THE READING RHEUM: THE HELLBOUND HEART (1986)

 My general negative estimation of Clive Barker's work probably discouraged me from bothering to check out "The Hellbound Heart" until now. But given that I did read the 2015 SCARLET GOSPELS, in which Barker sought to construct a "Cenobite mythology" independent of the movie franchise, that probably motivated me to gauge the origins of the Cenobites in prose fiction. In my review I rated the "iconicity" of those characters in the movies over that of the GOSPELS novel, and that made me more a little curious about the source novel. There's also another reason for my reading-reticence, but I'll come back to that later.                                                                       

 To my great surprise, HEART was the best Barker prose work I've ever read. The characters are clearly delineated and confined to a small group of necessary functions in a tightly plotted tale. At base HEART is a "devil's bargain" story, in which a mortal makes a deal that he thinks will be to his benefit, but that instead ends up leaving him both burned and burning. The transgressive mortal this time is Englishman Frank Cotton, a hedonistic reprobate who travels from city to city, getting by on his charm and looks. His one relative is his brother Rory, but Frank holds Rory in contempt for his dull conservatism. On the day Rory wed his glamorous bride Julia, Frank secretly seduced Julia and then blew town.                                                                                                                                                       

But a life of heedless pleasures leaves Frank wanting something beyond ordinary experience. At a family house in England, Frank uses that iconic "puzzle box" to summon other-dimensional beings called "Cenobites." They're not connected to any religious entities, so there's no soul-bartering going on, but Frank thinks that he can make a deal with them anyway, one he thinks will result in his gaining access to new levels of heterosexual pleasures. Instead, the Cenobites' definition of pleasure is the imposition of endless forms of torture upon the body, until pain becomes synonymous with pleasure. Frank is taken into their dimension for the Cenobite games, and the book loosely suggests that these strange entities, with their body piercings and mutilations, may have been humans who became enthralled with self-inflicted mortification. None of the Cenobites in the story are as vivid as their movie-counterparts, by the way.           

Barker's first HELLRAISER movie followed the novel's plot fairly closely, and since I minutely described the plot-action of the 1987 HELLRAISER in this review, I won't repeat myself here. The greatest alteration the movie made to the book is that Kirsty Singer, a friend of Rory's nursing unrequited feelings for him, gets changed in the 1987 movie into Kirsty Cotton. This Kirsty is the unmarried daughter of Rory (whose name is changed to Larry), who resents her stepmother without knowing precisely why. In both book and movie, Kirsty is responsible for consigning Frank back to "Hell" after Frank has murdered his brother. So, in the book Kirsty's no relation to either Rory or Frank. Yet HEART includes a strange scene in which Frank's trying to masquerade as Rory to deceive Kirsty. To lure the young woman, Frank utters a come-on that Barker himself calls "incestuous:" saying "Come to Daddy" to Kirsty Singer. But if Kirsty's not related to either man, how can the come-on seem "incestuous" to anyone, least of all Kirsty?                                                                                                           Despite the various actions of Kirsty, Frank and Julia, Barker throws his narrative spotlight upon the mysterious Cenobites, though they're much more nebulous in prose than in cinema. One Cenobite displays the "pinhead" look and gets more lines than the others, so obviously in crafting the movie Barker built up that character to be more of an authority over the others, so as to take advantage of the talents of actor David Bradley. The movie still edges out the novel in terms of iconicity, but the mythicity of the two is about equal. Lastly, the other reason I was reluctant to read HEART was that I wondered if Barker, who has been public as a gay author for many years now, might not have constructed Frank's "bad bargain with the Devil" as a punishment for his heterosexual excesses. I've seen no shortage of modern narratives willing to punish fictional characters for the sin of being "heteronormative." But while I don't dismiss the possibility that Barker might have had some sort of punitive notion in mind, at least subconsciously, he succeeded in creating myth-figures that went beyond the boundaries of ideology. That the Cenobites deserve that status is suggested by the fact that other authors could excel in depicting the infernal pain-freaks in terms Barker would not have attempted, not least the HELLRAISER movie sequel. Ironically, though SCARLET GOSPELS wanted to stand apart from those other works, Barker's character of "The Hell Priest" owes a lot more to the movie's Pinhead than to the vague figure from HEART.                                               

THE READING RHEUM: THE SCARLET GOSPELS (2015)

I'm glad I got some of my takes on author Clive Barker set down in an earlier essay, so that here I can focus more on the specific problems I had with SCARLET GOSPELS, one of Barker's rare crossovers between two of his icons.

