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The Invisibles #7
The Invisibles, Vol. 7: The Invisible Kingdom
For countless millennia the world has been subjected to an all-encompassing apocalyptic conspiracy. Through clandestine movements, a sinister secret organization has been creating a hypnotic state of conformity and control through their manipulation of the government, business, and entertainment industry. But from the shadows, a subversive group of anarchists called the Invisibles have opposed their plot and looked to create self-awareness and freedom through disobedience. Now with the fate of all mankind hanging in the balance, the secret freedom fighting cult make their final rebellious stand in the war of control versus chaos. Collects Volume 3, Issues #1-12
288 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2001
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1009 people want to read
About the author
Grant Morrison
1,791 books4,574 followersGrant Morrison has been working with DC Comics for twenty five years, after beginning their American comics career with acclaimed runs on ANIMAL MAN and DOOM PATROL. Since then they have written such best-selling series as JLA, BATMAN and New X-Men, as well as such creator-owned works as THE INVISIBLES, SEAGUY, THE FILTH, WE3 and JOE THE BARBARIAN. In addition to expanding the DC Universe through titles ranging from the Eisner Award-winning SEVEN SOLDIERS and ALL-STAR SUPERMAN to the reality-shattering epic of FINAL CRISIS, they have also reinvented the worlds of the Dark Knight Detective in BATMAN AND ROBIN and BATMAN, INCORPORATED and the Man of Steel in The New 52 ACTION COMICS.
In their secret identity, Morrison is a "counterculture" spokesperson, a musician, an award-winning playwright and a chaos magician. They are also the author of the New York Times bestseller Supergods, a groundbreaking psycho-historic mapping of the superhero as a cultural organism. They divide their time between their homes in Los Angeles and Scotland.
In their secret identity, Morrison is a "counterculture" spokesperson, a musician, an award-winning playwright and a chaos magician. They are also the author of the New York Times bestseller Supergods, a groundbreaking psycho-historic mapping of the superhero as a cultural organism. They divide their time between their homes in Los Angeles and Scotland.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 106 reviews
July 20, 2014
Fuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuucking hell. Am I glad THAT’S over with!
It took me over a month to read this final book. I would pick it up, read a page or two, then put it back down, thoroughly dejected. Some days I would open it up, stare at the page for a moment not reading, barely seeing, and put it back down again. Finally this weekend, I forced myself to get through this so I no longer have to stare at it staring back at me on my desk and so I can say that I’ve read the complete Invisibles series.
Well, I’ve finished it now - but I don’t think it was worth it.
I’d normally try to write a summary of the book and try to contextualise it before the review but, flicking through it once more, there’s no point - I have no idea what happened in this book other than the series ended. Actually I just came across one panel that perfectly sums up the series: a “character” is taking pictures of a toilet and calling it the Holy Grail. The Invisibles is a critically acclaimed piece of crap!
Usually by the end of a series, there’s been a storyline building up and you’re looking forward to its resolution but to be honest I’ve never really known what The Invisibles is about. The Invisibles are some abstract terrorist cell fighting conspiracies across the world that happen to be real and in this one they’re supposed to stop the coronation of a monster from another dimension who’s going to be King of England or something. Which they do in about 40 pages of brain-mashing nonsense. So what happens in the remaining 250 pages?
Weeeeell… there’s about 100 pages of gibberish as the various members of The Invisibles train (doing karate, flying jets, doing drugs) while Sir Miles (the villain) is tied to a chair in a windmill (or a time machine) and goes through some weird mental conditioning.
These first 100 pages meant nothing to me. What flying a jet had to do with anything went totally over my head, especially as it has nothing to do with the rest of the book. Doing karate and practicing martial arts? They never use either. Mental conditioning Sir Miles? Useless because he’s some kind of next-level Mason who can withstand the conditioning. So why allow The Invisibles to do this in the first place? It wastes his time, it wastes their time (granted they don’t know it’s wasting their time), it wastes the reader’s time, and neither The Invisibles or Sir Miles learn anything useful. So this first 100 pages is just Grant Morrison wasting everyone’s time, showing us, once again, how learned he is by cramming in reference after reference to all aspects of culture. It’s not interesting, it’s hella boring.
The next 100 pages follows the most tedious “character” in the series, Edith, an old flapper from the 1920s who’s now 99 years old and dying. She was once King Mob’s lover and they spend 100 pages being pretentious together, talking about philosophy and what happens when you die. I honestly just wanted to throw the book away rather than suffer through these issues.
By the way I’m putting the word character in quotation marks because at no point do any of these people feel remotely real. They all sound exactly the same, they all talk the same pseudo-philosophical/spiritual crap, and they’re all flat as pancakes. They also just drop in and out of the story for no reason. Most of the book takes place in England but characters from America and the rest of the world appear out of nowhere and then disappear just as abruptly.
So that covers 240 pages of this 290 page book - the remaining 50 pages, I have absolutely no idea. It’s the end of the world or something and I couldn’t understand a single fucking caption or piece of dialogue. And then it ends with Jack talking to the reader to basically wake up. Good thing too as I’d read these last 50 pages completely numb.
Can you see why it took me over a month to get through this turgid rubbish? By this seventh volume, The Invisibles has ceased to be a comic with any narrative, characters, etc. and has become a bizarre pamphlet where Morrison can spew out his thoughts on this, that and everything. It’s so self-indulgent, it’s unbelievable.
The only reason I’m giving it more than one star is because of the remarkable roster of artists assembled for this final, bloated hurrah - from Frank Quitely to Sean Phillips, Philip Bond to Chris Weston, Cameron Stewart to Jill Thompson, and about 10 other artists, I loved most of the art in this book and was quite often the one thing keeping me going. I was surprised not to see Phil JImenez contribute though, seeing as he’s drawn the majority of this series.
I’m actually a really big fan of Morrison’s work which is why I forced myself through the whole series even though, if I’m being honest, I stopped enjoying it after the first volume! I kept hoping - and other fans of the series kept telling me - that it would get better, it would start making sense, and so on, but it just happened, for me anyway. I’m not saying anyone who likes this series is wrong but for whatever reason it just never clicked for me. But I can see why there have been books written about The Invisibles because, if nothing else, Morrison has crammed all kinds of strange ideas and theories into this title, so there’s a lot of rich material to extrapolate and ponder upon.
The only problem with that approach is that it’s extremely boring to read - replacing things like narrative and characters with half-baked ideas, druggy visions, and an incoherent, experimental style to communicating them that’s almost anti-sober-reader just alienates the audience, as they can’t figure out what the hell is happening.
When you put no effort into creating characters, the reader won’t care about them; when you put no effort into the story, there’s no narrative tension or drive to interest the reader; Morrison just heaps reference upon reference of esoteric stuff that unless the reader is already interested in them, like his views on the Kabbalah or whatever, you’re not going to be remotely engaged with the book.
If The Invisibles is anything, it’s an extended display of Morrison stroking his own ego in front of an audience for seven lengthy books. And it goes from being dull to read, to annoying, and finally exhausting. I’ll re-read other Morrison books but I’ll never come back to The Invisibles.
It’s done - MY sentence is up.
.
It took me over a month to read this final book. I would pick it up, read a page or two, then put it back down, thoroughly dejected. Some days I would open it up, stare at the page for a moment not reading, barely seeing, and put it back down again. Finally this weekend, I forced myself to get through this so I no longer have to stare at it staring back at me on my desk and so I can say that I’ve read the complete Invisibles series.
Well, I’ve finished it now - but I don’t think it was worth it.
I’d normally try to write a summary of the book and try to contextualise it before the review but, flicking through it once more, there’s no point - I have no idea what happened in this book other than the series ended. Actually I just came across one panel that perfectly sums up the series: a “character” is taking pictures of a toilet and calling it the Holy Grail. The Invisibles is a critically acclaimed piece of crap!
Usually by the end of a series, there’s been a storyline building up and you’re looking forward to its resolution but to be honest I’ve never really known what The Invisibles is about. The Invisibles are some abstract terrorist cell fighting conspiracies across the world that happen to be real and in this one they’re supposed to stop the coronation of a monster from another dimension who’s going to be King of England or something. Which they do in about 40 pages of brain-mashing nonsense. So what happens in the remaining 250 pages?
Weeeeell… there’s about 100 pages of gibberish as the various members of The Invisibles train (doing karate, flying jets, doing drugs) while Sir Miles (the villain) is tied to a chair in a windmill (or a time machine) and goes through some weird mental conditioning.
These first 100 pages meant nothing to me. What flying a jet had to do with anything went totally over my head, especially as it has nothing to do with the rest of the book. Doing karate and practicing martial arts? They never use either. Mental conditioning Sir Miles? Useless because he’s some kind of next-level Mason who can withstand the conditioning. So why allow The Invisibles to do this in the first place? It wastes his time, it wastes their time (granted they don’t know it’s wasting their time), it wastes the reader’s time, and neither The Invisibles or Sir Miles learn anything useful. So this first 100 pages is just Grant Morrison wasting everyone’s time, showing us, once again, how learned he is by cramming in reference after reference to all aspects of culture. It’s not interesting, it’s hella boring.
The next 100 pages follows the most tedious “character” in the series, Edith, an old flapper from the 1920s who’s now 99 years old and dying. She was once King Mob’s lover and they spend 100 pages being pretentious together, talking about philosophy and what happens when you die. I honestly just wanted to throw the book away rather than suffer through these issues.
By the way I’m putting the word character in quotation marks because at no point do any of these people feel remotely real. They all sound exactly the same, they all talk the same pseudo-philosophical/spiritual crap, and they’re all flat as pancakes. They also just drop in and out of the story for no reason. Most of the book takes place in England but characters from America and the rest of the world appear out of nowhere and then disappear just as abruptly.
So that covers 240 pages of this 290 page book - the remaining 50 pages, I have absolutely no idea. It’s the end of the world or something and I couldn’t understand a single fucking caption or piece of dialogue. And then it ends with Jack talking to the reader to basically wake up. Good thing too as I’d read these last 50 pages completely numb.
