On this week’s edition of The Goggler Pull List, we review and recommend Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo’s We Have Demons and
Check it out…
We Have Demons (Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo)
Anyone who has read their 2011 run on Batman – one of the few bright spots in DC’s misguided New 52 reboot – can attest to the fact the Scott Snyder and Greg Capullo make for a legendary team. The pair that gave us The Court of Owls, Death of the Family, and Dark Nights areback for their first creator-owned collaboration with Comixology and it’s an absolute blast.
We Have Demons opens with quite the hook. Our protagonist, Lam, is telling us about a couple that she’s meeting with. She refers to this couple, the Spoons, as “Godfolk.” And you’ve met their kind. Intensely altruistic. Motivated by faith and faith alone. They’re the kind of people who seem hell bent (pun intended) on being nice, and helpful, and agreeable all the goddamned time. The page ends with Lam saying: “In three weeks, they’re supposed to have triplets. I’m supposed to be the godmother to the babies. But the thing is, one minute from now, I’m going to murder the spoons with this hatchet.”
You see what I mean. It really is quite the hook.
After that, Snyder and Capullo jump backward forward in time, through nested flashbacks and multiple points of view, in order to set up a thrilling new creation myth about who we are and how we came to be. What begins as a story about a father and daughter, and the secrets they keep, very quickly develops into a complete reinvention of the idea behind angels, demons, and their confluence with humanity.
We Have Demons is also a story about faith. Faith in a higher power. Faith in our family and friends. Faith that everything happens for a reason. Faith that this world we live in, in all of its insanity, can somehow be explained.
The thing I find most exciting about where Snyder seems to be taking this story is in the distinction he draws between religion, and faith, the myths we construct, and the stories we tell ourselves in order to navigate our world. There is power that manifests when large masses of people, good and bad, focus their energies on a belief system. And Snyder exploits that truth and uses it here to great effect. (I particularly like the idea of weapons that are powered by faith.)
Snyder can be a bit wordy, but I don’t mind that when the words are this good. Capullo’s art is as wonderful as ever, using the broadest assortment of lenses to ensure that we feel everything that is happening on the page.
I don’t think of myself as being particularly religious, but I’ve always been a sucker for stories that stem from sacred texts. There is that foundation of good versus evil in every one, plus just the right amount of fantasy, that lends itself for a good adventure.
We Have Demons is a book that is just brimming with great ideas, and if this first issue is anything to go by, then I think we’re in for quite the ride.
Green Lantern: Earth One, Vol. 1 and Vol. 2 (Gabriel Hardman and Corinna Bechko)
There’s certainly a level of freedom when thinking of recreating an established character’s origin story. Hal Jordan, the Green Lantern of Earth, was created 62 years ago this month, and in that time, his beginnings have been well established. A test pilot who stumbles upon a crashed alien who bestows upon him a green ring of power, Hal becomes the newest member of an intergalactic policing force known as the Green Lantern Corps.
But what if you could reimagine the beginnings of that story? What would you do differently? In 2009, DC announced its Earth One series to launch a new origin story for Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, the Teen Titans, and finally, in 2018, Green Lantern.
Gabriel Hardman and Corinna Bechko’s new story imagines Jordan (now Harold instead of Hal) in the not too distant future as a part of a space mining operation when he stumbles on the deceased body of an alien (although not named, it is still Abin Sur), and a green ring of power. Over the course of the first volume of Green Lantern: Earth One, we follow Jordan as he finds out there is more to the universe than humans and slowly pieces together the story of the Green Lantern Corps, the Guardians of Oa, and the power the ring possesses. Hardman and Bechko’s story feels smaller and more focused, without ever giving up the scale of the universe. The characters Jordan meets are all familiar to the original Green Lantern comic books – just slightly askew. Kilowog, Arisia Rrab, and Sinestro, all make an appearance, but the story really focuses on Jordan.
The second volume of the Green Lantern: Earth One series was released two years later and expands the story further into the Green Lantern universe. The last remaining Guardian of Oa has built himself a new team of ring wielders in the Yellow Corp, and through his machinations, has created a new threat to Earth, and the universe of alien races that Earth is trying to be a part of.
Much like the first volume, this second part takes the story further, while keeping all of its moving pieces intact. Sinestro and Jordan are still on opposite sides of the philosophical divide on what it means to be a Lantern. The race of Guardians still want to stop all wars and strife in the universe and think a protector force is the way to do it. It’s all still there, just one dimension off.
These Earth One retellings are not a vital addition to the comic book character. As a fan of Superman, or Batman, or Wonder Woman, you don’t need to read them. They are, however, an interesting new take if you are a fan of the characters. We all have our favourite comic book character and Hal Jordan is definitely mine. Reading the Earth One won’t change your favourites, but what it does is give you a new perspective, and a new story. And speaking as a superfan of Hal Jordan and the Green Lantern Corps, reading about Harold was a nice change.
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