First I'll say that even though GOSPELS isn't well-plotted and its characters are under-realized, Barker succeeds in creating enough of a linear sense of menace that the novel is a decent read, though I don't envision ever wanting to reread it. The criticism I voiced in the earlier essay-- that often Barker's works are just catalogues of sex-and-sadism scenes, without much narrative "glue" to hold them together-- particularly applies here. Because Barker doesn't care about delving into individual characters, he often tosses in new ones without any attention to context. For instance, one of Harry D'Amour's allies is a female body builder, name of Lana. This makes it possible for Barker to throw in a little femme-formidable action. But who is Lana? Is there a story about why her character devoted herself to muscle-building? Not at all, and so even though Barker might have included her as a change from his studiously swishy characters, she comes off as just another "freak flag" getting flown.

This is even more evident with one of Barker's starring icons, Harry D'Amour. D'Amour isn't exactly a well-known figure outside Barker fandom, for the author has only placed the detective in a handful of short stories, one major role in an unfinished novel-series (THE BOOK OF THE ART), and an unsuccessful stand-alone movie, LORD OF ILLUSIONS. Yet Barker wants to play up D'Amour as if he's a fascinating "everyman" (his word) type of character, who becomes enmeshed in occult situations far beyond his means. Barker doesn't arm his detective-hero with any special weapons or skills, so he clearly wanted him to be the sort of protagonist who just muddles through situations far beyond his compass. I for one just found D'Amour terminally dull, and his relationships with his various allies didn't improve his character. D'Amour doesn't really have the mojo to be dealing with the more famous icon of the story, and so he usually comes off as a glorified viewpoint character rather than an icon with his own stature.

There's actually zero reason for D'Amour to be involved in the story of the Cenobite mastermind Pinhead (whose movie-name I'll use for convenience, since Barker's name for him, "The Hell Priest," is cumbersome). Pinhead has a master plan to take control of Hell, and to that end, he spends a lot of time invading the sanctums of mortal magicians to plunder their secrets. One of these forays brings Pinhead into contact with D'Amour, and Pinhead hatches some contrived idea that D'Amour should be the witness of the Cenobite's grand scheme. Thus Pinhead lures D'Amour and a handful of helpers into Hell to witness his grand scheme in action. Said scheme involves the revelation that Satan, after centuries of ruling Hell, committed suicide due to his estrangement from Heaven. Pinhead uses this opportunity to steal Satan's armor, with which he can channel even greater mystical powers and thus take control of the infernal realm. However, for some obscure reason Satan comes back to life when his armor's removed, and the two demons fight. Without giving away too much, Barker seals the fate of his best-known icon here-- and I wouldn't mind that, except that Barker's Hell Priest isn't much more interesting than Harry D'Amour.

I may finally take time to read the original novella on which Barker based his HELLRAISER movie concept, but without question, Pinhead of the movies is far more famous than his prose predecessor, much less this 2015 version. The first HELLRAISER is indubitably Barker's best venture into cinema, just on the strength of his interbreeding between Hell's standard association with suffering and the new idea of demons informed by sadomasochistic obsessions. But I also admired how HELLBOUND: HELLRAISER II-- an original story not derived from a Barker story-- created a Hell with a much more impressive visual appearance. Barker may not have wanted to emulate that approach for either legal reasons, aesthetic reasons, or a little of both. But his Hell is utterly routine and visually unimpressive. 

On my movie-blog I've reviewed all eight of the HELLRAISER movies starring Doug Bradley as Pinhead. While only the first two films are better than average, all of them contribute to a fairly consistent cosmos in which Pinhead only intrudes on reality under special conditions and depends on tempting mortals in approved Satanic style. Barker doesn't abide by any particular rules in his book, much less having any deeper appreciation of the deeper myths informing Hell and, by extension, the rest of the Judeo-Christian cosmos. So his idea of a new Gospel is more like a heresy against the superior iconicity of the cinematic HELLRAISER. 

GOALS, OR ROLES?

In 2012's THE NARRATIVE DEATH-DRIVE PT. 2  I ended the essay thusly:

As a closing clarification, I am not saying that concrete goal-affects do not appear in hero-villain narratives.  Maybe the Joker sends Batman a mocking note so that Batman will come chase him, but clearly the Penguin would rather get away with the loot rather than tilt with the Caped Crusader again.  But the act of reading about Batman's struggles with both types of villains is in itself an example of an "abstract goal-affect," since the pleasures we derive from reading fiction cannot be said to promote either gain or safety in a direct relationship.

I have the general habit of recalling fragments of stuff I've written and wondering whether or not it fits into the overall schema-- which, I have no doubt, is the same way synoptic critics like Frye and Fiedler also work, since no system springs out of anyone's head a la Athena. I became concerned as to whether this statement had overemphasized the role of "goals" within the diegesis of a given story-- say, a Batman vs. Penguin story-- and had thus come into conflict with the principles stated in HERE COMES DAREDEVIL, THE MAN W/O IDENTITY:

 Daredevil is not a phenomenon with a real existence (at least not in materialistic/positivistic terms), but a fictional construct.

