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Monday, January 03, 2005
Abraxas and the Earthman
Over this year I plan to go in depth into works by cartoonists that I very much enjoy. A bit like what I did with the Howard Chaykin series but with all kinds of work by all kinds of people. Today let’s look at the Abraxas and the Earthman serial that appeared in Epic Illustrated. It’s one of the best works by one of my favorite comic book artists, Rick Veitch.
The skeleton of the story is an interpretation of Melville’s Moby Dick. It concerns a Captain Rotwang’s mad obsession over hunting a whale, the Abraxas of the title. It just happens that Rotwang is just one of the many weird alien creatures that populate the book and Abraxas is just one of the many flying space whales that hover over the planet the book takes place on. Rotwang is just one part of the story. The main character of the book is one of the two earthmen abducted by Rotwang, John Isaac. It seems Isaac has had all his skin removed by Xlexu Surgeons, giant and super-smart praying mantises, so that it can be replaced by an invisible aura that will help Rotwang catch Abraxas. The other earthman is the captain of the submarine scientist Isaac was on, Falco. He gets decapitated so his body can mechanically load coal into the ship’s engine. His head is still around and sentient but it spends most of its time getting thrown around. All this plus a sphinx woman and giant shmoo-like groupies. This serial certainly feels like Veitch is pulling out every last piece of his imagination into it. It’s what makes it one of his best works.
It’s Veitch’s celebration of his own grotesque creations that remains the most memorable part of the book. I have always felt that Veitch’s artwork has on off-kilter feel to it. It often times looks like one part Jack Kirby and one part Tijuana Bible. It might be a turn-off to some but since Veitch’s work like this, Brat Pack and The One seem to work well with his weird style I’ve enjoyed it. Abraxas, with its protagonist that has no skin and aliens that are weirder than the next, takes the most advantage of this bizarre style. This mix of the gross and the psychedelic benefits what this story gets at. Isaac refuses to go along with Rotwang’s plan to slaughter whales and instead uses his heightened sense of aura to become one with Abraxas and soon the entire universe.
It’s that mysticism that ultimately defines Abraxas. Captain Rotwang is the Ahab whose mania over this whale drives other to around him to their death and himself into further insanity. It is because of the Xlexu Surgeon’s modifications to him that Isaac sees a way out of the simple world of Rotwang’s (and the military man Falco’s). Rotwang lives a life that is defined by opposing or dominating one thing or another be those things hunting whales or commanding men. It’s view of life that man in the world, certainly the Western world, subscribes to. Isaac can now see a way out of a life of constant conflict because he is now in touch with the pain of Abraxas and the other whales Rotwang hunts down. Abraxas and the Earthmen, like Veitch’s Cold War story The One, is about finding a better way out of the us v. them or left v. right dichotomy. It doesn’t take the stand that Isaac and others should go up against Rotwang. If that would happen then they would all be part of the same vicious cycle of aggression. “To fight the empire is to be infected by its derangement” as old Phil Dick would have us know. It seems clear that Veitch would agree with this.
Even though Veitch owns Abraxas there doesn’t seem to be any plans to reprint it in trade paperback form. You can hunt down the issues of Epic Illustrated it appeared in (10 through 17) or see if you can download it through Bit Torrent. It’s worth the hunt as it is like few other stories you will read.
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