Stone Walls; Iron Bars

The Black Iron Prison is the Plane of Confinement. Despite it’s name, the prison is not always as apparent as iron bars and stone walls (though it has plenty of that, carved as it was from ancient bones of some demonic titan)--its evil is more subtle than that. Restriction and imprisonment of various forms permeate it.

Portals to the plane are sometimes found on the Material Plane in the form palm-sized, rusted, black iron boxes, heavier than they appear.  Visitors to the plane describe an "outer" desert of squalid intern camps, stretched arond and inner, three (or more) dimensional Escher maze of cell-blocks, isolation chambers, and interrogation rooms.

The plane is the home (and the prison) of the deodands, a vile race sentenced to serve as the guards and administrators of the apotheosis prison as punishment for ancient crime. Demonologists have cataloged three primary castes or species of these creatures (though there are undoubtably more):

The lowest caste of deodands are tall, emaciated, scabrous creatures with frog-like mouths. Their bare skins weep a tarry ichor from numerous injection sites. They're junkies and dealers; they mix the astral excreta of despair, callousness, and resignation that oozes from the souls that fall into their hands with the bile of arthropodals that make their homes in the prison’s substructure and inject it beneath their skin. The tarry substance--and a brief respite from their paranoia in a cold, sneering high--are the result. The tar is packaged and sold (to the prisoners to be smoked or injected) in exchange for pleasant memories or dreams, or hopes--anything that defines the former self-hood of the soul. When not engaged in commerce, these tar demodands are the menials of the prison.  On the Material Plane, their shadows have the same viscous consistence as their tar, but no psychoactive properties.

The middle caste are the color of a fresh bruise.  Their limbs are swollen like blood sausages, and their tick-like bellies appear filled to near bursting, sloshing loathesomely as they waddle or fly drunkenly on ridiculously small wings. Their bloated faces are unpleasantly human-like and wear expressions of volutuous satiety, complete with drool running from the corners of their mouths and down their double (or triple) chins. Always their skins appear to glisten as if oiled; this is due to a slime they secrete.  They sweat even more when they eat, and they eat almost constantly. They fancy themselves gourmets, and there is nothing they consider so refined as dining on astral substance of souls. They prefer fatted souls, though and first expose victims to their slime.  Under the slimes influence, they become grossly corpulent. At that point, they're ready for the slime deodands who drain them to emaciation and let the process begin again. Slime deodands are torturers and interrogators in the deodand hierarchy.

The highest caste are strutting, sadistic martinets--the wardens and senior guards of the prison. They’re vaguely human-like in form, but with pale, wrinkled skin that seems ill-fitted to their bodies. They’re androgynous with bald heads and unfeminine faces, but pendulous breasts and high-pitched voices. They have a penchant for dressing in uniforms, the more elaborate the better. Sagging deodands (as they’re called) are found of searches, interrrogations, and tortures. They foster paranoid not as a hobby, or even a vocation, but simply due to their natures. Infractions are always found, and prisoners are encouraged to inform on others--but only after they themselves are questioned to the breaking point.

It’s a good thing for Prime Material Plane that deodands seldom arrive on it unbidden. Sadistic sorcerers have been known to arrange “renditions” for enemies, though the price for such a service is rumored to be steep.

Collect Call from the Outer Dark

The City is awash with weird rumors, but one of the weirdest is about thaumaturgic artifact said to be in the possession of (or perhaps possessing) the City Telephone Company. In some inner corporate sanctum (so it goes) a secret order of technician-priests performs rituals in the service of a mummified severed head.

The rumors vary as to whether the head is housed in the City Telephone Company Skyscraper (a ziggurat-like structure that’s highest tower is topped by a Tesla coil-like spire--could it be more that decoration?) or a few blocks away in the research laboratories of its parent company, Reade Telephone (confirmed to be working on advances like etheric image transmission and trans-mortem communication). Wherever its housed, the head is said to be studded with electrodes attached to the glass sphere surrounding it. Beyond the dome, the “altar” upon when the head sits is surrounded by magic wards and electrical equipment like rune inscribed van de Graaff generators. Despite the sealed vacuum that surrounds the head, the room is always filled with its sonorous babbling.

What’s the heads purpose? That’s the question, isn't it? Some think its pronouncements are coded prophecies dutifully collected and decoded by the scientists. Others believe it's some sort of extradimensional computation device; it’s vocalizations are sonic representations of binary code, ultimately describing the entire multiverse and giving thaumaturgic mastery of reality itself. Still others are sure the head's a demon from the depths of the Pit and the sounds that hold its acolytes in such thrall are a slow working spell to breakdown the walls of the material world and overturn Creation.

