Chariots Of A Thousand Faces!

The road to 1977's Star Wars is a long and winding one and we begin it with a quick look at two "literary" sources for the show which transformed pop culture in its time and still does to this day. It's not secret that George Lucas was a serious minded, up-and-coming movie maker and the one story (maybe the only story) he wanted to tell was one which all of us live in some respect, the transformation of the child into an adult and what that means for how we interact with the big wide world. One of the works which was buzzing in the 70's was a work by Joseph Campbell called The Hero With A Thousand Faces.

It's a distillation of significant research by Campbell which describes what he calls the "Monomyth", or as it's sometimes called "The Hero Cycle". As most everyone already knows the saga of a hero in myth and in modern narrative is pretty much the same when reduced to its base elements -- a protagonist must journey towards a goal and while doing so will undergo changes which will make the achievement of the ultimate goal either successful or not. The "hero" will often get help from various sources, often magical ones and the choices made all along the path are critical to the success or failure. It's the story of a quest or the story of one's life if we cast our imaginations broadly enough. Being pretty much of the same generation as Lucas, I too fell under the spell of this book and find most of it to be quite serviceable in trying to explain stories. Some quibble with its details and consider it simplistic, but it hits the right level of buzz for me. You can readily see how such a story of heroic questing informs the storytelling of George Lucas and as the week unfolds I'll be taking a gander at his films before Star Wars. 

At the same time another pop culture item was raining down on one and all and that was the delightfully zany ideas of Erich Von Dankien who postulated in Chariots of the Gods that mankind's culture was, at least in part, a result of the influence and tinkering of aliens from well beyond the perimeters of this world. Aliens who came to Earth for ultimately unknown  reasons, but who left their mark on ancient civilizations to the extent that their coming was captured in the iconography of the that culture. The gods were not "gods" they were just advanced alien people who through use of technology beyond perhaps even our imaginations transformed and perhaps even created life on Earth.

It's a frolic of a theory and back in the day I admit to being enthralled by its romantic recasting of ancient history. Like much such stuff, it had the elegance of a one-size-fits-all solution to many a mystery. Eventually I fell away because of the way that those who have followed on after Von Daniken seem to ascribe nearly all aspects of human life to interference from space and give ancient peoples little or no credit for their significant accomplishments.

Takes this notion of a time long, long ago when in the depths of space civilizations grew and prospered and bond it with the idea of a hero coming into his own before our eyes and you have the template for a pretty rousing science fiction yarn. George Lucas thought so too.

More tomorrow. 

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The Eternals - Return Of The Gods!

When Jack "King" Kirby made his return to Marvel in the mid 70's, his fans (me among them) expected big things. We were alas mostly disappointed as he was put to work on Captain America and Black Panther. These were vivid lively stories with the zany imprint of Kirby's creativity, but lack the epic scope evident in his "Fourth World" material for DC. Despite the weirdness of Devil Dinosaur and Machine Man, nothing had the heft of what he'd attempted at the "Distinguished Competition" earlier in the decade.

Nothing that is save The Eternals.

With the debut of this new comic, Kirby tapped into a similar cosmic scheme he'd found in the realm of the New Gods. The Eternals had much in common with the inhabitants of New Genesis, a majestic heroism joined with an urbane self-awareness. But while the saga of the New Gods was about securing victory in the face of war, the Eternals were about survival in the face of possible genocide.
 

Built upon the singular notion put forth by Erich Von Daniken  in his seminal Chariots of the Gods?, The Eternals puts forth the idea that the whole of human creation is the result of interplanetary experimentation, that millennia before in the distant past mighty being descended from the heavens of deep space and using the genetic stuff found in prehistoric pre-humans fashioned three distinct "human races", only one of which was us.

Alongside us who came to dominate the planet in sheer numbers were hidden Deviants and Eternals. The former were genetically erratic creatures who were also seemingly morally limited and hidden in the depths of the Earth and the Earth's oceans, and who are responsible for many of our legends about demons and devils. They had apparently once upon an age challenged their creators the Celestials and brought about devastation to the globe.