Can you see why it took me over a month to get through this turgid rubbish? By this seventh volume, The Invisibles has ceased to be a comic with any narrative, characters, etc. and has become a bizarre pamphlet where Morrison can spew out his thoughts on this, that and everything. It’s so self-indulgent, it’s unbelievable.
The only reason I’m giving it more than one star is because of the remarkable roster of artists assembled for this final, bloated hurrah - from Frank Quitely to Sean Phillips, Philip Bond to Chris Weston, Cameron Stewart to Jill Thompson, and about 10 other artists, I loved most of the art in this book and was quite often the one thing keeping me going. I was surprised not to see Phil JImenez contribute though, seeing as he’s drawn the majority of this series.
I’m actually a really big fan of Morrison’s work which is why I forced myself through the whole series even though, if I’m being honest, I stopped enjoying it after the first volume! I kept hoping - and other fans of the series kept telling me - that it would get better, it would start making sense, and so on, but it just happened, for me anyway. I’m not saying anyone who likes this series is wrong but for whatever reason it just never clicked for me. But I can see why there have been books written about The Invisibles because, if nothing else, Morrison has crammed all kinds of strange ideas and theories into this title, so there’s a lot of rich material to extrapolate and ponder upon.
The only problem with that approach is that it’s extremely boring to read - replacing things like narrative and characters with half-baked ideas, druggy visions, and an incoherent, experimental style to communicating them that’s almost anti-sober-reader just alienates the audience, as they can’t figure out what the hell is happening.
When you put no effort into creating characters, the reader won’t care about them; when you put no effort into the story, there’s no narrative tension or drive to interest the reader; Morrison just heaps reference upon reference of esoteric stuff that unless the reader is already interested in them, like his views on the Kabbalah or whatever, you’re not going to be remotely engaged with the book.
If The Invisibles is anything, it’s an extended display of Morrison stroking his own ego in front of an audience for seven lengthy books. And it goes from being dull to read, to annoying, and finally exhausting. I’ll re-read other Morrison books but I’ll never come back to The Invisibles.
It’s done - MY sentence is up.
.
March 4, 2009
Ever feel like you're right and everyone else on the planet is wrong, but you think, "That can't possibly be true, how can EVERYONE be wrong but me? I must be the one who's wrong." This is one of those times where I'm right. Everyone else is wrong.
Grant Morrison is probably the single most overrated writer in comic history.
I bought the entire Invisibles series based on the seemingly sound merit of practically everyone I know who reads comics, all of who recommended this as one of "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!".
By now I had read some Superman, New X-Men, Seaguy, WE3, Arkham Asylum, The Filth...I pretended to like them to agree with my friends, because apparently in retrospect, I'm stupid (truth be told, the Filth and WE3 were actually pretty awesome).
I buy the first Invisibles book..."Uh...okay?"
"No man, keep reading! The second book is where the shit REALLY goes down."
I buy the second book...some of the worst penciling I've ever read. There are actual panels where character's eye pupils don't line up, giving a cookie monster quality to what I've been told is one of the "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!".
I buy the third book. The fourth. The fifth. (For some reason) I buy the sixth. It's now a terrible addiction, but not a fun addiction like alcoholism, more like glue. Every time I get to the end I'm left with a colossal headache, wondering why the fuck I keep doing this. Finally I get to the seventh and final book, and read exactly half of it before I get distracted and put it down.
I don't pick it up again for 8 MONTHS. Seriously.
I couldn't bring my self to read the finale to one of "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!" for well over half a year. I contemplated not reading it at all. Who care's? There's no way this will end with any sense of accomplishment or meaning for me. Finally, after a night of anger following a day of apathy, I stick a bug up my ass and force myself to finish. And you know what?
I was right. Everyone else is wrong.
The characters are two dimensional and disconnected, but not nearly as much as the shotty art collaboration, which is so rushed and unsynchronized it actually helps to distract from Morrison's "Whoooa, I can't believe he went there!" unremarkable stream of consciousness dialog and lack of story cohesion.
What should have been a inter-dimensional psychedelic brain flipper is instead a messy, amateurish, poorly explained turd with a big glittery inter-dimensional psychedelic bow on it.
I give Morrison points for being an idea man. His ideas are great, and that (usually) is why I read fiction, I love the 'what if?' Unfortunately the Invisibles is one of the few times great ideas alone can't right the the seemingly endless amount of production wrongs.
Grant Morrison is probably the single most overrated writer in comic history.
I bought the entire Invisibles series based on the seemingly sound merit of practically everyone I know who reads comics, all of who recommended this as one of "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!".
By now I had read some Superman, New X-Men, Seaguy, WE3, Arkham Asylum, The Filth...I pretended to like them to agree with my friends, because apparently in retrospect, I'm stupid (truth be told, the Filth and WE3 were actually pretty awesome).
I buy the first Invisibles book..."Uh...okay?"
"No man, keep reading! The second book is where the shit REALLY goes down."
I buy the second book...some of the worst penciling I've ever read. There are actual panels where character's eye pupils don't line up, giving a cookie monster quality to what I've been told is one of the "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!".
I buy the third book. The fourth. The fifth. (For some reason) I buy the sixth. It's now a terrible addiction, but not a fun addiction like alcoholism, more like glue. Every time I get to the end I'm left with a colossal headache, wondering why the fuck I keep doing this. Finally I get to the seventh and final book, and read exactly half of it before I get distracted and put it down.
I don't pick it up again for 8 MONTHS. Seriously.
I couldn't bring my self to read the finale to one of "The greatest comics ever!!!!!!!" for well over half a year. I contemplated not reading it at all. Who care's? There's no way this will end with any sense of accomplishment or meaning for me. Finally, after a night of anger following a day of apathy, I stick a bug up my ass and force myself to finish. And you know what?
I was right. Everyone else is wrong.
The characters are two dimensional and disconnected, but not nearly as much as the shotty art collaboration, which is so rushed and unsynchronized it actually helps to distract from Morrison's "Whoooa, I can't believe he went there!" unremarkable stream of consciousness dialog and lack of story cohesion.
What should have been a inter-dimensional psychedelic brain flipper is instead a messy, amateurish, poorly explained turd with a big glittery inter-dimensional psychedelic bow on it.
I give Morrison points for being an idea man. His ideas are great, and that (usually) is why I read fiction, I love the 'what if?' Unfortunately the Invisibles is one of the few times great ideas alone can't right the the seemingly endless amount of production wrongs.
November 30, 2007
It's been a long journey. I wanted to finish, hoping Morrison would be able to pull it out in the end. After all, he's written some very good books, and it was in part because of them that I gave him the benefit of the doubt.
The Invisibles almost turned me off of Morrison entirely when I first started them, and if not for his other books, I wouldn't have attempted it again. It wasn't that this series was insulting, its faults are the product of poor construction, which in turn was the result of Morrison's inability to edit himself.
It didn't help that the final series is numbered in reverse, causing me to read the last three comics as the first three. At first, I'd thought that Morrison's experimental plotting had reached some sort of frenzied climax, where empty symbols had completely taken over any sense of meaning. It was almost exciting.
My error was a bit confusing, but revealed part of why Morrison comes off so flat to me. Morrison's story works like a drug trip (indeed, he utilizes several real-life trips as direct inspiration for his comics), the semi-random firings of neurons brought on by sleep and (hallucinogenic) drugs creates an overlay of sensory and symbolic experience which we then try to comprehend.
Morrison produces a similar effect in this story, except he culls his symbols and sensory experiences not from the recognizable or the metaphorical, but from the theoretical, the metaphysical, even the paranoid. His reality has no focus, and exists in an interchangeable, dreamlike state; and like a dream, all that interconnects it is moment-to-moment continuation.
Yet he is not content for his narrative to take the scattered, multifaceted form of a dream, instead he tries to coalesce it into some holistic truth. But how can a holistic truth be built on an unrelated scree? Discordians adapt it into satire by accepting the absurdism of any notion of truth, but Morrison is too much the believer to take that route.
What sets Morrison apart from both Moore and Gaiman is that he's come to believe in his own bullshit. This story is too close to home for him, and beyond basing it on his own philosophies, he suggests that the whole work is a magic spell that is controlling his life. The end result being that Morrison stops working to make the thing coherent because he believes it will be, no matter what he does.
Unshakable belief in your own work is the death of imagination. Without a constant doubt as to the quality or coherence of the message, the inflow of unchecked ideas quickly fills the work to the brim, crowding out characters or plot.
Morrison wraps it all up with something that looks but does not feel like a climax. Though he sets up evil empires, double agents, monomythic battles against evil, magic items, and monsters galore, he spends his exposition trying to explain this or that 5th-dimensional crystal instead of writing the story.
That being said, it did inspire me to think more about physical exploration and catharsis. The art gets better as the series closes up, though the latter books are a bit annoying in that they switch abruptly from one artist to the next.
I finished the thing. It taught me a lot of things not to do as a writer and helped me to recognize why some of Morrison's stories work so very well and why others are so wacky and confused. I'll have to make sure that if I ever write my dream project--near and dear to my heart--that I have a very smart and very honest editor to stop me from buying my own line of bullshit and trying to sell it to my hapless fans, who would prefer I just wrote well instead of playing the magical messiah.
My Suggested Reading In Comics
The Invisibles almost turned me off of Morrison entirely when I first started them, and if not for his other books, I wouldn't have attempted it again. It wasn't that this series was insulting, its faults are the product of poor construction, which in turn was the result of Morrison's inability to edit himself.
It didn't help that the final series is numbered in reverse, causing me to read the last three comics as the first three. At first, I'd thought that Morrison's experimental plotting had reached some sort of frenzied climax, where empty symbols had completely taken over any sense of meaning. It was almost exciting.
My error was a bit confusing, but revealed part of why Morrison comes off so flat to me. Morrison's story works like a drug trip (indeed, he utilizes several real-life trips as direct inspiration for his comics), the semi-random firings of neurons brought on by sleep and (hallucinogenic) drugs creates an overlay of sensory and symbolic experience which we then try to comprehend.
Morrison produces a similar effect in this story, except he culls his symbols and sensory experiences not from the recognizable or the metaphorical, but from the theoretical, the metaphysical, even the paranoid. His reality has no focus, and exists in an interchangeable, dreamlike state; and like a dream, all that interconnects it is moment-to-moment continuation.
