Comical Books: 80's "Aliens Omnibus, Volume 1"

Confession: I'm an "Aliens" guy.

Not that I think "Alien" is a bad film, it just didn't blow my skirt up.¹ It has some great visuals and classic moments. But it wastes too much time on people walking down hallways and wandering through empty rooms. A whole lotta long set-ups for jump-scares that only work once. On repeat viewings, when you know what's gonna happen, it's not atmospheric. It's just boring.

My biggest beef: only ONE measly alien?! "Aliens" spoiled me rotten with an army of those jokers. Plus, it had the Marines taking 'em on. Consequently, when I finally saw "Alien," I kept shouting "Why don't they fight back?!?" Because "Aliens" taught me that when you see an alien, you blast it with a flamethrower or pulse rifle.

Which brings me to this here comic collection, which was made in the late 80's/early 90's by some other folks who favor "Aliens" over "Alien."

Dark Horse Comics was a pretty new company at the time and this was one of their earliest titles.² This first omnibus was originally released as three graphic novels, never in single-issue comic book format.

Overall assessment: It's okay.

They made a bold narrative choice in the first section: Earth gets completely overrun by the aliens and the human race abandons the planet. Then there's an alien on one of the escape ships and it turns out a super-cray-cray military guy is trying to breed the aliens to create an army that will serve only him. And in the last part, Ripley returns and fights some more aliens.

The quality varies wildly. Some panels are exquisitely shaded and composed. And some look like this.

They do a lot of cool, wide-angle stuff that just wasn't possible with the pre-CGI effects technology of the time.

There's some planet that also has dragons that's menaced by the xenomorphs.

And remember the giant Nostromo ship from "Alien," the one with this joker?

Well, unlike the convoluted creation myth hypothesis in "Prometheus" that tells us that thing was an outfit concealing a member of a proto-human race that seeded Earth with their DNA to create us...this comic tells us that thing was just a member of some random alien race.

And their motivation is to let the aliens attack us and overrun our planet so that one day we can return to Earth and reclaim it from the aliens and THEN this giant Cthulhu-elephant-looking thing will enslave all humanity in a weakened state on our reclaimed planet.

Running the long game there, man. Good luck!

Now, gotta say there are too many direct shout-outs to "Aliens." Much as I love that film, I don't love pandering. And these comics repeat several of its best lines³ and recreate several of its best scenes. Over. And over. And over.

It's at its best when it's doing completely nutty and unexpected things, like with the televangelist who starts an alien-worshiping cult, convincing his followers to sacrifice their bodies to the alien hosts.

The first two "Alien" films had strong anti-corporate, anti-institutional leanings. So it makes sense that the military leaders are evil here. But the commander who ruthlessly kills people left and right on his way to creating an army of slave xenomorphs is just too evil to be believed.

He never twirls his mustache, but he comes close.

Other nitpick- this is not what brains look like.

It looks like someone's intestines were blasted out of their forehead. That's not where intestines are stored. I've checked.

So overall- this is a neat bit of "Aliens" fan fiction in comic form. It's obviously not canon, since every narrative choice it makes is nullified by the films in the franchise that followed.

It's better than "Alien vs. Predator" but not as good as "Alien: Resurrection."⁴

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1. Plus I saw "Aliens" first. I recorded it off HBO- on a Beta cassette- and watched it exactly one gazillion times when I was six. I didn't see "Alien" until my voice cracked, so I was a bit harder to impress by then.

2. I always wanted to read it, along with "Aliens vs. Predator," but I couldn't find any issues until I was old enough to be too old for them.

3. "Eat this!" "They mostly come out at night," etc.

4. "Alien 3" I could give or take. "Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem" I saw on Christmas in the movie theater with my dad and just loved, even though it's awful.

-Phony McFakename

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Literateur: All the Sherlock Holmes

Sherlock Holmes. Perhaps you've heard of him? They made some movies and shows, I hear.

