini-series he wrote in the late 1990s), but it did add an edge to the title that had been lacking in the beginning.

It's a tough call on this, but I'm going to stick with it not because the book was the highest quality (it's very good, don't get me wrong), but because of its somewhat revolutionary nature. It was one of the first books to be sold in specialty stores exclusively, and the fact that kids couldn't get it on the news stands meant that Moench and Sienkiewicz could afford to be a bit more "adult" with the themes and ideas presented. It also signaled the rise of a major talent in comics and gave us a very interesting character who probably can never be a superstar in the Marvel Universe but could easily be a vehicle for some great stories. Finally, the personal nature of these issues make this more than just a standard "urban warrior" kind of thing. Close call, but I would argue it's a masterpiece.

Peter David's masterpiece: The Incredible Hulk, issues #347-425, September 1988-January 1995. I may get some argument from this one, but a few things make this a masterpiece. First, David took an essentially one-note character and made him one of the most complex in the Marvel Universe. Second, he kept re-inventing the Hulk, all the while adding to the whole story that he was creating, which is an impressive achievement. This is not just the arc of Bruce Banner/Hulk's life, it's a radical change every so often, while still keeping the arc of his life running smoothly. I doubt if anyone would have the onions to do this sort of thing with a long-running character like the Hulk, but let's face it - he wasn't much when David took him over. First, David had to clear the decks, and he did that prior to #347 (he started writing the book around issue #332, but that first year or so was only so-so, as he wiped the slate clean). In issue #347, he brings us the gray, intelligent Hulk - Joe Fixit, a Las Vegas mob enforcer. It's a bold move, and one that leads, ultimately, to Rick Jones' marriage to Marlo (Hulk's girlfriend for a time). However, David is not satisfied with simply changing the Hulk completely. He understands that this character is essentially goofy - in the cynical 1980s and 1990s, we just can't accept that a gamma bomb would be able to change a man's physical nature so radically, so David begins to build a foundation of how and why the Hulk is this way. He examines the Hulk's multiple personalities, and even integrates the coloring fiasco that changed the Hulk from gray (in his first appearance) to green (in his subsequent appearances). These problems culminate in several blockbuster issues, including #372 and #377, when we get a fully integrated green Hulk who is intelligent and even urbane. David never stops trying to get to the bottom of who the Hulk actually is - Bruce Banner disappears for long stretches during this run, as David points us to the conclusion that "Banner" is just a façade and the intelligent green Hulk is the true personality. Just when we accept that, David again pulls the rug out from under us and makes us once again question what the Hulk actually is. Finally, in issue #425, another integration develops, and we are again thrown into confusion, as Banner is the raging maniac while the Hulk remains lucid.

David wrote the book for another forty (!) issues, and he probably would have kept on if policy at Marvel hadn't pissed him off, but although the issues after #425 are decent, he had lost a bit of the direction that he had managed to keep for the previous 75 issues or so. The art became sloppy until Adam Kubert came on board late in the run, even though the artists (including Liam Sharp, Mike Deodato, and Angel Medina) have done decent work on other books. Throughout his run on the Hulk, David had a succession of good artists at the top of their game - Jeff Purves, Dale Keown, and Gary Frank - who helped bring his vision to life. David's work, it seemed, became sloppier when the art did, and the succession of crossovers Marvel was indulging in during the mid-1990s didn't help.

What was next for David? He is principally known for his work on the Incredible Hulk, unless people know him for his Star Trek comics. He wrote Aquaman and X-Factor during the time he was writing the Hulk, and since his work on that ended, he has done a lot of other stuff. Right now he's working on Fallen Angel, which might be a masterpiece when it's all said and done, plus various other stuff. With the exception of Fallen Angel, however, which is only 24 issues in, he hasn't done anything that has approached not only his longevity on the Hulk but its sheer inventiveness. He still has a lot of comic book work left in him, though.

As far as quasi-masterpieces, these three are good examples. As I have said many times, my knowledge of comics prior to 1988 is somewhat limited (many people would say my knowledge since 1988 is limited, too), so I know I'm missing several. I would count Walt Simonson on the Mighty Thor (#337-382, roughly), but I only own up to issue #355 and don't want to consider it without having read it. Does Byrne's Fantastic Four count? Didn't Gruenwald write a ton of Captain America comics, and aren't they considered brilliant? Is Michelinie's run on Iron Man a masterpiece? What about Wolfman and Perez on Teen Titans? I'm just wondering.

Anyway, thoughts on this are welcome, as usual. It's very interesting to consider when creators hit their peak and what they do after it.

Next time: the rise of the auteurs!

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