Yet he is not content for his narrative to take the scattered, multifaceted form of a dream, instead he tries to coalesce it into some holistic truth. But how can a holistic truth be built on an unrelated scree? Discordians adapt it into satire by accepting the absurdism of any notion of truth, but Morrison is too much the believer to take that route.
What sets Morrison apart from both Moore and Gaiman is that he's come to believe in his own bullshit. This story is too close to home for him, and beyond basing it on his own philosophies, he suggests that the whole work is a magic spell that is controlling his life. The end result being that Morrison stops working to make the thing coherent because he believes it will be, no matter what he does.
Unshakable belief in your own work is the death of imagination. Without a constant doubt as to the quality or coherence of the message, the inflow of unchecked ideas quickly fills the work to the brim, crowding out characters or plot.
Morrison wraps it all up with something that looks but does not feel like a climax. Though he sets up evil empires, double agents, monomythic battles against evil, magic items, and monsters galore, he spends his exposition trying to explain this or that 5th-dimensional crystal instead of writing the story.
That being said, it did inspire me to think more about physical exploration and catharsis. The art gets better as the series closes up, though the latter books are a bit annoying in that they switch abruptly from one artist to the next.
I finished the thing. It taught me a lot of things not to do as a writer and helped me to recognize why some of Morrison's stories work so very well and why others are so wacky and confused. I'll have to make sure that if I ever write my dream project--near and dear to my heart--that I have a very smart and very honest editor to stop me from buying my own line of bullshit and trying to sell it to my hapless fans, who would prefer I just wrote well instead of playing the magical messiah.
My Suggested Reading In Comics
July 27, 2014
Its years later in the story and the Invisibles are preparing for their final showdown against the Archons/Church of the Outer God. Jack Frost has accepted his role as the Messiah and King Mob has shockingly given up guns. Narration and viewpoints happen all over the world and at different times/realities and some of it is communicated through emails. The finale, as well as the fact that the main characters are mostly supporting characters in this volume, will disappoint some readers as it tries to be more than the typical ending. There's a lot to wrap up in this final volume and after riding through this series I'm sad to see it go. It got better over time and had a great deal of intriguing ideas. The art was hit or miss for me depending on the particular volume and this one was below par. That said, anybody ignorant enough to argue comic books are not art would be referred to this series by yours truly.
This is considered one of the classics and was said to have shaken up a stagnant period for comics/graphic novels back in the day. BBC started a TV series but it never saw the light of day. This series may have very well influenced movies like THE MATRIX and other such types.
While it isn't necessary to understand the many references it helps to know something of these topics (some pop up consistently, some just here and others in previous volumes): Monica Lewinsky, Marquis DeSade, Aesop's Fables, Ken Wilber, Varanasi, Barbelists, Armageddon, Biblical references, the meaning of King Mob, Discordianism, P.B. Shelley/Mary Shelley, Dogon, Chaos Magick, Princess Diana, Satanist Ring, The Wicker Man, Joan of Arc, J.R.R. Tolkien, Egyptian Mythology (Osiris especially), Beezelbulb, The Doom Patrol (DC Comics), Quabalah Mysticism, Tree of Life/Knowledge, Sunspots, Situationism, Queer Theory, Arthurian Mythology (especially Holy Grail), Reincarnation/Rebirth/Dying God, Patty Hearst, Postmodernism, novelist Michael Moorcock (“Jerry Cornelius”), Aum Shinri Kyo, Hinduism/Hindu gods, astral projection, time travel, tantric sex, H.P. Lovecraft, Gnosticism, Mayan Calenders & Mythology, Jungian psychology, Karma, Tarot and I'm probably leaving a few other things out.
ARTWORK: B; STORY/PLOTTING: B; CHARACTERS/DIALOGUE: B plus; THEMES/INNOVATION: A plus; WHEN READ: end of March 2012 ; OVERALL GRADE: B plus to A minus.
This is considered one of the classics and was said to have shaken up a stagnant period for comics/graphic novels back in the day. BBC started a TV series but it never saw the light of day. This series may have very well influenced movies like THE MATRIX and other such types.
While it isn't necessary to understand the many references it helps to know something of these topics (some pop up consistently, some just here and others in previous volumes): Monica Lewinsky, Marquis DeSade, Aesop's Fables, Ken Wilber, Varanasi, Barbelists, Armageddon, Biblical references, the meaning of King Mob, Discordianism, P.B. Shelley/Mary Shelley, Dogon, Chaos Magick, Princess Diana, Satanist Ring, The Wicker Man, Joan of Arc, J.R.R. Tolkien, Egyptian Mythology (Osiris especially), Beezelbulb, The Doom Patrol (DC Comics), Quabalah Mysticism, Tree of Life/Knowledge, Sunspots, Situationism, Queer Theory, Arthurian Mythology (especially Holy Grail), Reincarnation/Rebirth/Dying God, Patty Hearst, Postmodernism, novelist Michael Moorcock (“Jerry Cornelius”), Aum Shinri Kyo, Hinduism/Hindu gods, astral projection, time travel, tantric sex, H.P. Lovecraft, Gnosticism, Mayan Calenders & Mythology, Jungian psychology, Karma, Tarot and I'm probably leaving a few other things out.
ARTWORK: B; STORY/PLOTTING: B; CHARACTERS/DIALOGUE: B plus; THEMES/INNOVATION: A plus; WHEN READ: end of March 2012 ; OVERALL GRADE: B plus to A minus.
September 17, 2007
Posted here for lack of a better place, but really about the whole series:
Recently re-read this after reading an excerpt from Douglas Wolk's Reading Comics about it. (http://www.newsarama.com/ReadingComic... , if you're curious.) Wolk said this, which is a pretty appropriate way to start a "recommendation" type review:
"It is, in a lot of ways, my favorite comic book ever, and I have never been able to recommend it to anyone else with a clear conscience, partly because it's such a ridiculous mess in so many ways, and partly because it struck me so much as being exactly the kind of story I like to read--so much so that it's hard for me to imagine other people being as passionate about it as I am."
While The Invisibles is hardly my favorite book, I do like it a lot, almost precisely because of what an enormous clusterfuck it is. It teeters between genius and complete nonsense, but every time you think you've pinned it down enough to have scorn for it, it slips away and becomes something else entirely. The anti-establisment stuff starting to seem a little naive? Well, which side to root for (or if there are sides at all) is called into question plenty by the time Mister Six announces that "We lied. / We are not at war. There is no enemy. / This is a rescue operation." Getting a little burnt out on the quasi-mystical mumbo jumbo? You'll love Elfayed's "engineering problem" for Dale. The casual ultra-violence getting to be a bit much? It only heightens the impact of moments like King Mob's realization: "I killed all those people because they didn't agree with me." Ancient gods not your thing? Well, they're really aliens. Unless they're demons from hell. Unless they're time travellers. Unless they're "Barbelith." (Whatever the hell a "Barbelith" is...)
For all it's out-there kookiness, the first series (meaning those issues collected in Say You Want a Revolution, Apocalipstick, and Entropy in the U.K.) actually follows the established Vertigo template (a la Sandman) pretty closely: magic performed by British men in trenchcoats, a central narrative to start us off followed by individual issues scattered throughout exploring secondary and tertiary characters, and artists mostly from that early Vertigo stable: Steve Yowell, Jill Thompson, etc—styles grounded a little more in the mundane than the kind of pop-art craziness that Morrison evokes in later collaborators.
Once the action moves to America in series 2 (Bloody Hell in America, Counting to None, and Kissing Mister Quimper), artists like Phil Jimenez and Chris Weston take over, and the dominant idioms switch from magic and suave spies and the French Revolution to Big Explosions, alien invaders, military conspiracies—you know, American stuff.
And by series 3 (The Invisible Kingdom), Morrison has definitely developed his current supercompressed style, where all the dialogue is "newspaper headlines written by poets" (a quote that I always thought was Morrison but a quick Google search reveals was actually Denny O'Neil, bizarrely). The art finally (and admittedly, intentionally) goes off the rails toward the end, but you can't complain too much about a book featuring Morrison's two most able collaborators (Philip Bond and Frank Quitely). Series 3 accomplishes the impressive task of roping together disparate elements of what had to be some kind of automatic writing to give the appearance of a master plan all along. It still doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but even so—no mean feat.
Anyway. Like I say, it's all one giant glorious mess, and it doesn't even quite come together at the end, but all in all, one of the more fun ways to make your brain hurt.
Recently re-read this after reading an excerpt from Douglas Wolk's Reading Comics about it. (http://www.newsarama.com/ReadingComic... , if you're curious.) Wolk said this, which is a pretty appropriate way to start a "recommendation" type review:
"It is, in a lot of ways, my favorite comic book ever, and I have never been able to recommend it to anyone else with a clear conscience, partly because it's such a ridiculous mess in so many ways, and partly because it struck me so much as being exactly the kind of story I like to read--so much so that it's hard for me to imagine other people being as passionate about it as I am."
While The Invisibles is hardly my favorite book, I do like it a lot, almost precisely because of what an enormous clusterfuck it is. It teeters between genius and complete nonsense, but every time you think you've pinned it down enough to have scorn for it, it slips away and becomes something else entirely. The anti-establisment stuff starting to seem a little naive? Well, which side to root for (or if there are sides at all) is called into question plenty by the time Mister Six announces that "We lied. / We are not at war. There is no enemy. / This is a rescue operation." Getting a little burnt out on the quasi-mystical mumbo jumbo? You'll love Elfayed's "engineering problem" for Dale. The casual ultra-violence getting to be a bit much? It only heightens the impact of moments like King Mob's realization: "I killed all those people because they didn't agree with me." Ancient gods not your thing? Well, they're really aliens. Unless they're demons from hell. Unless they're time travellers. Unless they're "Barbelith." (Whatever the hell a "Barbelith" is...)
