Tag Archives: atheism

articles and essays, from the Internet

“This is the Avengers, not the God Squad!” (Sequart.org)

(The following article by Mario Ribeiro first appeared at Sequart.org on 5/5/2016 as “They Were Lost in Space-Time and Then They Found God.” It is presented here with his permission.)

Written by Steve Englehart and drawn by Al Milgrom, the Lost in Space-Time saga ran from West Coast Avengers #17 to 24. The real meat is between 18-23, with the others serving as a prologue and an epilogue. Now, before we go any further, keep in mind that this was published in 1987. For modern readers, mainstream superhero comics from the eighties, with very few exceptions (Moore, Miller, Morrison) are old-fashioned and childish with terrible writing (exclamation points, thought balloons, tons of exposition, obvious plots, unrealistic dialogue) and crude, ugly, lazy art. Vanilla heroes fighting cardboard villains, with no depth or subtlety. They are silly, I get it, that’s exactly how we felt back in the eighties about Silver Age comics and that’s how readers in 2046 will feel about today’s comics. But, whenever they come from, if we accept them on their terms we can often find incredible beauty in execution and ideas.

Accepting them on their own terms doesn’t mean accepting them unconditionally. Lost in Space-Time has many flaws, and I won’t enumerate them all. Suffice to say that the first issue (17) is pretty bad, even for its time. The text clashes with the art more than once, one of the villains is Cactus (“he causes fear in every other living thing”) and the main plot is basically filling till the last three pages, when the real story actually begins.

But, before we move forward, we must provide some context. The West Coast Avengers, lovingly called Whackos, consisted of newlyweds Hawkeye (the group’s chairman) and Mockingbird, plus Iron Man, Tigra and Wonder Man. Hank Pym, looking for redemption after the Trial of Yellowjacket storyline, didn’t join the team, but lived in the compound in civilian capacity, doing scientific research and some house-keeping. The Thing and Espirita (then still called Firebird) were candidates for the sixth slot, but neither joined the team.

What is missing from the first 16 issues is the big concept. It is a good read, but the fights against uneventful villains like Ultron, Master Pandemonium and Graviton are not that exciting. Still, Englehart and Milgrom do wonders with their characters, particularly Wonder Man, Tigra and Hank Pym. Wonder Man finds the confidence to be a real hero when he overcomes his fear of death; Tigra finds confidence and a tail as her personalities are merged and she regains control of herself; and Hank sees no other choice but to kill himself. And then it’s time for the big concept.

Continue reading “This is the Avengers, not the God Squad!” (Sequart.org) →

contributors, interviews

The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part III

MARTIN COMICS #5In this third and final installment of our discussion with Martian Comics creator and Sequart Organization founder Julian Darius, we discuss characters’ vs. readers’ vs. believers’ perspectives on Jesus and Paul, as well as the future of his series and any relationship it might have to real-world religions dealing with extraterrestrials.

S&S: I wonder: Of all the stories in this issue, “What Has Athens to Do with Jerusalem?” features the titular Martians the least, perhaps only in reference to the Athenians “Unknown god […] a placeholder the Athenians use, knowing their knowledge of the gods to be limited.” Do readers know from “Ezekiel” (and “The Galilean” and “Lazarus”) what it is the Athenians don’t, namely that aliens have had an influence in the spiritual affairs of humankind? Is this the manner of answer that Lazarus is seeking?

JD: I love that you saw a connection between the Unknown God and the Martians. That’s not my own primary reading, but it’s there. It follows, once you connect this story with “Ezekiel” — the Martians are, in a sense, an unknown god to the Greeks. And you’re right that they don’t know about Martians, any more than the ancient Jews did. There are other Martian stories to come that kind of play with this same sort of thing, in which humans sort of realize there are forces or divinities out there, beyond their ability to understand. So that’s definitely there, and you’re smart to pick up on it, but to me, that’s a layer, rather than the primary meaning.

