Book Review: Supergods by Grant Morrison

A while ago, you may have seen my review of the first half of Supergods.  Well, I’ve finished the book, and am ready to give you a complete review.




Supergods, by Grant Morrison, is a book about comic history.  It’s
also an incomplete memoir of Grant Morrison’s life and career.  Perhaps
not too surprisingly, given the mixed feelings of the comic-reading
public toward Morrison’s own comics, I have mixed feelings about this
book.  Which side am I leaning toward?


The opening to this book is an excellent look at the Golden Age of
comics.  I imagine that most people reading this book, and an even more
overwhelming majority of the people reading this article, were not alive
during the Golden Age.  It is perhaps due to this, or perhaps just a
very happy coincidence, that this is the best historical part of the
novel.  We get a very in depth look at the creation of such characters
as Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman and Captain America, not to mention a
look at other characters such as the members of the Justice League of
America, the original Human Torch, and others.




As World War Two ends, the book continues along the path of comic
evolution and American culture.  Oh, Britain definitely gets its turn in
the spotlight, but when we’re talking about the formative moments of
the Golden Age, the Comics Code, and the Silver Age, it’s all about
American history and American politics.  If you were wondering why half
of your favorite Golden Age characters were re-created in the 50s and
60s, and why Silver Age comics are so… Silver Age, you get a good look here.




After that, it starts to get muddled.  Not only are the already
ambiguous and not necessarily agreed upon boundaries of Bronze, Dark,
and Modern Age discussed, but in the settings of American vs British
comics and Independent vs DC and Marvel, giving us a three-dimensional
axis to try and follow along. Any non-fiction book trying to move
linearly through a topic with enough facts has this problem, and it
wouldn’t be a concern but for the people, one in particular that made
the third quarter of this book extremely tedious for me to slog through,
but I’ll get to that shortly.




A writer of an informative work following the careers of several
individuals (let’s call them Lee, Kirby and Ditko for the sake of
examples) has a choice to make.  In this case, rather than devoting
entire chapters to them, the choice was made to return to them time and
again.  While this might not be a problem for some readers, I struggle
with movies that do this, because I’m extremely slow to
familiarize myself with names and people, and by the time I realize that
the guy who created Captain America and the one who created Darkseid
are the same person, I tend to lose a lot of character traits between
the cracks.




But, as any comics fan could expect of a piece written by fans, for
fans, the creators aren’t the only ones being followed.  Superman was
with us from the first page of the book, and Batman, Captain America,
the Justice Society, and the Justice League weren’t far behind.  These
individuals have gone through even more than their creators in the
decades since their origins.  Morrison didn’t go into everything like
Superman and Batman’s changes in Date of Birth (you could write a book
on that stuff alone), but he did make sure to stop in between each Era
and Semi-Era to mention how the changes in popular writing style were
effecting the Zeus and Hades (or at least the Apollo and Erebus) of the
comics world.




Then we get to theother individual that I mentioned.  You remember
how I said in the first paragraph that this was also a memoir?  I’ll
admit, I struggle to keep up with half a dozen individuals over the
course of their lives while they’re all being relevant in the comic
industry.  Now add in a really weird guy (Normally nothing wrong with
that, but I’m trying to piece this book together) with a really
complicated life story who gets more focus on each year of his life than
any of the other individuals in the book do.




Fans of Morrison’s work might find this really interesting.  I…
didn’t.  The only thing I’ve read by Grant Morrison prior to this (that
I’m aware of) is Batman: R.I.P., which I would describe as a
bad acid trip meeting Batman on paper.  This doesn’t fill me with an
incredible urge to learn more about every detail of Morrison’s life when
I could be learning about Geoff Johns, for example, whose work I’ve
read a ton of, though honestly I would still rather see something more
linear about Moore or Kirby filling up that space.




Morrison’s life sometimes seems to be described the same way a bad
trip would be, which is not a good thing when you’re reading what you
thought would be entirely a lesson on the origins and histories of your
favorite superheroes.  It might even be a touch egotistical, for that
matter.


In any case, these chapters with heavy involvement on the side
projects and personal life of a comics creator that I had no attachment
to really hurt my pacing of the book.  The last quarter picked up, but
it took me a while to get there.




I still think this book is a must for anybody who wants the nitty
gritty details, any serious comics collector who wants to learn about
the Golden and Silver Ages.  That said, I don’t recommend it as strongly
as I thought I would, because of the bogging down that some of these
details cause.  If you’re a huge fan of Grant Morrison, don’t let this
escape your fingers.  Get it signed and everything because you’re going
to eat up every word.  If you have no interest in Morrison’s personal
life, be a little more cautious, buy the paperback or get it with a
coupon, because you’re going to be looking mainly at about 75% of the
book.  Which isn’t bad, but still, try get something 25% less than the
full price.



Bill Silvia is a regular contributor at Fantasy & SciFi Lovin' News & Reviews.  You can find more of his content at www.MiBreviews.com