The Eternals on the other hand were nothing less than superbeings, possessed of immensely long lives and seemingly complete control of the environment around them. They appear to be gods. Between these to opposites sat us, the humans living within confines of our limited lives and motivations.

Aided mightily by the inking of Marvel journeyman John Verpoorten with Frank Giacoia onb some of the covers, Kirby tells the story of what will happen when the Celestials, the distant gods who created us return to evaluate their work. The first issue of The Eternals lays out this scenario introducing Ikaris, an Eternal who alongside Dr.Damian and his daughter Margo explore ancient Incan ruins for clues to ancient astronauts. They find the evidence and the Damians learn their colleague is more than he seems. The Deviants, specially the Deviant known as Kro turn up to try and stop the inevitable, the arrival of the Celestials themselves who touch down as the comic closes.

In the second issue of The Eternals we finally get to see the Celestials. Kirby was a proper genius in keeping them off stage for a full month, as it added to impact when he finally get to see them.

But even then it is only the ship itself we see at first in one of the "King's" best double-page spreads for the series. Sometimes a scene given double-page status wasn't really worthy of treatment, but that was not the case in the early issues of The Eternals, only double-pagers could display the awesomeness of the Fourth Host as it descended to Earth.

Later in this second issue we meet Ajak, another Eternal and friend of Ikaris, though Ajak and his Incan squad have been only disassembled atoms for a thousand years waiting for the Celestials to return. And just as quick as that, the opening phase of this story begins to wrap up as the Deviants depart and Arishem makes his presence felt.

It is in the third issue that we for the first time see Ikaris in his true form as he and Margo Damian flee the landing zone as the Celestials begin to seal it off. Ajak and Dr.Damian along with the Incan landing crew stay behind and observe as the Celestials begin their research which will determine the fate of the world.

Drawn in a way which offers only hints of faces, the Celestials as designed by Kirby are utterly inscrutable. As Arishem takes his position to observed and render after fifty years his judgment, we are denied any hint of his disposition or inclination. The Celestials are truly alien, here to decide if mankind lives or dies and seeming not to care really how it turns out.

Meanwhile the Deviants plot to draw the whole of humanity into their misbegotten war with their alien creators. To that end, Kro and an army of Deviants prepare to invade Manhattan and inform the population that scary aliens are among them.

It is in the fourth issue that this plot takes off and Ikaris rises to battle the Deviants after having dropped Margo off with another Eternal, a beauty named Sersi who lives not apart from humanity but deep in the heart of the them, though she has a disdain for the species.

The Deviants attack and defeat Ikaris and he ends up in the depths of the ocean sealed in a great metal tube. Kro and his Deviant army pretending to be devils of ancient myth riot in the streets of New York City bringing fear to men.

Meanwhile far away Arishem still stands, implacable and aloof, observing it all.

More to come as I continue a long close look at Kirby's last great epic for Marvel.

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Chariots Of The Gods!

I'll confess that when I was a much younger man, I found the "theories" of Erich Von Daniken fascinating. It was the 70's and his ideas of spacemen having given help to ancient civilizations was frankly a thrilling one to me, awash as I was in science fiction and comics. I got his books and read the theories, but soon my college training made me first challenge his arguments and ultimately his facts. The sweep of conspiracy theories can be vast, and the pleasure of finding the "key" can be intoxicating, but life is complicated and ancient peoples weren't dummies. These two facts help me debunk his wild claims, as internally attractive as they might seem.

But for a time his ideas were everywhere and even showed up at Marvel Comics. First there was that debut issue of Marvel Preview with that magnificent Neal Adams cover. The title "Man-Gods From Beyond The Stars" left little doubt and the distinctive logo design left none at all about what the source of this fiction was. Later Marvel let Jack Kirby play in this field and he did some magnficent work with The Eternals, a concept spun out of the notions of Von Daniken. The early title of The Eteranals was "Return of the Gods" and once again that distinctive logo was to be used. But cooler heads prevailed, as DC was reviving Kirby's other "gods" and using the word "return" to boot.

I've recently seen that Von Daniken is still very much with us. A recent TV special went through all his "evidence" again and it didn't seem at all compelling to me this time. Maybe the years have added healthy skepticism. It all seems intriguing but fundamentally lame these days.

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