Paul cites the “Unknown God” in Acts. There’s a historical dispute as to whether it really existed or not, or to what extent. Was there a temple to the Unknown God? Was there a statue or monument? From what I’ve read, some think yes, some think no. If I remember correctly, Paul only mentions an inscription to the Unknown God, and there’s some ambiguity about what he’s referring to. But it’s a wonderful concept, this polytheistic statement of humility. I suppose you could see it as a parody of polytheism — “We hope we didn’t leave anyone out!” And it is that. But it’s also this wonderful admission, by the smartest city around, that yeah, we don’t know anything. Here’s a monument to that idea. Wow.

I was always fascinated by the Unknown God. As a kid, I thought it was funny that Paul said he was going to tell people about it, because this frames his god in the context of Greek polytheism. Saying that, you’re essentially saying that you’re going to add a god to the Greek pantheon. You can’t say this and then preach monotheism, really. It’s at least very disingenuous. It wasn’t until studying Greek history in college that I began really appreciating the humility of the concept and how it fit into the Greek philosophical outlook. So I love the Unknown God concept and this story from Acts, and I included it on that basis. It illustrates more the difference between Paul’s arrogant “you’re ignorant!” preaching and the nuances of Athenian philosophy.

But yeah, you’re totally right: you can look at the Unknown God and think, “Yeah, they don’t know about the Martians, who played the role of God to Ezekiel.” And who were behind Jesus in the series. Continue reading The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part III →

contributors, interviews

The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part II

Continuing our interview with Martian Comics creator and the Sequart Organization founder Julian Darius, we move from his depiction of the prophet Ezekiel to his treatment of Lazarus and of Jesus, “The Galilean”:

S&S: “Ezekiel” is followed by the longer, 11-page, “What Has Athens to Do with Jerusalem?” The title, presumably, comes from the writings of the Church Father Tertullian, yet the story focuses on Lazarus, the man Jesus resurrected, and Paul. What’s the connection between the title and the concerns of the story?

JD: The quote comes from a later period. But it’s key to the point of the story.

On the one hand, the story allows us to catch up with Lazarus, seeing how he’s evolved —

S&S: Since readers last saw him in issue #2 of Martian Comics, freshly resurrected by Jesus but, in effect, unable to fully live or rejoin what was his life.

JD: Right. Lazarus actually has a cameo in issue #1, but issue #2 is the first to have a story all his own. The idea is to follow up on the Lazarus story, because the Bible never tells us what happened to him. The point is that Jesus resurrected him, and it’s a miracle – but Lazarus is just a prop, really. He’s a demonstration of Jesus’s power. So I thought “what happened next” was an interesting idea, and I thought this tension – about how Lazarus is kind of forgotten, once he’s resurrected – should be part of the story.

So in issue #2, Lazarus is resurrected, but he’s been decaying a little, and these rural Jews of the first century, who were pretty superstitious, would have seen him as a supernatural thing. They’re scared of him, and he doesn’t look right. It’s not going to be like “Oh, Lazarus, glad you’re alive again, old chap!” No, there are going to be rumors, and any physical deformity or ailment was seen as potentially demonic or dangerous. That’s why Jesus ministering to lepers was such a thing. And in those days, you really needed a community to survive. So Lazarus is alive, but he’s kind of a pariah. And he sees how this is hurting his family – that, as he says, he’s of no use to them.

So Lazarus is kind of figuring out what being resurrected means. It’s not just that you came back to life. You’re different now. You look different, and you’re treated differently. Jesus does his miracle, and everyone’s impressed, but no one really follows up with Lazarus. There’s no post-resurrection counselors or anything.

Along with this, what does resurrection mean biologically? Does someone who’s been resurrected return to life and live out a normal lifespan, as if they hadn’t died? Do they get a week and then die again? Maybe resurrection’s not permanent! Or do they live forever? I think we usually don’t ask these kinds of questions, and it’s not a focus of these stories in the Bible, where the point is that Jesus is powerful because he resurrected someone – implicitly encouraging us to believe. We kind of assume that any bodily decay is healed as part of the resurrection, although that doesn’t necessarily follow. And I was interested in exploring all of this. My Lazarus doesn’t have his bodily decay healed, and whatever energy resurrected him is still in him. He’s immortal, although he doesn’t know it at first. He learns it in pretty dramatic fashion in that story.