For all it's out-there kookiness, the first series (meaning those issues collected in Say You Want a Revolution, Apocalipstick, and Entropy in the U.K.) actually follows the established Vertigo template (a la Sandman) pretty closely: magic performed by British men in trenchcoats, a central narrative to start us off followed by individual issues scattered throughout exploring secondary and tertiary characters, and artists mostly from that early Vertigo stable: Steve Yowell, Jill Thompson, etc—styles grounded a little more in the mundane than the kind of pop-art craziness that Morrison evokes in later collaborators.
Once the action moves to America in series 2 (Bloody Hell in America, Counting to None, and Kissing Mister Quimper), artists like Phil Jimenez and Chris Weston take over, and the dominant idioms switch from magic and suave spies and the French Revolution to Big Explosions, alien invaders, military conspiracies—you know, American stuff.
And by series 3 (The Invisible Kingdom), Morrison has definitely developed his current supercompressed style, where all the dialogue is "newspaper headlines written by poets" (a quote that I always thought was Morrison but a quick Google search reveals was actually Denny O'Neil, bizarrely). The art finally (and admittedly, intentionally) goes off the rails toward the end, but you can't complain too much about a book featuring Morrison's two most able collaborators (Philip Bond and Frank Quitely). Series 3 accomplishes the impressive task of roping together disparate elements of what had to be some kind of automatic writing to give the appearance of a master plan all along. It still doesn't make a whole lot of sense, but even so—no mean feat.
Anyway. Like I say, it's all one giant glorious mess, and it doesn't even quite come together at the end, but all in all, one of the more fun ways to make your brain hurt.
May 9, 2011
I'm feeling very mixed about this one, and would ideally give it three-and-a-half stars. So, let me start off by listing pro and con.
Good bits
I liked the stuff about alien languages and words that have hidden content programmed into their sounds. Okay, it's clear that Grant Morrison knows about as much about linguistics as I do about American Football, but it's still a nice idea. Though it was rather better handled by Phil Dick in VALIS. In fact, as a fan of Phil's work, I was happy to see the repeated invocation of his ideas, such as the Great Iron Prison, etc. And thinking of references, in a link that would have appalled Phil, the linkage to H P Lovecraft, though inevitable, was nicely done.
Another good bit is definitely the art work; the use of deliberately varying styles is very appropriate and, at times, screamingly funny. There is always, indeed, a good amount of wit in the text, so even when one is feeling utterly confused by the extremely disjointed narrative (not that I was, it's reasonably easy to find one's way about) the crackling wit keeps one going. And the pace is definitely kept up: reaching the climax there was definitely a non-stop feel to the piece (even if the content disappointed on subsequent consideration).
But back to the point, the idea that there is secret knowledge coded in our minds that 'they' have hidden from us and that we must recover is not original, but was nicely handled, except that . . .
Bad bits
. . . it didn't really go anywhere, so we had interesting ideas galore and intriguing plot-threads that got lost or were dismissed in a 'and with one bound he was free' kind of way. So, for example, the whole thing about secret languages fizzled, apparently having existed only to be used in one, largely incidental, minor plot point. And this abetting sin really went to the core of the book. After the massive build-up of the first six books, I would have expected something quite apocalyptic to happen. And yet the climax when it came was a massive non-event, rather like the bit in the Matrix where Neo stops the bullets, only not quite so interesting to look at.
Then, after the rapid fizzle of The Invisibles Vol. 5: Counting to None and the climactic non-climax of The Invisibles Vol. 6: Kissing Mister Quimper perhaps we should have expected this. I think that the problem is basically that Morrison is an ideas source. Now, very occasionally, as in We3, he applies self-discipline and produces a masterpiece, or he creates a book like The Filth where the whole point of the piece is to be a mass of ideas. But the Invisibles starts out as a reasonably tightly plotted conspiracy story, and such stories (as in Foucault's Pendulum) can absorb lots of ideas, but only within a firmly controlled framework, and while Umberto Eco disciplined himself in the Pendulum (and what a shame he ceased doing so in his later books) here Morrison doesn't seem to have been able to control himself. So every idea he had went in, even if it meant doing considerable violence to the plot, and even if apparently hugely significant characters and plot threads are left hanging at the end.
Minor points. It's fairly obvious that Morrison identifies with King Mob. But King Mob is boring, he's just a man who kills people. In Lord Fanny we have a truly fascinating character who has all kinds of depth, and yet (s)he is criminally underused, in the climax being there for little more than reaction shots. Poor Lieutenant Uhura had more to do. The mysterious Helga is fascinating, but drops out entirely for no apparent reason. And so on. I suppose, again, Morrison got caught up in new ideas and forgot about the old ones.
And as a final negative, maybe I'm alone, but I'm getting really bored with all the right on stuff. I mean, it was rather disturbing to discover that Morrison apparently believed 100% of the Serb propaganda during the Kosovo conflict, but I find it more disturbing that people who think they are being plucky individualists and standing out from the crowd repeat the same tired old line of 'all of Western culture is, like, oppression, man'. If I were to write a conspiracy piece (which I might one day) in my conspiracy the counter-culture really wound be the bad guys, but due to mass stupidity, people would refuse to believe it, no matter how incontrovertible the evidence.
Conclusion
So, it's a fast-paced action piece which will keep your attention when you read it, but afterwards you'll feel doubts. It's full of wonderful ideas, but they aren't properly integrated. In a sense, it's rather like the blueprint for the climax of The Invisibles rather than itself being the climax. So, depending on how charitable one is, one can draw one of two conclusions. Either Morrison is amazingly talented, but only sporadically disciplined, and so was unable to assemble his blueprint into a finished work of art. Or the whole point is that he has only given us the key to the door, and we must discover the Invisible Kingdom ourselves.
You choose.
Good bits
I liked the stuff about alien languages and words that have hidden content programmed into their sounds. Okay, it's clear that Grant Morrison knows about as much about linguistics as I do about American Football, but it's still a nice idea. Though it was rather better handled by Phil Dick in VALIS. In fact, as a fan of Phil's work, I was happy to see the repeated invocation of his ideas, such as the Great Iron Prison, etc. And thinking of references, in a link that would have appalled Phil, the linkage to H P Lovecraft, though inevitable, was nicely done.
Another good bit is definitely the art work; the use of deliberately varying styles is very appropriate and, at times, screamingly funny. There is always, indeed, a good amount of wit in the text, so even when one is feeling utterly confused by the extremely disjointed narrative (not that I was, it's reasonably easy to find one's way about) the crackling wit keeps one going. And the pace is definitely kept up: reaching the climax there was definitely a non-stop feel to the piece (even if the content disappointed on subsequent consideration).
But back to the point, the idea that there is secret knowledge coded in our minds that 'they' have hidden from us and that we must recover is not original, but was nicely handled, except that . . .
Bad bits
. . . it didn't really go anywhere, so we had interesting ideas galore and intriguing plot-threads that got lost or were dismissed in a 'and with one bound he was free' kind of way. So, for example, the whole thing about secret languages fizzled, apparently having existed only to be used in one, largely incidental, minor plot point. And this abetting sin really went to the core of the book. After the massive build-up of the first six books, I would have expected something quite apocalyptic to happen. And yet the climax when it came was a massive non-event, rather like the bit in the Matrix where Neo stops the bullets, only not quite so interesting to look at.
Then, after the rapid fizzle of The Invisibles Vol. 5: Counting to None and the climactic non-climax of The Invisibles Vol. 6: Kissing Mister Quimper perhaps we should have expected this. I think that the problem is basically that Morrison is an ideas source. Now, very occasionally, as in We3, he applies self-discipline and produces a masterpiece, or he creates a book like The Filth where the whole point of the piece is to be a mass of ideas. But the Invisibles starts out as a reasonably tightly plotted conspiracy story, and such stories (as in Foucault's Pendulum) can absorb lots of ideas, but only within a firmly controlled framework, and while Umberto Eco disciplined himself in the Pendulum (and what a shame he ceased doing so in his later books) here Morrison doesn't seem to have been able to control himself. So every idea he had went in, even if it meant doing considerable violence to the plot, and even if apparently hugely significant characters and plot threads are left hanging at the end.
Minor points. It's fairly obvious that Morrison identifies with King Mob. But King Mob is boring, he's just a man who kills people. In Lord Fanny we have a truly fascinating character who has all kinds of depth, and yet (s)he is criminally underused, in the climax being there for little more than reaction shots. Poor Lieutenant Uhura had more to do. The mysterious Helga is fascinating, but drops out entirely for no apparent reason. And so on. I suppose, again, Morrison got caught up in new ideas and forgot about the old ones.
And as a final negative, maybe I'm alone, but I'm getting really bored with all the right on stuff. I mean, it was rather disturbing to discover that Morrison apparently believed 100% of the Serb propaganda during the Kosovo conflict, but I find it more disturbing that people who think they are being plucky individualists and standing out from the crowd repeat the same tired old line of 'all of Western culture is, like, oppression, man'. If I were to write a conspiracy piece (which I might one day) in my conspiracy the counter-culture really wound be the bad guys, but due to mass stupidity, people would refuse to believe it, no matter how incontrovertible the evidence.
Conclusion
So, it's a fast-paced action piece which will keep your attention when you read it, but afterwards you'll feel doubts. It's full of wonderful ideas, but they aren't properly integrated. In a sense, it's rather like the blueprint for the climax of The Invisibles rather than itself being the climax. So, depending on how charitable one is, one can draw one of two conclusions. Either Morrison is amazingly talented, but only sporadically disciplined, and so was unable to assemble his blueprint into a finished work of art. Or the whole point is that he has only given us the key to the door, and we must discover the Invisible Kingdom ourselves.
You choose.