I read one of his stories as a kid and thought it would be fun to read them all as an adult.¹

Glad I did! For the most part,they hold up well and are all compelling and thrilling and enjoyable. Even when they're bad.

Also- the stories' mysteries are random.² There's no way you can figure things out on your own. There's just not enough information provided. We mostly only learn the details we need in order to put the pieces together as Holmes explains them...after stating his deduction. So it's mostly a passive reading experience- you don't get to engage with the story, you just watch it go.

Which is fair enough, as the stories mostly go great.

 "A Study in Scarlet"

Doyle hits the ground running. Holmes arrives fully formed and it's a joy to watch him work. The mystery is intriguing, the twists are twisty, the banter is snappy,³ and then the story stops abruptly halfway through and the book becomes a delusional, frothing-at-the-mouth anti-Mormon rant with no Sherlock Holmes in sight.

Yup. The murder suspect is caught with no warning and then HALF THE BOOK is a narrative explaining the entire history of the two murder victims and the murderer. Basically- a guy's lover is forced into a polygamous marriage in Utah after her father is threatened and then killed by Brigham Young and those evil Mormons. So the guy tracks down and kills the two nefarious Mormons that took his lover away and killed her father.

This book states that any Mormon in good standing in the 1850's was expected to be polygamous. Fact check: at the height of polygamy's practice among Mormons- the 1850's- about 5% of them did it. And the entire political/ social structure in Utah as depicted by Doyle is a paranoid fantasy, with armed Mormons blocking access to and from their cities, doing surveillance and reporting on each other to church leaders, and church leaders murdering or abducting any dissidents.

Doyle probably read some anti-Mormon pamphlet, thought "Seems legit," and gave it half the real estate in his first novel. The real danger of bigoted vitriol like this is not that people will believe it, but that they'll think "Well, this is just a story, of course it's not true...but stuff LIKE THAT probably happened." Wrong. Nothing remotely like anything in this story ever happened to anyone. Ever. It's nonsense. It's as accurate on Mormonism as "Protocols of the Elders of Zion" is on Judaism.⁴

Fun book, otherwise.

"The Sign of Four"

This one introduces Holmes' catchphrase, "Once you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains- however improbable- is what's up." It also puts the fact that Holmes is a junkie front-and-center. The book's first paragraph is a detailed description of Holmes intravenously shooting up cocaine. The last paragraph of the book has Holmes gleefully reaching for his cocaine bottle for solace after Watson says he's leaving to get married.⁵

No anti-Mormon stuff here, though there is some racism and xenophobia. Non-Englishmen are dismissed as "savages" and even when one of them gets a chance to explain himself, it's still depicted as the mad work of a savage.

I didn't understand what was going on during a lot of their hunting for ships and treasures- the story drifts- but there's a lot of great lines and cool scenes throughout.

And mercifully, Doyle only kills one chapter with the endless explanation/ justification story from the murderer, instead of wasting half the book on it the way he did in his first book.

"The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes"

This first short story collection is surprisingly bland. The stories all blend together with repetitious plots and abrupt, out-of-left-field resolutions.

It does have "The Adventure of the Speckled Band," one of the most renowned Holmes stories about [SPOILER!] a killer snake. That one's pretty solid.

Irene Adler, Holmes' prominent love interest in a lot of film/TV adaptations is mentioned here, but not given much to do. Which is a missed opportunity to break up the stories' monotony. She was probably expanded on in other media adaptations because people realized Holmes works better when challenged by a strong woman.

"The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes"

Things pick up here.

The stories are still kinda repetitive, but they're much more well-written and their content is more interesting. It starts with a death-by-horse and a story about an illegitimate interracial love child. The latter could have been sensationalized and presented in a racist way, but it's actually handled with care and affection. Which is progressive and impressive for a mainstream late-19th century yarn.

"The game is..." is stated at one point, but the sentence isn't finished. It's like we're being teased with a catch phrase that won't be unleashed until later books.