Some adventures have gone looking for the head. Most have found nothing but stiff security at the telephone company offices. If anyone’s ever found the head, it doesn't seem they've lived to tell about it.

The Weird Shadow Under the El

A strange and hungry shadow lurks in the City beneath the 7th Avenue El near the Grimalkin Street station. How long Has it been there?  No one can recall. Train riders prefer not to see it. They will themselves not to notice the too-complete darkness beneath the slats of the platform, insensitive to the movement of the sun or light sources.

Sometimes people go missing. Bums stumble after the glint of a forgotten bottle of whiskey in the edge to the railway’s shadow. Children follow a wayward toy that seems strangely drawn into the dark. Sometimes, lone travelers, late at night, think they here the voice of someone calling for help. or someone crying softly. People go missing, and they’re not seen again.

The Weird Shadow can be treated as a Greater Shadow with a few differences. It isn’t undead, and can’t be turned. It doesn’t travel, but instead stays beneath the El. It can mimic the voice of anyone it has heard, and reach out tendrils of darkness to grab small objects. It’s sometimes stores these in its formless substance to use as lures.

Warlord Wednesday: Savage Empire

This week, let’s take a look at Warlord’s prehistory--not the Atlantean origins of Skartarian civilization, but the origins of the series itself. Before there was the hollow world, the eternal sun, and Travis Morgan, Grell conceived of an archeologist transported back to ancient Atlantis to become ruler of a Savage Empire.

While attending the Chicago Academy of Fine Art, Grell created a comic strip called Savage Empire, born of his admiration for Hal Foster’s Prince Valiant and Burne Hogarth’s rendition of Tarzan. In 1973, Grell went to New York to try to sell the strip to a syndicate editor, but was unable to even get an interview to present it. He was told: “Adventure strips are dead.”

During that trip, he also went to New York Comicon. He left with a job at DC Comics, but Savage Empire was still in limbo. While working at DC, he pitched the idea to Atlas Comics. When DC publisher Carmine Infantino found out from Jeff Rovin about the meeting with Atlas, he wanted to hear Grell’s idea. While Infantino took a phone call, Grell had a few minutes to rethink things, and so when he pitched what came out was Warlord.

The two strips had a lot of similarities. The heroes looked something alike, and the female leads do too--they both look like Raquel Welch. In fact, the love interest of Savage Empire was named Tahnee (which happens to be the name of Welch’s daughter, also an actress, born in 1961). This Tahnee was “a lovely savage from the jungle kingdom of Valka” (perhaps showing some Robert E. Howard influence as “Valka” is the name of the favorite deity of his Atlantean savage turned king, Kull).


Raquel, "Tahnee," and Tahnee



Jason Cord, archeologist, was exploring a tomb on the isle of Kalliste (Santorini) when he was caught in the “laser-like light of a mystic jewel” and transport to the fabled lost continent. He was just in time to save Tahnee from sacrifice by the priest...Deimos. Obviously, the genetic relationship between Savage Empire and the Warlord of First Issue Special #8 is clear.

Grell relates this history and more in Back Issue #46 from TwoMorrows. Check it out and see more great Grell art.

Captain America Throws His Mighty Shield

I managed to pull myself away from SDCC to see Captain America: The First Avenger while I was out there.  My verdict: Best superhero film of the year.  It doesn't really do anything surprising, but it does what you expect it to do very well.

The film follows familiar lines, as telegraphed by the trailer.  "The formula that made a man out of Steve Rogers!'  with bits from the Ultimate Universe and the 1991 limited series The Adventures of Captain America: Sentinel of Liberty.  A few new twists have Bucky being the senior partner in their duo (at first) and Cap as a war bonds sales performer before becoming a real soldier.

The World War II period is pretty well evoked (at least for a film like this)--it was certainly more convincing that X-Men: First Class' 1960s.  True, its Hydra seemed less Nazi and more Cobra at times (in fact, Nazis seemed to have been oddly verboten in this WWII film), but by the time they're playing a major role, the story was moving along too fast for me to care.

