And so it ends, not with a bang but a whimper.
The final three-part story of Mr. Majestic is interesting because it doesn't do anything you expect. When last we read the comic, the universe was about to be unmade and an evil Mr. Majestic was fucking shit up on Earth. Fight time, right?
Wrong.
The cosmic group deals with Xonstructacles in a manner outside of Majestic's ability to understand. Majestic is powered up and absorbs the evil Majestic back inside and becomes the cosmic guardian he was always meant to be, leaving Earth behind forever (or, until this was all retconned and forgotten).
And you know what? I love that more than any fight Casey could have delivered (as Holguin didn't co-write this issue). The way the cosmic group deals with Xonstructacles is fantastic in its scope and the fact that when it's done, they tell Majestic that he may think what they did was cruel, but he doesn't understand since they're so far advanced. In a typical comic, the story would have become a fucking morality lecture or something, but Majestic know they're right. They are way beyond his limited views of morality and he's not fit to judge them. I've always hated comics that have our heroes confront these infinitely advanced beings and pressume to talk down to them. It's fucking stupid is what it is and it just plays upon the most loathesome of human characteristics.
As for the Majestic/Evil Majestic "fight," our hero just does the logical thing. The funny thing is that the entire issue is narrated by Gabereality to a child that is very similar to αΩ Major. Here an exchange between the two when we get to the "fight":
Child: OOOO...THIS IS IT! THE BIG CONFRONTATION! A TITANIC SLUGFEST TO END ALL SLUGFESTS! I LOVE THIS PART OF A FICTION DANCE!
Gabereality: Calm yourself, child. You presume TOO MUCH. There will be no fists hammering down in THIS instance...
Child: HOW ABOUT THIS... THE EVIL DOPPELGANGER BURNS A GIGANTIC CHESS BOARD ACROSS THE FACE OF THE EARTHLY CONTINENT, AND HE AND MAJESTROS PLAY A MATCH FOR THE SURVIVAL OF ALL THING HUMAN--
Gabereality: Ridiculous. How many pages do you think we have LEFT here...?
Child: WELL THEN...PERHAPS THEY SIMPLY HURL ENTIRE MOUNTAINS AT EACH OTHER...?
Gabereality: Remember, the hero is NOT what he WAS... There is an EXPECTATION that comes with one who would don a cape... wrap himself in the RESPONSIBLITIES of heroism as MOST would understand it. Let's call them... GENRE CONVENTIONS... The point being... Majestros's metamorphosis has taken him FAR ABOVE such concerns... perhaps beyond the archetypes that spawned him...
Child: NO SLAM-FEST, THEN...? NO VISCERAL RELEASE...? NO SATISFACTION...?
Gabereality: Fear not... for a while this outcome may not follow the so-called TRADITIONAL path of the "final showdown" that these legends trace time after laborious time... there s JUSTICE to be administered. JUDGMENT and DECISION...
I love that and it makes me even more mad that the book ends here. Casey pushes Majestic into an area beyond typical superhero comics (an area he will push characters time and time again--most notably Superman, which we'll also get to MUCH later--like after midnight later). Majestic is not longer the Superman rip-off, he's above that shit now. He throws away the cape and heads to the stars to take on a role much larger than his previous one.
And that's where it ends. There is no statisfaction here, because the new point of interest concludes. In a way, you can see this as commentary on how comics don't really want new and interesting, but the first six issues of the series delivered the same old, same old (albeit in a very well-done fashion) and people didn't buy it. So, what gives?
The sad truth is, Mr. Majestic failed because it wasn't a Superman book. If you took everything that happened in those first six issues and altered it so it happened to Superman, you would have had every person who reads superhero comics talking about how Superman was back, it was the best superhero comic around, etc. But, it was Mr. Majestic, so who cares?
The art in this isse was handled by Eric Cante and Toby Cypress. Cypress' work is a bit sketchier than Cante's, but works well with it. What happened to him and why is this the only comic I remember him drawing?
In 30 minutes, I'll discuss some of the news that's come out of San Diego the past few days and then, in one hour's time, we'll begin the long trek through Joe Casey's run on Uncanny X-Men. That's 17 issues of, mostly, utter crap--but interesting utter crap.
And remember, to sponsor me in this 24-hour blogathon, click on the sheep and all money goes to the Alzheimer Society of Canada.
Phoenix #5 annotations
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