We meet Holmes' brother, Mycroft, here and he's cool. Holmes' nemesis, Moriarty, gets introduced and instantly dispatched in the last story. He's presented as this amazing, super-awesome, mega bad guy who controls everything...but we're not really seeing much of that in action. It's a total tell-not-show situation where we're just told how super-evil Moriarty is without any examples of his deeds. That's a bit disappointing.

I didn't know Sherlock was killed at the end of this book. That's another SPOILER, btw. This is barely the mid-point in the Holmes canon and Doyle threw him off the cliff. No way the audience was gonna let Holmes die like that, so they must've hounded Doyle on Twitter until he brought Holmes back.

"The Hound of the Baskervilles"

This is a prequel to the other books, so it technically doesn't reverse Holmes' death. Though it is kind of odd that Doyle never once mentions that it's a prequel. It's just like "Holmes died in the last story. Uh...Here's another one."

This one's pretty good, though. Solid mystery with layers of intrigue and a Scooby Doo-esque ending. Also it's nice to take a leisurely ride with one single case instead of the onslaught of formulaic cases in the short story collections.

Watson makes a trenchant observation in here that sums up my main beef with all the Holmes yarns:

"One of Sherlock Holmes's defects- if, indeed, one may call it a defect-⁶ was that he was exceedingly loath to communicate his full plans to any other person until the instant of their fulfillment."

Dead on. We're left in the dark as an audience about way too many details and then we're hit with an avalanche of revelation as Holmes unveils the solution.

Substance abuse note- Holmes smokes in one scene, but doesn't do any heroin or cocaine. So that's progress.

"The Return of Sherlock Holmes"

Here, Holmes proves he was about as dead as a Marvel Comics superhero.⁷

Turns out Holmes didn't even fall at the Falls. He used "baritsu"- the Japanese system of wrestling- and escaped Moriarty before Moriarty fell, alone, to his death.

Eh. I could have bought that Holmes maybe survived the fall and went into hiding to recover and reemerge stronger than ever,⁸ but retconning it so that Holmes didn't even fall is lame.

In fun news, Holmes finally says "The game is afoot" in here. He goes to a Red Bull pub where I presume they only sell super-caffeinated beverages. And the last story mentions that Holmes retired to do bee farming. As you see, this article is not over yet, so you can guess how that whole retirement thing went for Mr. Holmes.

"The Valley of Fear"

For whatever reason, this is another prequel novel. Doyle already resurrected Holmes, so it's odd that he chose to write a pre-"death" mystery. I guess because he wanted Moriarty to play a part and you can't do that with Moriarty dead.

But Moriarty is- AGAIN- an off-stage presence. We still get nothing but hints of his power and menace. He's allegedly behind plots in the book, but it doesn't matter because there's no showdown and we never get Moriarty's side of the story. It's like another Marvel phenomenon- in their movies, they seemed almost afraid of using a villain other than Loki.⁹ Doyle's re-use of "Moriarty's criminal genius is behind it!" feels like he was just too lazy to introduce a new villain.

Story's okay. The first half, at least. This has the bit where they try to decipher a code and figure out what book it's in and that's all fun. Like "Study in Scarlet," it cuts off halfway through and gives us a lengthy backstory for the mystery. But it's not a very interesting backstory. Inflammatory and deluded as "Scarlet" was, its backstory was compelling. Here- it feels like it stopped a fun mystery cold in order to make room for a mediocre mining town potboiler.

"His Last Bow"

I'm still reading these at this point because I'm almost done. It's becoming a chore. Another set of by-the-numbers mysteries.

"The Casebook of Sherlock Holmes"

So this is his real last bow.¹⁰ Holmes' charms wore off a couple books ago. It feels like Sir Doyle was phoning it in here to appease fans. Doyle's introduction to the book is loaded with barely-concealed venom against an audience that kept demanding more Holmes yarns.

Some cool stuff, though. There's a vampire story and one story told from Holmes' perspective. And some cool quotes:

"I am a brain, Watson. The rest of me is a mere appendix."