August 2, 2014
The Invisible Kingdom is at first glance what appeared to be a mishmash of different story elements that have no connection to each other as the story progresses it becomes apparent that they are part of a deeper hole! :D The pace the story is frenetic and fast-paced without ever slowing down with things in the presence and future coming together to explain elements happening in either period! :D The characterisation, bearing in mind that some of the characters are under multiple colours, is brilliant with things happening on a giant scale with humour running throughout which is there a many of the characters dialogues and in the way the scenes are drawn! :D
The story is not for those of a faint heart but wheezes its way through history touching many real and imagined circumstances! :D This also adds to the feel of the graphic novel and is also a slightly many of the politicians and goings-on by Sherry say slightly corrupt individuals of the era! :D
Witty fast-paced and intriguing highly recommended! :D
The story is not for those of a faint heart but wheezes its way through history touching many real and imagined circumstances! :D This also adds to the feel of the graphic novel and is also a slightly many of the politicians and goings-on by Sherry say slightly corrupt individuals of the era! :D
Witty fast-paced and intriguing highly recommended! :D
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
October 3, 2013
I don't know what to say about this volume, or this entire series. Obviously, you'll get a lot more out of it if you know what Morrison is referring to. The list is very long, and reads like a roll call of conspiracy theories and paranormal concepts. I can't say that I got everything, but I was able to understand quite a bit of it. Did I like it? Well... Yes and no. There are some really great things in here, and I think Morrison had put some serious thought into how to construct his finale. But I also think that it's a little indulgent. I'm a fan of Morrison in general, but if he has one major failing, it's an inability to edit himself. I thought about putting off my review until I felt like I understood what happened in the book and my own reaction to it a little better, but something tells me that might never happen.
December 13, 2012
Still unbelievably complex, prophetic, frustrating and chaotically enjoyable. With this culminating volume Grant lets more veils drop to give us a clearer view of the story in all its brainblown splendor, alive and revealing new intricacies at every turn, and near the end almost drops the storytelling convention of conflict in order to have more room for the download of more mad ideas. Reading this series once is certainly not enough, and this being my third full encounter only reinforces its infiltration into modern culture. Shockingly enough, everything does get tied up and explained, yet the multitude of different artists working on this one means that you have to be more alert than usual. The story reverberates and begins anew.
June 11, 2015
Well, the end of the series was a definite improvement over the previous volume. Where the plot seemed to me to be falling apart, most of the threads were finally pulled back in and woven together, though I still found it a bit excessively disjointed—though perhaps that is a deliberate tactic for keeping the reader off balance, like many of the choices Fellini made for his Satyricon. I'm glad I pushed through, and at the same time I don't think I'll be recommending it frequently; not to say it was bad, just that, even though it uses many elements I like, it's not my thing. I don't like ketchup on hot dogs either.
September 8, 2025
Just an incredible series, event better on the second readthrough.
December 12, 2021
La última entrega de la saga. Todo termina. O no. Y os voy a confesar una cosa que me da mucha rabia… ¡por error me lo he leído antes que su anterior! Y el problema es que no me he dado cuenta porque, pese a que faltaban algunos personajes, todo es tan extraño en el universo de Morrison que no me descuadraba del todo. Hasta que ya iba a mitad del tomo y me decía “joder, parece que esto ya se termina…” Maldita mi estampa. Jajaja…
Lo cierto es que este tomo es una puñetera locura porque, aunque muchas cosas cuadran hay tres cosas que me desconciertan y me desorientan por completo para entender la trama.
Por un lado los cambios de dibujantes, ya no solo de número a número, sino de escena en escena. Entiendo que Morrison pretende asociar a cada uno un tono o trama concreta, pero la diferencia entre ellos es abismal, sobre todo con Warren Pleece, cuyo estilo más “cartoon” desentona por completo en una obra como esta.
Tenemos también los saltos de escena y tramas, los flashbacks, los flashfowards. Si ya la trama es compleja, estas técnicas narrativas en plena conclusión y cierre de la saga, hay generan mayor caos.
Y, por último, los enigmas, sorpresas de guion y escenas enigmáticas que responden muchas cuestiones pero generan muchas nuevas.
Eso sí, dejadme que os diga que las portadas que tiene este tomo son todas, sin excepción, una puñetera maravilla. Brian Bolland es el autor de todas ellas. Brutales.
En conclusión: esta obra de Morrison es una puñetera genialidad, donde mezcla una cantidad ingente de magia, filosofía, religión, política, existencialismo, conspiraciones, fuerzas ocultas y elementos paranormales bastante complejos y nada pueriles. La cabeza de Morrison parece haber leído todo tipo de libros esotéricos, visto muchos capítulos de “Expediente X” y consumido muchas drogas psicotrópicas. Es un cómic potente, adulto, pero no apto para aquellos que quieran tramas cerradas y que todo quede perfectamente explicado. La saga, en sí misma, en su viaje en el que hay que dejarse llevar y ver por dónde nos lleva. Nos hará pensar, soñar, reflexionar, odiar y amar. En cualquier orden.
Inevitable también ver la influencia que este trabajo ha tenido en muchas obras posteriores de cine, televisión, literatura, cómic y juegos de rol. Sin ir más lejos, el universo de “Los Invisibles” encajaría perfectamente y con pocas o ningunas modificaciones en el que plantea el juego de rol Unknown Armies. Incluso en el propio juego veremos reflejadas alguna de las escuelas de magia postmoderna que aparecen en el cómic.
Lo cierto es que este tomo es una puñetera locura porque, aunque muchas cosas cuadran hay tres cosas que me desconciertan y me desorientan por completo para entender la trama.
Por un lado los cambios de dibujantes, ya no solo de número a número, sino de escena en escena. Entiendo que Morrison pretende asociar a cada uno un tono o trama concreta, pero la diferencia entre ellos es abismal, sobre todo con Warren Pleece, cuyo estilo más “cartoon” desentona por completo en una obra como esta.
Tenemos también los saltos de escena y tramas, los flashbacks, los flashfowards. Si ya la trama es compleja, estas técnicas narrativas en plena conclusión y cierre de la saga, hay generan mayor caos.
Y, por último, los enigmas, sorpresas de guion y escenas enigmáticas que responden muchas cuestiones pero generan muchas nuevas.
Eso sí, dejadme que os diga que las portadas que tiene este tomo son todas, sin excepción, una puñetera maravilla. Brian Bolland es el autor de todas ellas. Brutales.
En conclusión: esta obra de Morrison es una puñetera genialidad, donde mezcla una cantidad ingente de magia, filosofía, religión, política, existencialismo, conspiraciones, fuerzas ocultas y elementos paranormales bastante complejos y nada pueriles. La cabeza de Morrison parece haber leído todo tipo de libros esotéricos, visto muchos capítulos de “Expediente X” y consumido muchas drogas psicotrópicas. Es un cómic potente, adulto, pero no apto para aquellos que quieran tramas cerradas y que todo quede perfectamente explicado. La saga, en sí misma, en su viaje en el que hay que dejarse llevar y ver por dónde nos lleva. Nos hará pensar, soñar, reflexionar, odiar y amar. En cualquier orden.
Inevitable también ver la influencia que este trabajo ha tenido en muchas obras posteriores de cine, televisión, literatura, cómic y juegos de rol. Sin ir más lejos, el universo de “Los Invisibles” encajaría perfectamente y con pocas o ningunas modificaciones en el que plantea el juego de rol Unknown Armies. Incluso en el propio juego veremos reflejadas alguna de las escuelas de magia postmoderna que aparecen en el cómic.
November 12, 2025
I still don’t really know what’s going on but can sense the complexity and am curious as to what it’s about it and why it’s told so secretively. Also, this series is probably the most 90s to ever exist
March 20, 2023
I remember being largely confused by the finale of The Invisibles when I read it for the first time as a teenager. I enjoyed it more this time around, not least because I read it shortly after the preceding six volumes. It hangs together better and makes more sense with the rest of the series in recent memory. Consequently I'm adding a fifth star, which applies both to this volume and the series as a whole.
There are cast changes in The Invisibles, Vol. 7: The Invisible Kingdom. Ragged Robin and Boy have left; Helga is introduced. When I was a teenager I thought she was the coolest character ever. She studies alien languages, frightens everyone around her, and always wears black. As an adult I still think she's awesome. Jolly Roger also comes into her own - I love her Eurythmics eyepatch look. Division X rock up: a set of psychics cosplaying a 1970s cop show. I appreciated them more this time around, by paying attention to their adoption of these pastiche genre identities rather than taking them literally.
To be honest, as a teenager I couldn't make sense of the ending, although it fascinated me as much as the rest of the series. Many elements from the preceding volumes collide: UFOs! Interdimensional monster royalty! The Wicker Man! The millennium! Deprogramming evil Sir Miles! De Sade, who has invented a renewable energy source from orgasms! The King in Yellow! Orlando the skin-wearing demon! The Harlequinade! Solar flares! Etc. Twenty years later I can parse it all a bit better.
The overall point I inferred is that reality is a dialectical process.
I'm very glad I reread The Invisibles. It is both interesting as a flashback to the turn of the century and for its ongoing relevance. Thanks to ubiquitous connectivity, we live in a more unstable and disputed reality than ever. This line was particularly cutting to read in 2022: "We didn't have MeMes when I was little. Personalities, we called them." Ouch. The series plays with narrative, identity, and meaning in original and memorably weird ways. It's also just cool as fuck. I thought so as a teenager and was pleased to find my younger self wasn't mistaken. A lot of heavy existential stuff is delivered via kinetic action scenes, stunningly vivid splash pages, and compelling characters wearing stylish outfits. The series definitely shaped my taste in fiction and teenage daydreams. Thank you, Grant Morrison, for making me that bit weirder.
There are cast changes in The Invisibles, Vol. 7: The Invisible Kingdom. Ragged Robin and Boy have left; Helga is introduced. When I was a teenager I thought she was the coolest character ever. She studies alien languages, frightens everyone around her, and always wears black. As an adult I still think she's awesome. Jolly Roger also comes into her own - I love her Eurythmics eyepatch look. Division X rock up: a set of psychics cosplaying a 1970s cop show. I appreciated them more this time around, by paying attention to their adoption of these pastiche genre identities rather than taking them literally.
To be honest, as a teenager I couldn't make sense of the ending, although it fascinated me as much as the rest of the series. Many elements from the preceding volumes collide: UFOs! Interdimensional monster royalty! The Wicker Man! The millennium! Deprogramming evil Sir Miles! De Sade, who has invented a renewable energy source from orgasms! The King in Yellow! Orlando the skin-wearing demon! The Harlequinade! Solar flares! Etc. Twenty years later I can parse it all a bit better.