Ergo, neither Daredevil nor any other PURELY fictional character is subject to the "law of identity."

By that principle, the Penguin too is a fictional construct, and though he's been constructed so that he does possess what I called "concrete goal-affects" within his own diegesis, he's defined more by his "role" as a fictional construct than by his "goal" as an actual willing subject, since he isn't one. Unless one of the raconteurs working on him re-defines his roal, the Penguin is defined by the abstract affects of villainous glory than by getting gold, jewels, etc.

Parenthetically, something like this did happen at one point with the Riddler. In some Bat-universe stories-- I can only attest to a story-arc in GOTHAM CITY SIRENS-- the Riddler reforms and becomes a private detective. For all I know the character may have turned back to crime by now, but during that arc he ceased to be a villain as such, though it's debatable as to whether he then assumed the role of "hero" or "demihero."

Fortunately, a quick survey of some of my writings on "persona-types" and the forms of will they incarnate don't seem to place undue emphasis upon the diegetic motives of characters, and I see that in ESTRANGED SPORTS STORIES I did stress "role" over "goal:"

 ...it's the intent behind the narrative, not the conscious intent of the protagonist, that denotes the nature of his persona.

This observation helps me out with a related problem I've been considerering recently. I've defined the monster-persona against the hero-persona as one relating to whether or not their primary role emphasized the "idealizing will" or "the existential will"-- two terms I devised after I wrote this passage in MONSTERS, DEMIHEROES AND OTHER WILLING BEASTS, and which I've interpolated in place of the original, now outdated terms:

King Kong, Gamera and Godzilla may follow the plots of heroes in these assorted works, but I assert that in terms of fundamental character they still represent "existential will," while the not much more intelligent Hulk represents "idealizing will."

But the concept of "existential will" is harder to sell when the monsters are clearly intelligent human beings, like my sometime examples of Doctor Moreau and Victor Frankenstein. Still, I've argued that their obsessions, even if they are motivated by a desire for glory, are subsumed by the "intent behind the narrative." Unlike a genuine glory-oriented villain like Fu Manchu, the two monstrous mad scientists embody the quality of "negative persistence" as much as do big hulking monsters like Kong and Godzilla.

Similarly, because of my tendency to identity Sadean activity as examples of Bataillean expenditure rather than acquisition-- probably best summarized here-- I find myself thinking twice regarding two monsters who are very popular for their overt Sadean qualities.

The first is Freddy Kreuger of the NIGHTMARE ON ELM ST series. He's become popular, I'm convinced, not because he's a nasty child molester (if indeed that was the intention in the original series) but because he stalks and slays his victims with an imaginative panache atypical of the average slasher-monster.

The second is Pinhead of the HELLRAISER film-series. He doesn't warp his infernal domain quite as flamboyantly as Freddy does with his dream-worlds. But he incarnates the idea of suffering as Sadean glory, and so he does have a highly imaginative "ideal" behind his depradations that is foreign to most monsters.

But in both cases, the narrative's intent supersedes Freddy's snarky cleverness and Pinhead's cerebral viciousness. Their obsessions imprison them far more than do those of the great villains like the aforementioned Fu Manchu, and so I can still align them more with the quality of persistence than with glory.

Perhaps a useful distinction also arises from the concept of "paired opposites' I've formulated: to wit, "hero is to villain as monster is to victim (or, more formally, 'demihero.'"  The monster is designed to prey on a victim who is usually weaker than he, although in many cases the demihero may "step up" and conquer the monster through strength, guile, or a combination thereof. The villain may be just as obsessed as the monster, but characters like the Joker and Lex Luthor-- who make rather good comic-book parallels to Freddy and Pinhead-- are always oriented on challenging heroes, often despite having been beaten by said heroes on many, many occasions. That kind of glory may have only negative consequences, but it's still the same glory we descry in Milton's fallen Lucifer.

On a closing note, I've read that Pinhead has recently been executed by his creator Clive Barker in the world of prose. Pinhead did not appear in the last HELLRAISER film, which I have not seen, and it seems unlikely that Doug Bradley will essay the role again, any more than Robert Englund will again play Freddy, after publicly claiming that he would not do so. I personally won't mind if the characters never appear in film again--

But the crossover-loving part of me wishes that someone could engineer a comic-book meeting between Freddy and Pinhead, one worthy of their respective forms of sadistic nastiness. True, one such comic-book crossover I reviewed here  turned out awful. But the idea of a good writer managing to do justice to both Freddy's American wisecracks and Pinhead's dry Brit humor is a tempting one indeed-- though admittedly, not tempting enough to make any Faustian bargains.