"Come at once if convenient - if inconvenient come all the same."

"Rubbish, Watson, rubbish! What have we to do with walking corpses who can only be held in their grave by stakes driven through their hearts?"

And that's all.

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1. Which is actually doable, since all of the Holmes stories together are about the length of an average epic fantasy novel.

2. Having a sloppy mystery is a notable weakness for a mystery story.

3. Holmes name-checks and explains why he's more awesome than every literary detective that preceded him. His diss on Edgar Allen Poe's detective fiction is a particularly nice zinger.

4. Also Wikipedia says it got banned from a school in the town where I currently live. Gross as the book is, I'd never try to stop someone from reading it. The best way to counter lies is more truth, not repressing the lies.

5. Holmes gives Dr. Rockso a run for his money in this tale.

6. One may.

7. Writers are paid to write, so they have to be pragmatic. If there's money to be made with a character, he/she will never be left for dead.

8. Doyle was leaving Holmes awfully open to the possibility of a resurrection by not mentioning any body being found, so hey.

9. Loki was the bad guy three times in a row and, in fairness, no villain has been as cool. So- stick with what works?

10. That would have been a better title for this one- "His FOR REAL THIS TIME Last Bow. Really. We Mean It."

-Phony McFakename

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Literateur: "Return of the Living Dead"- The Movie Version!

This is complicated, but stick with me.
John Russo co-wrote "Night of the Living Dead."
He and George Romero shared sequel rights.
So George Romero made "Dawn of the Dead" and John Russo wrote "Return of the Living Dead."
Romero's movie was perfect. Russo's book was wretched.¹
When Hollywood adapted "Return of the Living Dead," they scrapped the book and made a totally different movie with the same title.
When it came time to release the novelization of the movie, John Russo- the author of the ignored original novel- wrote it.

Yes, this is all as crazy and tangled as it sounds.
I read the original ROTLD ("Return of the Living Dead") novel way back when, but as soon as I discovered there was a Russo-written novelization of the film, I wanted to smell this fart for myself, so I got it via inter-library loan ASAP. ²
I assume you've seen the 1985 ROTLD movie. If so- skip this paragraph. If not- you have my permission to read this paragraph. Movie plot: two schmucks in a medical supply warehouse accidentally release a chemical that brings the dead back to life. These zombies aren't all-out cannibals, they just want to eat your brains. And they tell you so. And they're fast. These things coordinate their attacks, impersonate police officers, and trap their victims. Things escalate quickly and our main characters and a group of punk kids end up under siege in a mausoleum and it ends very badly for everyone. Grim as the plot is, it's zippy and off-the-wall, with lots of physical comedy, classic lines, and great effects. Noteworthy- this is where the notion that zombies want to eat your brains came from.
Now back to the novelization. Well...

It's bad, but there's some neat stuff in here. The two main characters, Tina and Freddy, are actually given a back story that gives their relationship some resonance which is lacking in the film.
In another departure, the first resurrected zombie is attacked with an axe to the face while it's lying prone in a metal freezer drawer where it seems harmless and then it leaps up, pulls the axe out of its face and attacks, actually managing to bite one character's character in the face. Nice moment.
The zombies don't just go after brains in the novelization- they bite necks and rip out organs. It says that blood and other human body parts are slightly soothing to their hunger, but only brains fully sate them.³
One of the paramedics who arrive early on is a Vietnam vet who uses his judo skills to kung fu the zombies before he's taken down by a big fat one.⁴
The undead-infested cemetery gets flooded and is turned into a giant quicksand-like mudslide swamp with puddles of rain that burn to the touch, creating a "the floor is lava!" scenario. The punks leap up on tombstones to avoid touching it, adding a level of menace to the already-menacing zombies.
And the corpses that are getting embalmed in the morgue leap up and attack. That's low-hanging fruit and it's odd that the film just let those sleeping corpses lie.⁵
That's about it. For the most part, the book's a turd. The awkward descriptions and clumsy narrative choices are jaw-dropping. A scene where ex-Soviet spies sit around and twirl their mustaches and basically say "It's been 14 years, so those barrels we secretly planted in the U.S. should be accidentally cracking open and unleashing the zombie plague on the capitalist pigs ANY TIME NOW!" at the same time that the barrels ACCIDENTALLY break open? Nope.⁶
Plus Russo's stiff Christianity-obsessed, 60's slang-infused style is really really not a good fit for the movie's madcap, anarchic, very-80's, very-punk material. It's neither hep, groovy, nor a good trip.
Behold some examples of the book's literary prowess:
“Man, I don’t dig you undertaker cats!”