Continue reading The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part II →

contributors, interviews

The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part I

Julian DariusThis past month, Sacred and Sequential had the opportunity to chat with Julian Darius, President & Founder of the Sequart Organization and creator of Martian Comics from his own Martian Lit imprint. With the release of the Kickstarter-funded Martian Comics #3 and its intriguing religious content, he talks with us about the wide range of thinking behind his (not-so-)alien tales.

S&S: Before we focus on the most recent Martian Comics #3, perhaps you could outline what “Martian Mythology” is and what was involved in producing these works?

JD: The “Martian mythology” is essentially the backstory of the whole series. Back when I founded Martian Lit, I thought it would be funny to have it actually run by Martians, and I worked up this backstory of planetary orders, an enlightenment program (that included Jesus and others), the cloaking of Mars’s cities, and the sort of vague threat that the Martians are still debating and split over whether to invade. There was a lot of detail for what was essentially a complex joke.

When Kevin Thurman pitched me on what became “The Girl from Mars,” it was wedded to this backstory I’d worked up for Martian Lit. As we collaborated on the early “Girl from Mars” chapters, I began expanding this backstory and writing these other Martian stories. It’s kept growing. It’s really because of this that the series is called Martian Comics — a throwback to titles like Adventure Comics and whatnot — and wasn’t titled The Girl from Mars. Initially, “Martian mythology” was a way of separating this backstory I’d created and was exploring in these side stories from “The Girl from Mars.” “Martian mythology” is kind of the backbone of the series — “The Girl from Mars” is the first story, the first window into that mythology.

But this “Martian mythology” has kept growing. There’s a map of stories waiting to be told, whole arcs of Martian history, ways in which themes echo throughout the stories and into the various more narrow stories, like “Girl from Mars.” It’s a pretty vast thing, which I’ve kind of put together over the past several years and keep adding to.

Martian Comics #3 Continue reading The Martian Chronicles of Julian Darius, Part I →

academic, articles and essays, levity

Comics Remain Important — and Varied!

Over the course of the past year, various pieces — pertinent both to comics in terms of  religion specifically or simply the serious consideration of comics — have come to light that either fell through the cracks at the time or deserve some wider coverage. They include:

  • Back in mid-2006, Today.com reporter M. Alex Johnson took a look, albeit a superficial one, at the religiosity of Spider-Man, The Thing, X-Men villain Rev. Stryker, the Atheist and others with “At the Comics Shop, Religion Goes Graphic.” 
  • Graphic Medicine, founded by Ian Williams in 2007, was relaunched with MK Czerwiec in 2012, and they caught the “Graphic Fiction” panel (moderated by Shelly Wall) at the Toronto Comics & Medicine conference that year. Presenters included Steven Bergson with “From Ivanhoe to Rex Mundi: Jews and Medicine in Comic Books, Comic Strips, and Graphic Novels,” Jeffrey Monk with “A Ghost of an Idea: A Reflection on My Comic Adaptation of ‘A Christmas Carole’ for the Medical Humanities,” and Lorenzo Servitje with “Empathy in the gutter: Participatory delusion in graphic adaptation of Shutter Island.” 
  • Read the Spirit, an “online magazine covering religion and cultural diversity” as well as an extension of Dr. Wayne Baker’s Our Values program, answered the question to “Why Comics and Comic Books Are Important Today!” — and the solution seems to be “independent comics artist and author” Kurt Kolka.
  • Most recently, Gene Yang of Comics in Education provided a valuable, digest-sized overview of  the “History of Comics in Education,” spanning from 1933 to the turn of the 21st century — an adjacent topic to Religion & Comics but relevant and useful for a sense as to how serious academic discussion has arisen not only in but also for the classroom.

And then there’s just this odd/funny/insulting/compelling comic from Kevin Moore’s In Contempt comics from back in 2008. No better place to put it than here:

“Gods Damn America” by Kevin Moore