The Many Phases of Jonah Hex - The Displaced Hex

The sales on Jonah Hex was dropping and in an attempt to save the character, Michael Fleisher ventured into a realm that he himself has confessed that he was uncomfortable with, science fiction.

Jonah was thrown into the world on 2052, years after a worldwide nuclear holocaust, and even though he passed out from information overload in the first issue, Jonah did what he did best. He adapted.

Though the world was new, the carnage and destruction were still pretty much the same. Guns still had triggers, people would still bleed and things would still explode. Some (I, for one) will say that he adapted waaaay to fast, even managing to ride a futuristic motorcycle in the first issue. Jonah showed an incredibly quick knowledge of mechanics that included driving cars, melting robots, taking on an automated shooting gallery, and even using rocket exhaust to destroy a few aliens. But, this is a comic book, we only have about 20 pages to deliver the danger as well as the escape for the hero, and Hex was forced to be a quick learner.

Overall, the book was still pretty much a Western at heart. The evil railroad men became the evil corporations, gold became Soames, the roving Indians and bandits became roving biker gangs and... bandits, the stagecoach became a hovercraft, the pistol was still a pistol (something that tickled me whenever Hex would resort to an old fashioned bullet), and Batman became, sort of a Batman. It goes to show that the basis of a story is, and always will be, about a hero and a villain and what ultimately happened between the two.

As a series, I was hot and cold on the book. It was Jonah Hex and I would be buying it, pretty much no matter what. The beginning art by Texeria was smooth, clean and very cinematic. Very much like the work of Ross on Jonah Hex V2 or the Lopez work on the original run. The stories had a proper amount of melodrama that kept the same pacing as the end of the Jonah Hex run and Fleisher did a good job at introducing new concepts even though the Earth of the future didn't hold together very well when examined with any sort of close eye (New York is still standing while Seattle is a nuclear wasteland?).

I think the whole series started slipping around issue 11, with the future Batman and then we got the Dogs of War and finally the 'artwork' of Keith Giffen but it was able to redeem itself with the very last page of the very last book in one of the all-time moments in comics (and I'm including all of DC, Marvel, as well as everything that Don Rosa ever produced).

It would be a long time before we got another taste of the scar-faced bounty hunter that we could all sit back and savor. Hex, uneven as it was, was still Jonah Hex and for some folks a mediocre Hex series is better than no Hex series at all. 

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All of the above was penned way back in 2011, since then we have seen Jonah once again thrown into the future in All-Star Western 21 via Booster Gold. Jonah encountered a slew of super-folks in addition to Booster. He tangled with a version of Nightwing, Swamp Thing, Constantine, Superman, Bruce Wayne (in non-Batman garb). He ended up in Arkham Asylum in the care of Jeremiah Arkham and eventually kidnaps Arkham, guns down several of the Gotham Mutants from The Dark Knight Returns and hooks up with a curvy young woman named Gina Green.

He stops a rampaging serial killer, digs up a ton of his old hidden gold, attends a Burning Man type festival, encounters soul sucking demons, gets attacked by the Black Mercy (most recently seen on CBS Supergirl episode).

Finally, in a poor turn of judgement, Gina take Jonah to a museum exhibition of Jonah Hex paraphernalia where they both encounter the stuffed remains of old Jonah himself. Jonah storms out of the museum, goes on a drunken binge and ends up wrapping his motorcycle around a semi. Modern medicine being what it is, the doctors think Jonah's facial scarring was a result of the wreck and they completely repair Jonah's face.

Once discharged from the hospital, Jonah encounters Booster Golds again who sends Jonah and Gina back into the old west, where things go from very bad to very worse. All in all, only 8 issues and Jonah's reaction to his corpse does not take into account the end of Hex, leading me to believe that we are dealing with a Jonah from an alternate history, somewhere along here.

There have been a few other incidences of Jonah making reference to his time travel, once in The Once and Future Thing in a Justice League Unlimited episode where several members of the JLA go back to the old west. Jonah comments that he thinks they are time travelers and when quizzed as to why he thinks that, Jonah responds "I've had an interesting life."

This episode is pretty much rehashed in Justice League Unlimited #19 where Jonah once again talks about time travel and mentions that "it's complicated".

So, probably due to the lack of story-telling time, Jonah has shown to be quite adaptable no matter where he is thrown and I am wondering if, in the upcoming Legends of Tomorrow episode, we will get a Jonah that has experienced time-travel or not.

Swamp Thing #85 "My Name is Nobody"

Swamp Thing #85 Apr 1989
"My Name is Nobody"
Rick Veitch, story & cover - Tom Mandrake & Alfredo Alcala, art

During this storyline Swamp Thing is traveling backwards through time. Issue 83 had Swampy leaving WWI (heading backwards) and #84 was concerned mostly with his supporting cast, so we come into #85 with almost nothing connecting to a prior issue.

It starts off with Firehair & Hawk, son of Tomahawk riding along until they come upon a horrific sight. Dozens of horses and men have been skewered by huge throny plants that seem to have sprung up from the desert with incredible speed. Both men, appearing to be elderly happen to find one survivor...







With a reference to San Antonio, this story appears to take place in Texas. Firehair & Hawk are heading for the ranch of Lazarus Lane. Watching over the ranch is Bat Lash, Madame .44 & Johnny Thunder. They also have Superchief and nearby is a member of the Black Bison cult. Things get kinda weird when Black Bison summons a tornado that appears to be Swamp Thing and then, of course, El Diablo shows up.

I'm just gonna recap what happens in the rest of the story because this is a Jonah Hex blog, not really a Swamp Thing blog.

• Black Bison gets stuck within a tree.
• Swamp Thing is in a huge crystal in the ranch.
• Madame .44 ties up Bat Lash and take Super Chief to save Johnny Thunder.
• Firehair & Hawk find Bat Lash but leave him tied up.
• Madame .44 & Johnny Thunder kill the bad guy, releasing Lazarus Lane from paralysis, Swamp Thing from the crystal and the Super Chief rips off Swamp Things arms.
• Jason Blood has rescued Bat Lash and Lash & Hex are playing cards in a wagon.
• Oh, this story takes place on Nov. 7th, 1872 (according to Hawk.
  

More exposition follows that would be of interest to Swamp Thing fans. Sadly, Swampy & Jonah Hex do not appear together in this issue. This story, sadly, is a victim of the DC Dumping Syndrome which basically states that is a hero is time traveling he will always run into a DC hero from that time period, no matter where he is and no matter what.

In the end, Jonah Hex shoots nobody and doesn't get hurt. Yawn.