“This place is a stroke!”

“Hey, you’re a groovy chick with everything going for you, so play it cool and stop freaking yourself out.”

”If they could agree to forget about the ghouls outside for a little while, it wasn’t a half bad setting for romance…Chuck was scared, but not that scared. His horniness was overriding his scaredness.”

“Her ability to love was tainted by her torment over whether it was truly worthwhile to love someone for a brief interlude on the way to the grave.”

“That friggin’ ghoul lady laughed at us while we were burnin’ her up! She didn’t care diddly squat!”

“’Oh…the poor creature!’ Tina wailed, stunned by the depth of his love- that he would sacrifice himself to save her even as he was turning into a monster.”

“’It ate Suicide’s brain!’ “‘That’s why it’s still hungry,’ Meat joked. ‘It didn’t hardly get enough to eat.’ Nobody laughed. ‘Suicide’s brain would barely be an appetizer,’ he added, but still nobody dug the humour.”

“’I know it sounds crazy, but there are mobs of-of cannibals down there!...Our men have been murdered by bloodthirsty, ravenous, fiendish assailants- perhaps mutants of some sort-or-or-or robots-or creatures from another planet!’”

“’Either hit me with some logic, or phone somebody else, buddy- like a shrink or a funny farm, maybe!’”

“Haircut! Like, nobody tells me how to cut my hair!”

"Man, anybody who bops on out there on his own is a real queeb.”
Four stars.

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1. I won't go into detail on the original ROTLD novel here, but basically- a little zombie outbreak happens in rural Pennsylvania and not much happens. There was a school bus and a mausoleum and a lot of bad writing. If you want a longer explanation of this whole story and a solid analysis, check this: http://cinemachine.blogspot.com/2012/04/dan-obannons-return-of-living-dead.html
2. I guess Russo signs library books, too?

3. It's possible Russo just inserted this not-only-brains idea to make the zombies more in line with what he and Romero created in "Night of the Living Dead."

4. In the movie, the paramedics are redshirts that get taken down without a fight.

5. Maybe the director realized that the corpses in the morgue weren't actually hit with the resurrection gas or the contaminated rain, so it didn't make sense? Fair enough, but it's still a nice cheap shock gag in the book.

6. In fairness, that's probably scripter Dan O'Bannon's fault, since that's a dumb idea he put in the script, not something Russo wrote originally.

-Phony McFakename

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Legal disclaimer: Me am on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and YouTube and even Pinterest if that's your thing. And me books am on Amazon and Barnes & Noble and Kobo and probably some other places, too.

Literateur: All the "Elric" by Michael Moorcock

Doom. Blood. Fury. Sorcery. Drugs. Decadence. Dead Gods. Doom. 

Elric of Melniboné is an incarnation of Michael Moorcock's "Eternal Champion," the mythical character unifying his life's work. And he's a mess.

Elric is a red-eyed, white-haired albino prince, strung out and dependent on herbs and drugs. In a world where Law and Chaos fight for control, Elric is a wild card. He has a black-bladed sentient sword, Stormbringer. This sword eats the souls of the people and creatures it kills. Total brutal.

Elric lives in the dreaming capital city Immyr. Its citizens are far beyond decadent. They've lived so long and done so much, they wonder why they bother with anything.