MYTHCOMICS: JIHAD #1-2 (1991)

I've provided a brief sketch of the concept of JIHAD's status as one of pop culture's best crossovers in this post on my blog OUROBOROS DREAMS, which is more or less my "stuff I've been reading" blog.  This neglected graphic novel consists of a pair of squarebound 48-page books issued by Epic Comics during their creative roundelay with Clive Barker. I detailed my personal acquaintance with the Hellraiser and Nightbreed franchises on the OUROBOROS post so that I wouldn't have to explain all that here.

I'm also not going to spend a lot of time on the complicated plot and the extremely crowded cast of characters in JIHAD. As noted in the other essay, the base goal of JIHAD's plotline, as scripted by D.G. Chicester and painted by Paul Johnson, is to meld the loose mythologies of the Hellraiser and Nightbreed franchises. However, there's quite a bit more going on in JIHAD's theme than the customary cross-franchise meet-and-greet.

For one thing, JIHAD offers one of the few complex meditations on the metaphysical theme of "order and chaos." In Greek creation-myths these contrary forces are more often styled as "kosmos and chaos." The English rendition has been used by many authors, but may be most familiar to fantasy-fiction readers in its utlization by author Michael Moorcock in some of his sword-and-sorcery works, notably the "Elric" series. Though I haven't read every Moorcock work, I've found his handling of the dichotomy to be routine at best, and the same applies to similar adaptations in DC Comics' "Doctor Fate" franchise.

In contrast, JIHAD begins with a syncopated juxtaposition of images that contrast the worlds of the Nightbreed and the Cenobites as emblematic of "chaos" and "order." Yet. instead of picturing chaos as simply some sort of nasty world-conquerors opposed to the reigning hegemony, the Nightbreed embody the messy chaos of the unbridled life-force. It's violent, but also sexy in a visceral fashion.

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In contrast, the Cenobites, who practice a form of extremely violent mortification that surpasses anything that the flagellants of medieval times could have imagined, seek to impose a ruthless form of order upon their bodies and of all those within the hell of their god Leviathan. In keeping with the HELLBOUND film, the Lord of Hell is an abstract polygon-shape whose precision the Cenobites seek to emulate. Chichester takes screenwriter Atkins' conceit-- probably borrowed from similar motifs in the horror stories of Arthur Machen-- and expands upon the conceit, satirizing the attempt of all religions to impose an artificial orderliness and to restrain the chaos of life.

The force that brings the two factions into conflict is a group of inferior Cenobites who aren't satisfied to suffer under the banner of Leviathan, as is the nameless leader known as "Pinhead." These Cenobites are led by an accursed couple, Alastor and Chalkis, who urge Leviathan to allow them to declare a jihad against the resurgent Nightbreed. The true aim of this purgatorial power couple, however, is to elevate themselves to become deities in their own right and take over Hell. Pinhead opposes their ambitions, not least because such desires possess "the stench of chaos," but his many-faceted deity overrules the Cenobite leader and allows Alastor and Chalkis to make war on the monstrous Nightbreed. The villains' plans involve a blasphemous parody of the Christian host and the suborning of a Knight Templar (based on the historical Jacques de Molay). The Nightbreed fight back with both bestial fury and subtle alchemies. One of these involves bringing back a dead man to be the vessel of their long-absent deity Baphomet, who is more or less the deific opposite of Leviathan. In the Johnson-Chichester cosmos, the order represented by the Christian mythology is every bit as inverted as that of Christianity's versions of sin and suffering. Indeed, I strongly suspect that one of the creators had read his Bataille, for on page 19 of Book 1, one of the Cenobites recites an injunction from hell's holy books that is an almost verbatim reprise of a phrase from Bataille's EROTISM: "And do not deny the taboo, but rather transcend it and complete it."

I've discussed various aspects of Bataille's taboo-and-transgression formula in essays like LEAD US NOW INTO TRANSGRESSION and HOLY NUMINOSITY PART 4, so I won't comment further on this theme here. Suffice to say that whereas a lot of horror-writers, both in prose and comics, merely play at transgression, Johnson and Chichester display a predilection for physical distortions worthy of the celebrated Hieronymous Bosch.

To be sure, JIHAD is as as dense as-- well, hell. Not all readers will catch its learned references, but I'll note that my favorite is the Thomas Malory FAUSTUS quote on the last page, which offers a tragic perspective on the dedicated diabolist Pinhead; one that the extremely uneven film-series certainly never managed to articulate.