This film had to carry the weight of all Marvel references from the previous films to get them to the upcoming Avengers movie.  It could have easily collapsed under their weight, but the script handles the cosmic cube, the Howling Mad Commandos (if not in name), and Howard (father of Tony) Stark as if they were all there naturally and not as fan service.  As always, stay through the credits for the inevitable link to the next film.

After the (slight) dissappointment (or maybe just weariness of the genre) with Thor, The First Avenger has renewed my excitement to see the team get together.

SDCC 2011: The Curtain Falls

This is my buddy Brandon in the shot he orchestrated to commemorate his Comic Con experience.  It wasn't easy to get--mainly because the ladies got a lot of attention and were difficult to get to.

I managed to make it over to the few gaming related booths (Chessex and Steve Jackson Games for rpgs).  There was also a "Cthulhu Library" booth right next to SJG which had Lovecraftian merchandise of all sorts, including games.  I picked up Kenneth Hite's Bookhounds of London, and let myself get talked into a purchase of Delta Green: Targets of Opportunity on the grounds that the hardcover limited edition is hard to come by.  This delving into Yog-Sothothery led to the stunning revelation that Brandon had never heard of Cthulhu or HPL!

Needing to patch this gap in his geek education, I encouraged Brandon to buy one of Penguin's Lovecraft collections.  Later this afforded me the opportunity to mock him, by dramatizing his discovering HPL for the first time.  He took a picture of it:

Our luck with panels wasn't very good (all the ones we wanted to attend were had too long lines), but we did get into the Immortal panel by inadvertently breaking in line.  After hearing Tarsem Singh talk about his artistic goals, and seeing more footage from the film.  I'm a bit more interested in this than I was before.

That's the Con highlights.  It was interesting comparing this year to last.  The crowds seemed less on Thursday and Friday than the previous year, and the convention floor seemed less busy, whereas the panels seemed moreso. One thing that doesn't change is that it remains quite a spectacle.  Where else can you see four slave-girl Leias crossing the street in a loose approximation of the Beatles on Abbey Road?  Alas, I was too slow to photograph that bit of quintessential con, so you'll just have to take my word for it.

Comic Con-fidential

I'm in San Deigo for Comic Con International, and again this year, the first bit of excitement centers around getting my pass.  This time, I get a text from a man who identifies himself as "Aric" who wants me to meet him in the lobby of a hotel in the gaslamp district.  After I final locate the hotel in question (which was much harder than it should have been owing to hotels and streets with almost identical names) Aric passes on the badges for myself and my friend Brandon (who always arranges these exchanges that somehow get left to me to carry out) marking us as "Professional Guests" (which amuses me to think we've somehow elevated the art of "guesting" to a degree as to actually be professional at it) and our oversized and gaudy souvenir bags that are the mark of SDCC attendance.

I thank Aric and make my way over to the covention through the crowds--and in the shadow of a giant inflatable Smurf.  Beyond that, the overwhelming message of the San Deigo streets is that I shoud play this Arkham City game because billboards are everywhere, including on the backs of moving vehicles.

Anyway, inside the convention center its the usual mixture of fairies, steampunks, and cardboard Daleks--though my impression so far is that there are fewer costumes than last year.  Ignoring the cosplay, I buy myself an $8 personal pizza and $4 bottled water and set out to do some shopping.  Several major genre book publishers are there, but they mostly disappoint me by serving up a plate of Star Wars or video game tie-in novels or fantasy with smoldering covers hinting at romance undertones.

I do see that The Thackery T. Lambshead Cabinet of Curiosities is out, though I resist buying one at that momemt.  Also Grant Morrison's history of/meditation on comics Supergods: What Masked Vigilantes, Miraculous Mutants, and a Sun God from Smallville Can Teach Us About Being Human is out, so that I quickly download it to my Kindle.  I've only read a couple of chapters, but its great. Morrison's insights into the iconic comic characters are at once exactly what everybody says, but at the same time delivered in such a way as to seem fresh and insightful.  Maybe I'll do a fuller review at some point.

Back at the Con, Heavy Metal tempts me with the latest of Jodorowsky's and Mannara's Borgia and 2000AD woos me with a Nemesis the Warlock collection, but both lose me to the wonder of an almost 3 foot long shark swimming stately through the air above our heads, its tail moving sinuously as it goes.

I'm told these are called "Air Swimmers" amd will soon be available at a toy store near you.

After that I try to go to a Batman panel.  Too long a line.  I don't even try A Game of Thrones as its line already stretches into infinite.

Maybe I'll have more patience for standing in line on Day 2...