Everyone is up to something and everywhere there's some weird cultural or religious thing going on. As Elric explores his world, seeks the MacGuffins, and quests the quests, Moorcock keeps the scenery vibrant, the atmosphere dark, and the action intense. Almost never a dull moment.

And the major element that sets this apart from Tolkien-esque heroic/high fantasy is the unsympathetic protagonist and his narrative's crooked arc. Elric has moments of introspection and kindness, but he's mostly amoral and constantly compromising with evil.¹ And he's not seeking objects or journeying to find glory or bring peace to his kingdom. Elric's quest is a doomed one and he's never fully able to escape the knowledge of his bleak fate.

The books were written totally out of order.² They started in the early 60's and continued for decades. I'm not gonna review by publishing order, I'll review them in the order of the stories' events, which I recommend as the best way to take this dark ride.³

If you like gritty or well-written fantasy, you will not be disappointed. Unless you demand f-bombs, which Moorcock keeps out of this particular series.

"Elric of Melnibone"

Great start. Elric sits on his huge ruby throne overseeing a kingdom due for a shakeup after centuries of stagnancy. And then his cousin starts some trouble. Elric trades his drug addiction for a sword addiction as his soul-sucking blade, Stormbringer, starts to share its power with him. Every chapter is a new adventure and they're all vivid and compelling. A wild ride through a mad world.

"Fortress of the Pearl"

A major tonal shift, as this was written 20 years after the previous tale. Makes good use of the villain-poisons-the-hero-to-force-him-into-service-in-exchange-for-the-antitdote trope. Elric seeks the pearl at the heart of the world and gets trapped in a cosmic dream dimension where we start to understand the nature of Elric's reality. A bit overlong, but very colorful and intense.

"The Sailor on the Seas of Fate"

Elric's blade first betrays him here as he takes a pleasure cruise of doom. We get some time-shifting, for good measure. As one reviewer put it, Elric cements his status here as a "Non-Hero," which is trickier than the more common "Anti-Hero." Moorcock triumphs by taking a character with unclear motivations on a doomed quest and still making him interesting.

"Elric at the End of Time"

In what amounts to an afterthought to the series,^3.5 Elric finds himself crossing paths with other Moorcock incarnations of the Eternal Champion. Lotsa cool high-level cosmic metaverse stuff going on. Short and vividly written.

"The Dreaming City"

This is the big one right here. This story is only 30 pages long, but it changes everything. Elric returns home, tragedy ensues. His beloved [SPOILER DELETED] when his sword violently betrays him by [SPOILER DELETED] and then his entire city [SPOILER DELETED]. If you're impatient, you can get the full scope of Elric's story by reading "Elric of Melnibone," this story, and "Stormbringer." That's the tragic beginning, middle, and end.

"While the Gods Laugh"

"I am an evil man, lady, and my destiny is hell-doomed, but I am not unwise, not unfair." Boom. Elric is pulled out his funk from the last story's events by a quest for the Dead Gods Book. Mucho metaphysical. Also we meet Elric's companion, Moonglum, and there are flying attack monkeys like something out of "The Wizard of Oz."

"The Singing Citadel"

Elric takes on a missing persons case in this comparatively lighthearted romp. We also meet Elric's sorcerer nemesis here, a guy with a nonsense first name and apostrophes all over his last name. That kind of name is mandatory in high fantasy these days, but I'm pretty sure it was new and unique in Moorcock's day.

"The Sleeping Sorceress"

Pulpy, vibrant, full of blood and iron. Zippy short chapters keep the doom-haunted protagonist's story rocking along. Elric's soul-hungry sword swallows a demon, nearly overdosing Elric on the demonic power it absorbs. He later kills even more powerful and more evil creatures, filling himself to the brim with demonic energy. He ends up taking on an entire army single-handed with the power of his sword, overwhelming his blade's soul storage capacity after a few hundred casualties. Gotta hate it when that happens.