The overall point I inferred is that reality is a dialectical process.
I'm very glad I reread The Invisibles. It is both interesting as a flashback to the turn of the century and for its ongoing relevance. Thanks to ubiquitous connectivity, we live in a more unstable and disputed reality than ever. This line was particularly cutting to read in 2022: "We didn't have MeMes when I was little. Personalities, we called them." Ouch. The series plays with narrative, identity, and meaning in original and memorably weird ways. It's also just cool as fuck. I thought so as a teenager and was pleased to find my younger self wasn't mistaken. A lot of heavy existential stuff is delivered via kinetic action scenes, stunningly vivid splash pages, and compelling characters wearing stylish outfits. The series definitely shaped my taste in fiction and teenage daydreams. Thank you, Grant Morrison, for making me that bit weirder.
August 18, 2017
Weird reading this days before the eclipse and during a presidency that often feels like end-times. I'm very down with the overall vibe - Alan Moore, dystopian, cyberpunk, regular punk, whatever - but too often had literally no idea what anyone was talking about and wished the wrap-up matched the highlights of the previous books. I guess I liked the character stuff a lot and this was necessarily more about the more meta-stuff - still quite an experience, but a little let down at the end.
March 9, 2020
I would give it 3.5 stars if that was an option, but it's not. And I don't want to give it 4 stars, so it's 3.
Was it worth reading this series? I would say yes. But I'm not a representative sample of the public.
I've read a lot of weird stuff over the years. So, I think I have a good idea of what Morrison is talking about. Or, put differently, you NEED to be a weirdo to understand this series.
If you're just a casual reader, don't waste your time on The Invisibles.
I'm reasonably familiar with many of the ideas, and people that influenced this series, and even I found it difficult at times to follow Morrison's thinking. Towards the end the series changes from difficult and complex to confusing and overloaded.
Morrison somehow manages to give you both too much and not enough information at the same time.
He just keeps throwing ideas at you till the end. Even if they don't contribute anything to the story.
Sometimes, you get the impression that an idea is just there because Morrison thinks it's really clever, and that's reason enough to include it, even if cutting it out would improve the story.
At other times, Morrison doesn't give us enough information, even if more information would improve the story.
Just one example: the Marquis de Sade. I think, I know what Morrison is trying to say, but if you haven't read anything by de Sade, and you don't know who Wilhelm Reich was, or what "aeon" means in a thelemic context, it's all just confusing.
And Morrison doesn't really explain any of it in a satisfactory way. The Marquis is one of the key players in this story, but he's written in a way that you could cut his entire arc out, and the story wouldn't change much.
And the closer the conclusion of the story comes, the worse these tendencies get.
At times, The Invisibles reads more like an illustrated occult manifesto than a comic. And, when I say manifesto, I mean manifesto. As in extreme views, weird and confusing trains of thought, rambling, and everything.
And I don't want to hear anything about how clever, and postmodern it is. It's not confusing because it's complex, it's confusing because it's messy.
Unsusual narrative structures, cutting back and forth between several storylines, and intertextuality can work very well. Take Quentin Tarantino for example. But when you overdo it, it becomes messy. And Morrison overdid all of it. Especially the intertextuality thing. He overdid that to the point where his series is incomprehensible to many if not most people.
Intertextuality should improve the reading experience for people who get an allusion. It shouldn't hinder comprehensibility.
I don't mind that King Mob, and Mason compare everything to movies, TV shows, and books. It's maybe a bit exaggerated, but whatever.
What I do mind is that important plot elements aren't really explained, except for a fleeting reference to some obscure author.
I get more references than most people because I'm interested in many of the things Morrison writes about, but still.
If a story is so intertextual that it can't be understood by people who aren't at least somewhat familiar with the works of dozens of littel known authors, and equally obscure ideas, the author didn't do his job properly.
There are religious, and occult texts you aren't supposed to be understand immediately. But The Invisibles isn't a koan you have to meditate on. It's a comic and regardless of what deeper meaning there is, you should be able to understand a comic at least on a surface level without having to read half a library first.
And I think this is where the main problem lies. The Invisibles is a COMIC series. And comics aren't like novels. Their possibilities and limitations are very different. But Morrison doesn't really work with the possibilities of the medium as much as he could/should.
Many of the concepts in The Invisibles could easily be shown, but instead Morrison wants to explain them. And that's when things get confusing.
There is a reason why they say 'show, don't tell'.
I get it, The Invisibles is about language, its relation to cognition, its relation to reality, and all this postmodern falderal. So, of course language has to play an important role. And, as often as he alludes to or outright names the Situationists, and other influences, it's clear why Morrison did this.
It explains everything, really. The Invisibles' half-baked politics, the, at times, juvenile character design, the postmodern wordiness, everything.
Morrison obviously read a bunch of leftist authors who hide their pseudo-intellectualism behind a lot of postmodern jargon. (Judging by Morrison's preference for baldies who wear black, and the way The Invisibles presents mental illness, I'd say he was influenced by the Foucault fad that swept through academia in the late 80s.) And they obviously made such an impression on Morrison that he wanted to be "on a par" with these guys.
To that I have two things to say.
One: Morrison doesn't need to emulate these clowns. His thinking is already much more original and entertaining than theirs.
And two: It's a comic. If you don't want to use the possibilities of your medium, choose a different medium.
Comics can do things no other medium can. Especially an outlandish stories like The Invisibles.
Take Douglas Rushkoff's "Testament" for example. It isn't nearly as out-there as The Invisibles, but it shares some of the same subjects, and Rushkoff's comic made much more of its medium.
Like the way "Testament" shows higher dimensions and their residents interacting with lower ones.
The Invisibles easily could have done something similar. Just think how much more they could have made of voodoo time travel via astral projection in collaboration with a voodoo spider deity. Or the way "aliens" interact with the human world.
And it wouldn't just look cool. I think many of the ideas of The Invisibles would be easier to understand if they were communicated visually instead of textually.
Conclusion: Was The Invisibles worth the time? Yes. Definitely. It's crazy in a good way. It's fascinating, and it covers many topics I'm interested in. The magnitude of the work alone is impressive.
But for the reasons I mentioned, I assume The Invisibles would bore and/or confuse anyone who isn't familiar with its topics.
Also, I'm old enough to remember the 90s. And The Invisibles is very much a work of the 90s.
I get the 90s references, and I remember the zeitgeist of the 90s. But I can only imagine what it'll be like to read The Invisibles for someone a few decades from now. And I'm not sure how well it will age.
Was it worth reading this series? I would say yes. But I'm not a representative sample of the public.
I've read a lot of weird stuff over the years. So, I think I have a good idea of what Morrison is talking about. Or, put differently, you NEED to be a weirdo to understand this series.
If you're just a casual reader, don't waste your time on The Invisibles.
I'm reasonably familiar with many of the ideas, and people that influenced this series, and even I found it difficult at times to follow Morrison's thinking. Towards the end the series changes from difficult and complex to confusing and overloaded.
Morrison somehow manages to give you both too much and not enough information at the same time.
He just keeps throwing ideas at you till the end. Even if they don't contribute anything to the story.
Sometimes, you get the impression that an idea is just there because Morrison thinks it's really clever, and that's reason enough to include it, even if cutting it out would improve the story.
At other times, Morrison doesn't give us enough information, even if more information would improve the story.
Just one example: the Marquis de Sade. I think, I know what Morrison is trying to say, but if you haven't read anything by de Sade, and you don't know who Wilhelm Reich was, or what "aeon" means in a thelemic context, it's all just confusing.
And Morrison doesn't really explain any of it in a satisfactory way. The Marquis is one of the key players in this story, but he's written in a way that you could cut his entire arc out, and the story wouldn't change much.
And the closer the conclusion of the story comes, the worse these tendencies get.
At times, The Invisibles reads more like an illustrated occult manifesto than a comic. And, when I say manifesto, I mean manifesto. As in extreme views, weird and confusing trains of thought, rambling, and everything.
And I don't want to hear anything about how clever, and postmodern it is. It's not confusing because it's complex, it's confusing because it's messy.
Unsusual narrative structures, cutting back and forth between several storylines, and intertextuality can work very well. Take Quentin Tarantino for example. But when you overdo it, it becomes messy. And Morrison overdid all of it. Especially the intertextuality thing. He overdid that to the point where his series is incomprehensible to many if not most people.
Intertextuality should improve the reading experience for people who get an allusion. It shouldn't hinder comprehensibility.
I don't mind that King Mob, and Mason compare everything to movies, TV shows, and books. It's maybe a bit exaggerated, but whatever.
What I do mind is that important plot elements aren't really explained, except for a fleeting reference to some obscure author.
I get more references than most people because I'm interested in many of the things Morrison writes about, but still.
If a story is so intertextual that it can't be understood by people who aren't at least somewhat familiar with the works of dozens of littel known authors, and equally obscure ideas, the author didn't do his job properly.
There are religious, and occult texts you aren't supposed to be understand immediately. But The Invisibles isn't a koan you have to meditate on. It's a comic and regardless of what deeper meaning there is, you should be able to understand a comic at least on a surface level without having to read half a library first.
And I think this is where the main problem lies. The Invisibles is a COMIC series. And comics aren't like novels. Their possibilities and limitations are very different. But Morrison doesn't really work with the possibilities of the medium as much as he could/should.
Many of the concepts in The Invisibles could easily be shown, but instead Morrison wants to explain them. And that's when things get confusing.
There is a reason why they say 'show, don't tell'.
I get it, The Invisibles is about language, its relation to cognition, its relation to reality, and all this postmodern falderal. So, of course language has to play an important role. And, as often as he alludes to or outright names the Situationists, and other influences, it's clear why Morrison did this.
It explains everything, really. The Invisibles' half-baked politics, the, at times, juvenile character design, the postmodern wordiness, everything.
Morrison obviously read a bunch of leftist authors who hide their pseudo-intellectualism behind a lot of postmodern jargon. (Judging by Morrison's preference for baldies who wear black, and the way The Invisibles presents mental illness, I'd say he was influenced by the Foucault fad that swept through academia in the late 80s.) And they obviously made such an impression on Morrison that he wanted to be "on a par" with these guys.