"Revenge of the Rose"

Elric rides a dragon this time out. Some fun stuff, but this one drags. It shows that it was written three decades after the earlier books. It's the work of a more mature, thoughtful writer. The paragraphs are longer, there's more multiverse meshing, and people talk more than fight. All well and good, but once the MacGuffin goes into play in the first chapter- Elric has to find his father's soul- the book ignores that driving plot device until almost the very end. Feels scattershot. Like Moorcock had some things to say and this happened to be the book he said them in.

"Stealer of Souls"

And we're back. This one and the next two are fast, mean, and punchy shorts written in 1962. Elric gets caught between scheming merchants and a manipulative wizard and loses his legendary blade in the process. Mucho mayhem ensues.

"Kings in Darkness"

If there hasn't been enough doom for you so far, this story features the Doomed Folk. Doom, doom, DOOM! An evil king gets resurrected and Elric finds himself helpless to defeat him. Neither his sword nor magic are any help. Will he be able to overcome?⁴

"The Caravan of Forgotten Dreams"

Elric gets a couple pages of domestic bliss⁵ before getting yanked into an epic conflict with a conquering warlord. He ends up riding a dragon at the end and blasting the entire invading army to ashes with dragon fire. Not too shabby.

"Stormbringer"

A wonderfully grim, cataclysmic grand finale to the tale. Chaos has taken control of the world, turning the ground to dark mush and the inhabitants to mangled mutants. Evil armies march, dragons scorch the skies, and so many main characters perish, even Joss Whedon would be upset. Lots of great revelations, such as the truly doomed fate of Elric and his entire world, along with the true identity of his cruel and soul-devouring sword. Best part was this exchange, abridged here:

“The earth’s history has not even begun. You, your ancestors...you are nothing but a prelude to history. You will all be forgotten if the real history of the world begins...We are all of us, gods and men, but shadows playing puppet parts before the true play begins...Elric...Keep the swords and all of us will be as we had never existed.”

“So be it.”

“We shall be obliterated!”

“Good!”

Brutal and totally satisfying.

* * *

1. And unlike George R.R. Martin's characters, Elric never gets so bad that we lose interest or disengage. Moorcock can write an interesting, flawed, sometimes evil protagonist without throwing rape into every chapter.

2. You could say the books' publication history is "chaotic neutral."

3. There's a new softcover "Elric" reprint series that looks great and is filled with bonus features and essays...but it prints the stories in the order they were written, not according to the story's chronology. So with this new series, you would read the grand finale to Elric's story before even reading the story that introduces Elric and his world. It's all very confusing, so I recommend you follow my example and read the tale, complete and in order, in these two volumes:

Pretty cool that he got a J.G. Ballard blurb on that first cover, but it says "Shows Moorcock a worthy successor to Mervyn Peake and Wyndham Lewis." I have no idea who either of those people are. You? (UPDATE- I got books by both of those authors from the library, so I'm looking into them...)

3.5. Only available in a tiny paperback collection that contains this story and a bunch of scattered, mostly mediocre Moorcock non-fiction and juvenilia. So it's fun but skippable.

4. Yes. Yes, he will.

5. Elric also gets free from his addiction to his demonic sword by snagging some heavy-duty vitality drugs.

6. Bonus footnote- Moorcock wrote another Elric trilogy in the 2000's- "The Dreamthief's Daughter," "The Skrayling Tree," and "The White Wolf's Son"- but I'm gonna skip 'em here. Most Elric collections leave them out of their chronology, I'm already perfectly satisfied by how Moorcock wrapped up the character's fate in "Stormbringer," and I tend to be not-so-crazy about Moorcock's more recent output, so I'm guessing I'm better without those books in my brain. If I ever do read 'em, though, you'll be the first to know. Stay tuned!

-Phony McFakename

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Legal disclaimer: Me am on Twitter and Facebook and Instagram and YouTube and even Pinterest if that's your thing. And me books am on Amazon and Barnes & Noble and Kobo and probably some other places, too.