To that I have two things to say.
One: Morrison doesn't need to emulate these clowns. His thinking is already much more original and entertaining than theirs.
And two: It's a comic. If you don't want to use the possibilities of your medium, choose a different medium.
Comics can do things no other medium can. Especially an outlandish stories like The Invisibles.
Take Douglas Rushkoff's "Testament" for example. It isn't nearly as out-there as The Invisibles, but it shares some of the same subjects, and Rushkoff's comic made much more of its medium.
Like the way "Testament" shows higher dimensions and their residents interacting with lower ones.
The Invisibles easily could have done something similar. Just think how much more they could have made of voodoo time travel via astral projection in collaboration with a voodoo spider deity. Or the way "aliens" interact with the human world.
And it wouldn't just look cool. I think many of the ideas of The Invisibles would be easier to understand if they were communicated visually instead of textually.
Conclusion: Was The Invisibles worth the time? Yes. Definitely. It's crazy in a good way. It's fascinating, and it covers many topics I'm interested in. The magnitude of the work alone is impressive.
But for the reasons I mentioned, I assume The Invisibles would bore and/or confuse anyone who isn't familiar with its topics.
Also, I'm old enough to remember the 90s. And The Invisibles is very much a work of the 90s.
I get the 90s references, and I remember the zeitgeist of the 90s. But I can only imagine what it'll be like to read The Invisibles for someone a few decades from now. And I'm not sure how well it will age.
January 3, 2014
It took me awhile to finish this volume, not because it sucked, but because the holiday season--doooo bee doobie-doo! The Invisible Kingdom was the culmination that Morrison had built for seven years, spanning 1500+ pages. It consumed my Fall of 2013, finally finishing it here, on the third day of 2014. No spoilers here, but the beauty of this book/series, it's almost spoiler-proof. It's too sodding odd for spoilers. This officially my favorite series of books. Morrison swung for the fences and delivered. It puts conspiracy theories to rest in a techno-hallucination that lulls society to sleep. He was decades before his time. This story is more relevant now than it was with its original run.
Towards the end of this volume, King Mob perfectly describes reality and this book: "It's a thriller, it's a romance, it's a tragedy, it's a porno, it's a neo-modernist kitchen sink science fiction that you can catch, like a cold."
The charms to you, Grant!
Towards the end of this volume, King Mob perfectly describes reality and this book: "It's a thriller, it's a romance, it's a tragedy, it's a porno, it's a neo-modernist kitchen sink science fiction that you can catch, like a cold."
The charms to you, Grant!
August 10, 2014
The Invisibles story wraps up with hyper-dimensional, mystical, woo woo.
Non-linear, and exciting. You'll like this a whole lot if you "get" or are familiar with certain things that are explored in the storyline - metaphysically speaking. Reading up on quantum physics, cosmology, psychedelia, occult, conspiracy theory, UFOs, paranormal, and ancient mysteries, probably gave me a bit of an edge. I'm willing to bet most of the people who appreciate this series find these topics somewhat interesting. All of these subjects, and reality itself, come crashing together in The Invisibles: The Invisible Kingdom.
Really, if you've read this far into the series, I think you're good to go.
Non-linear, and exciting. You'll like this a whole lot if you "get" or are familiar with certain things that are explored in the storyline - metaphysically speaking. Reading up on quantum physics, cosmology, psychedelia, occult, conspiracy theory, UFOs, paranormal, and ancient mysteries, probably gave me a bit of an edge. I'm willing to bet most of the people who appreciate this series find these topics somewhat interesting. All of these subjects, and reality itself, come crashing together in The Invisibles: The Invisible Kingdom.
Really, if you've read this far into the series, I think you're good to go.
September 27, 2011
I really, really do love this volume. I know many people don't. But man, what an excellent story. Like I've said in earlier reviews, The Invisibles works best when parts of the story are just out of reach...and I love how this brings so many things together. One of the parts I love best, that I finally just now discovered (this is my 5th or 6th reread), is how Edie, when talking about the end of her life, is talking about how what really matters are goodness and kindness, in other words, positive emotions. And then, at the end, we find out that the language that Barbelith speaks in is pure emotion, and it only has positive emotions for all of us. And that's just a touch.
August 16, 2022
I loved it, its funny though, almost everybody complains about the anticlimatic ending, but wait a minute the whole series is an orgasmic climax, everytime I was finishing an Invisibles volume I felt my head spinning on the speed of light towards every direction, its a tense and dense series which by default is the revelation itself on every page, so what more could you expect?! I believe Morrison wants to leave the reader free to make whatever he wants out of it in the end, like planetary, everything is possible, it's your choice 😉
May 30, 2014
I'm wrecked and Morrison is insane. But I get it. Wonder why more women aren't writing this eclectic existential action shit. Cause it's amazing. The payoff is there, and just as insane and unsettling as the rest.
October 24, 2015
Pretension uncontained.
September 3, 2018
I became a fan of Grant Morrison thanks to his high profile relaunch of the Justice League in the pages of JLA. At the time I hadn't read any of his Vertigo comics, not his fourth-wall-breaking Animal Man, his psychedelic Doom Patrol, and certainly not The Invisibles. The last was his longest work, and arguably his defining work to that point, and it's largely responsible for his enduring image as, well, just the kind of dude who belongs in a comic like Invisibles. I have no idea if that image was ever accurate or if it was the product of an incredibly expansive mind and excellent PR in his letters columns. But in all the years I've attempted to catch up with Invisibles, I've never quite managed to penetrate its dense hyperimage of Morrison's most basic storytelling instincts. Which is to say, if you've ever struggled to understand a Grant Morrison comic, Invisibles is basically the comic that best defines that reputation. But The Invisible Kingdom might finally have solved the riddle for me.
I'd read Morrison's later Filth, which in some ways is Invisibles condensed, but lacking the overall message Invisible Kingdom makes clear. Filth and Invisibles both share a hidden hedonistic culture of multidimensions. Filth is thirteen issues; Invisible Kingdom alone is twelve, and it's the seventh volume of Invisibles comics. It's also the final one. Therefore, it theoretically, and does, include a concluding thought. While it can be typically bewildering wandering through Morrison's maniacally kinetic ping-ponging through a forest of wild ideas, it's worth it, it really is. Invisibles is the ür-text of Vertigo comics, the idea that DC's typical storytelling is even weirder when you lift the veil (that was the original idea, anyway, when most of its output was still dominated by dark interpretations of existing DC properties). Where Vertigo eventually settled on the fringes of society in general (where Neil Gaiman's Sandman, for instance, helped lead with its goth icons Dream and Death), Invisibles basically collected the whole set, and basically represents the world we live in today. There used to be chatter that the Wachowskis' Matrix movies ripped off Invisibles, but I still find no real apt comparisons between them except on a very superficial level. No, as Invisible Kingdom makes clear, this was always about the death of the Christian worldview.
Which, as you look around you today, can easily see is very much the apparent development of history today. It's the Christian ideas of morality that Invisibles so thoroughly refutes, certainly gender concepts. Invisibles isn't really even about gender concepts, but even more than Sandman it casually weaves them into its narrative.
Anyway, let me quote from the last page of the volume, of the series:
"Anyhow...I've said my bit and it's your go now...So while you're thinking about it, think about this...My mate Elfayed told me something when I was little and wanking about twenty times a day: 'We made gods and jailers because we felt small and ashamed and alone,' he said. 'We let them try us and judge us and, like sheep to slaughter, we allowed ourselves to be...sentenced. See! Now! Our sentence is up.'"
And there's some terrific storytelling in there, too, even if there's work needed to keep up with it, many of the issues pivoting on the events of August 11, 1999. Even without having read five out of the seven volumes of Invisibles (I've also read the first, Say You Want a Revolution), I found the sequence riveting, even if it ends with Morrison's trademark abrupt solution to the crisis at hand. If someone made a movie, or TV series, out of these comics, this would be a truly show-stopping climax.
I'd read Morrison's later Filth, which in some ways is Invisibles condensed, but lacking the overall message Invisible Kingdom makes clear. Filth and Invisibles both share a hidden hedonistic culture of multidimensions. Filth is thirteen issues; Invisible Kingdom alone is twelve, and it's the seventh volume of Invisibles comics. It's also the final one. Therefore, it theoretically, and does, include a concluding thought. While it can be typically bewildering wandering through Morrison's maniacally kinetic ping-ponging through a forest of wild ideas, it's worth it, it really is. Invisibles is the ür-text of Vertigo comics, the idea that DC's typical storytelling is even weirder when you lift the veil (that was the original idea, anyway, when most of its output was still dominated by dark interpretations of existing DC properties). Where Vertigo eventually settled on the fringes of society in general (where Neil Gaiman's Sandman, for instance, helped lead with its goth icons Dream and Death), Invisibles basically collected the whole set, and basically represents the world we live in today. There used to be chatter that the Wachowskis' Matrix movies ripped off Invisibles, but I still find no real apt comparisons between them except on a very superficial level. No, as Invisible Kingdom makes clear, this was always about the death of the Christian worldview.
Which, as you look around you today, can easily see is very much the apparent development of history today. It's the Christian ideas of morality that Invisibles so thoroughly refutes, certainly gender concepts. Invisibles isn't really even about gender concepts, but even more than Sandman it casually weaves them into its narrative.
Anyway, let me quote from the last page of the volume, of the series:
"Anyhow...I've said my bit and it's your go now...So while you're thinking about it, think about this...My mate Elfayed told me something when I was little and wanking about twenty times a day: 'We made gods and jailers because we felt small and ashamed and alone,' he said. 'We let them try us and judge us and, like sheep to slaughter, we allowed ourselves to be...sentenced. See! Now! Our sentence is up.'"
And there's some terrific storytelling in there, too, even if there's work needed to keep up with it, many of the issues pivoting on the events of August 11, 1999. Even without having read five out of the seven volumes of Invisibles (I've also read the first, Say You Want a Revolution), I found the sequence riveting, even if it ends with Morrison's trademark abrupt solution to the crisis at hand. If someone made a movie, or TV series, out of these comics, this would be a truly show-stopping climax.
October 16, 2019
A great ending to a fan-fucking-tastic... mind-fucking-bending... conception-fucking-obliterating... acid-fueled rollercoaster of a plain ‘ol balls to the walls old-fashioned, anti-fascist ROMP... fun for the whole family!!! :D... unless of course, they’re Christian... LOL!
No, but in all seriousness, what do you expect... it’s Grant Morrison and it’s The Invisibles... how can it be anything but amazing?!... and of course, it didn’t disappoint!
My one critique or criticism is that, seeing how this was the final issue of the series, it would was gonna go out with a BANG!... and I mean the type of CRAZY BANG that only The Invisibles can pull off... a huge, long extended crazy clustefuck of intensely countercultured weirdness that is trademark to The Invisibles at this point in the game. And I was just a bit disappointed that the ending wasn’t some sort of crazy, harrowing, bullet-flinging, TK-blasting romp through The Archon’s realm or something.
THAT being said, I DID, however really like the way he chose to end it, in the über-meta way that this series pretty much called for. Really dug it, and even though my “action”-wishes weren’t met, it wasn’t enough of a detractor for me to take away any points in the end. I mean... it’s THE FUCKING INVISIBLES!... how could I possibly give it anything less than a 5-star review! This series was all-around fucking awesome... and innovative and ahead of its time even today, 20-30 years after it was first published, let alone back in the 90s-early 00s when it was first put on the shelves!
An absolute must-read for anyone counterculture-minded, or anyone who loves themselves some LSD and some graphic novels! 5-star all the way!!! :D
No, but in all seriousness, what do you expect... it’s Grant Morrison and it’s The Invisibles... how can it be anything but amazing?!... and of course, it didn’t disappoint!
My one critique or criticism is that, seeing how this was the final issue of the series, it would was gonna go out with a BANG!... and I mean the type of CRAZY BANG that only The Invisibles can pull off... a huge, long extended crazy clustefuck of intensely countercultured weirdness that is trademark to The Invisibles at this point in the game. And I was just a bit disappointed that the ending wasn’t some sort of crazy, harrowing, bullet-flinging, TK-blasting romp through The Archon’s realm or something.
THAT being said, I DID, however really like the way he chose to end it, in the über-meta way that this series pretty much called for. Really dug it, and even though my “action”-wishes weren’t met, it wasn’t enough of a detractor for me to take away any points in the end. I mean... it’s THE FUCKING INVISIBLES!... how could I possibly give it anything less than a 5-star review! This series was all-around fucking awesome... and innovative and ahead of its time even today, 20-30 years after it was first published, let alone back in the 90s-early 00s when it was first put on the shelves!
An absolute must-read for anyone counterculture-minded, or anyone who loves themselves some LSD and some graphic novels! 5-star all the way!!! :D
July 23, 2022
Man, what a crazy, out of this world ride. When I first started reading again (which wasn’t that long ago) I was going through the usual titans of the industry like Batman Year One, The Dark Knight Returns, Watchmen, etc. and as I continued my journey I always took more of a liking to the “weird” and non typical superhero books from Vertigo. After reading a handful from that line I had come across The Invisibles. From what I had heard and seen it looked like it was totally up my alley, so I picked up Book 1 from the library a couple days later and….
MAN I HATED IT.
From never reading anything like it prior and not having much experience in this kind of non linear, extremely unique, intellectually difficult, bat shit crazy type of book….I was so lost.
I figured there was no way anyone could follow and willfully enjoy this, it was the worst book I had ever read up to that point.
Cut to a few months later after having more experience in these types of books and Grant Morrisons work in general, I find the whole Invisibles series in a bargain bin, and for whatever reason I was drawn to it. I figured for a deal like this I might aswell give it another shot.
After reading this whole series now I can confidently say, nothing I’ve read has seeped into my mind and changed my own reality like this series has. It went from my most hated read to my most beloved series. From something created in the mid to late 90’s it’s still so in tuned with the world we live in and really opens your eyes and mind to think differently about so many of our normal everyday human occurrences. It’s a kind of series that you can’t really explain to someone, they just have to experience it.
I don’t want to drag this on for much longer but this has been the most unexpected and rewarding discovery in my reading thus far and I’ll always remember it.
MAN I HATED IT.
From never reading anything like it prior and not having much experience in this kind of non linear, extremely unique, intellectually difficult, bat shit crazy type of book….I was so lost.
I figured there was no way anyone could follow and willfully enjoy this, it was the worst book I had ever read up to that point.
Cut to a few months later after having more experience in these types of books and Grant Morrisons work in general, I find the whole Invisibles series in a bargain bin, and for whatever reason I was drawn to it. I figured for a deal like this I might aswell give it another shot.
After reading this whole series now I can confidently say, nothing I’ve read has seeped into my mind and changed my own reality like this series has. It went from my most hated read to my most beloved series. From something created in the mid to late 90’s it’s still so in tuned with the world we live in and really opens your eyes and mind to think differently about so many of our normal everyday human occurrences. It’s a kind of series that you can’t really explain to someone, they just have to experience it.
I don’t want to drag this on for much longer but this has been the most unexpected and rewarding discovery in my reading thus far and I’ll always remember it.
March 21, 2020
Welp. That's that.
I was loaned the entire series by a friend, so I guess that was a reason that I kept reading the novels despite not liking the story.
I will say this though: it was fun. Not good, but fun. The "plot" of the entire series reads like a guy dicking around with his guitar and coming up with a semi-coherent tune that he absolutely MUST share with his friends. The convoluted plot full of random conspiracies and East Asian references feels like you're humoring that white guy who went to Asia once and now thinks himself Totally Enlightened™ with his henna tattoos and imported hookah or whatever. Not good, but fun.
Plus, this entire series was gross. Like watching green mold, blue mold, and black mold becoming sentient and having an orgy on your weeks-old bread gross. The imagery, even with the bad art, is just too much, too stomach-turning. That's probably a reason it took me three days to finish this volume when it usually takes me a couple hours to read through a graphic novel volume.
Overall, it was not as cool as it used to be hailed. Can't wait to return these books.
I was loaned the entire series by a friend, so I guess that was a reason that I kept reading the novels despite not liking the story.
I will say this though: it was fun. Not good, but fun. The "plot" of the entire series reads like a guy dicking around with his guitar and coming up with a semi-coherent tune that he absolutely MUST share with his friends. The convoluted plot full of random conspiracies and East Asian references feels like you're humoring that white guy who went to Asia once and now thinks himself Totally Enlightened™ with his henna tattoos and imported hookah or whatever. Not good, but fun.
Plus, this entire series was gross. Like watching green mold, blue mold, and black mold becoming sentient and having an orgy on your weeks-old bread gross. The imagery, even with the bad art, is just too much, too stomach-turning. That's probably a reason it took me three days to finish this volume when it usually takes me a couple hours to read through a graphic novel volume.
Overall, it was not as cool as it used to be hailed. Can't wait to return these books.
April 5, 2018
Well, I was mistaken about the artists. I forgot the book went in three four-part arcs. First arc started with Bond for an issue, then three issues of Pleece layouts/pencils and Bond finishes. The middle arc is entirely Phillips with Jay Stephens inking. Quitely draws the finale. All the other artists trade off pages during the three issues leading up to the finale - it's incredibly jarring. Morrison pencils the last page of the second-to-last issue himself.
Anyway, I found this last book in the series rambling and disjointed. The Invisibles kidnap Sir Miles, let him go, King Mob spends four issues with Edith while she prepares to die, the new cast members (Boy left the team and Robin went back to the future in the previous book) aren't given room to become interesting or compelling - Helga's just a series of Morrisonian one-liners - and the big finale is a letdown. Sir Miles says he's tricked the Invisibles, and the the King Archon is going to possess Jack. And then Jack says he ate the Archon and it's over. What? Plot's too disjointed, and there's no emotional hook.
Anyway, I found this last book in the series rambling and disjointed. The Invisibles kidnap Sir Miles, let him go, King Mob spends four issues with Edith while she prepares to die, the new cast members (Boy left the team and Robin went back to the future in the previous book) aren't given room to become interesting or compelling - Helga's just a series of Morrisonian one-liners - and the big finale is a letdown. Sir Miles says he's tricked the Invisibles, and the the King Archon is going to possess Jack. And then Jack says he ate the Archon and it's over. What? Plot's too disjointed, and there's no emotional hook.
September 14, 2017
Años me demore...años, en terminar LOS INVISIBLES, y valio la pena...¿o no?, ¿o si?, no se, creo que nadie lo sabe, solo Grant Morrison...¿o no?. Bueno, too se desenvuelve en una espiral de violencia, invocaciones,sacrificios, realidades que colapsan,inicios,finales y se disfruta, mas nos e entiende y si, puede que yo sea despistado pero a ver quien alza la mano y dice que entendio el 100% delo que Morrison nos conto. Este tomo me deja es con una pregunta: ¿como hubiera sido Invisibles si hubiera sido dibujado en su totalidad por Quitely?, ese numero que se marca es épico, violento y precioso a manos llenas.
March 9, 2021
While I appreciate Morrison uses Invisible Kingdom to tie up some plot lines from earlier volumes, Invisible Kingdom also fails to resolve enough of these lines to have a fully satisfying conclusion. I am drawn to Morrison's experimental style, but the memories I have of reading Entropy in the U.K. and Kissing Mr. Quimper in isolation gave me the impression that Morrison was present a far more coherent, yet esoteric story to their readers. The Invisibles is a queer text insofar that it refuses conventional, "straight" interpretations. Readers who are not comfortable with liminality are bound to be disappointed.
July 29, 2019
Probably more than any book I've ever read before, I'm at a loss for words to say how much I enjoyed not only this volume, but the entire series. Something being so baffling yet so enlightening in nothing for me, but the extent to which this series lived up to both things astonished me with each chapter; and astonishes me even more looking back.
I will definitely be rereading the series, perhaps putting everything in a new context. Whether or not I will be less baffled . . . well, I don't really care.
I will definitely be rereading the series, perhaps putting everything in a new context. Whether or not I will be less baffled . . . well, I don't really care.
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