Invisibles 1,4
From Barbelith
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Credits
Grant Morrison (Writer) Steve Yeowell (Artist) Daniel Vozzo (Colors) Electric Crayon (Color Separations) Clem Robins (Letters) Julie Rottenberg (Asst. Editor) Stuart Moore (Editor)
The Invisibles created by Grant Morrison
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Summary
Tom and Dane muck about in the countryside, and then blow up a car. It is time to prepare for the leap from Canary Wharf. Tom gives Dane some of the blue mold to smoke and they take a lift to the top of the tower. Dane doesn't want to jump, but he does, and they both fall. Tom disappears, but Dane falls softly onto some strange grass under an odd light that changes colour. After biking around for a while he finds himself back in the real world with a note in his pocket. He goes to the address on the note and meets King Mob, Ragged Robin, Boy and Lord Fanny. They were pretending to be the hunters before. Jack agrees to join them when he hears the enemy is approaching. When the enemy arrive they find a grenade with no pin in it waiting for them. Smile.
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Characters
Jack Frost Tom O'Bedlam King Mob Ragged Robin Boy Lord Fanny Orlando
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Analysis
Barbelith
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Annotations
PAGE 1 Panel 2 The frisbee makes a red circle; paranoia or Barbelith again? [JBU]
PAGE 3 Panel 2 "...I stayed for you because I was asked. An old friend asked me." That old friend would be Edith.[JB] Panel 4 "What a long, strange dream its been." Has a Grateful Dead quote somehow slipped into Tom's endless King Lear allusions? [RM]
PAGE 4 Panels 2-3 "Our languages hypnotize us and traps us in little labeled boxes." In Invisibles 1,19, we'll learn there's a demon who confines our thoughts through the alphabet. [PV] This is also an explicit reference to theories of language propagated by author Robert Anton Wilson in some of his recent books, most notably "Quantum Psychology." [JB]
PAGE 7 The Canary Wharf building, which appears in Invisibles 1,02, Invisibles 1,03 and Invisibles 2,10 [JB]
PAGE 8 Panel 5 "Auric interference" ??? [PV]
PAGE 9-13 Jack's in the "other universe" where the Invisible College is. See Invisibles 2,6 for more information on it and the nature of the universe. [CG] Pages 9-10 This jump that Dane and Tom take is a direct parallel to the jump Gloucester took in "King Lear." Gloucester has been blinded (in a terribly manner) and now wants to commit suicide. He meets his son, Edgar, who is disguised as Tom O' Bedlam and asks to be lead over the cliffs of dover. Tom does not reveal himself to his father, as he is being hunted by his evil brother, the bastard Edmund. He takes Gloucester to the beach at the bottom of the cliff, and tells him he is standing on the brink. Gloucester jumps and thinks he has died, although he only falls a few inches. Edgar, still in disguise, revives him, and says that it has been a miracle he survived. Gloucester, through this miracle, starts to see the point of life again and is put back on the path of redemption. The building jump is mechanically similar to the jump taken by Edgar (Tom O' Bedlam) and Gloucester. This would make Dane like Gloucester. Also, Gloucester gained understanding, enlightenment, and insight (true sight), which made up for his lack of real sight. Dane's jump similarly brings him "true sight" or enlightenment. Sight is such a powerful symbol in the first few episodes of The Invisibles, both with Gelt etc. having no eyes, and the sequence where Dane gets the eyes of birds. [ZA] page 13, panel 3 The Cosmic Traffic Light turns green, but Dane pulls back from it. Was he just about to enter the Invisible College as King Mob and Robin do in Invisibles 2,6? [RM]
PAGE 16 Panel 5 This is the same room from Invisibles 1,1 where King Mob asked Ragged Robin to read the tarots [PV]
PAGE 17 Panel 1 "Big brother is watching you." From "1984" by George Orwell [PV] Panel 4 "Smile": Smile was a Neoist multiple identity, like 'Luther Blissett.' The tract 'Viva Neoism' says, "Neoists call their pop groups Smile, their performance groups Smile--even their magazines are called Smile." It seems that the Invisibles go so far as to give the name to their hand grenades [RJ] Panel 5 "School's out" is the title of a famous song by Alice Cooper. [PV]
PAGE 19 Panel 5 "It's a man's life in the Invisible Army" is a reference to the (former?) recruiting slogan of the British Army. [CG]
PAGE 20 Sex orgies and cabinet ritual power collections of the CIA and upper crust elite. In the conspiracy literature there are many references to the "sex circuses of the CIA," especially in relation to the Monarch mind-control program. These involve black magick rituals designed to generate psychic energy and fuel to power covert and magickal operations. (The same kind of thing that trapped Quimper into physical form in Invisibles 2,20 and provided "quite a feast for the governors" upon the death of Princess Di.) [JH] Panel 2-3 The blood on the table is from Orlando's acquisition of a new face. How he does it is explained in Invisibles 1,5 [RL] Panel 3 "Rex Mundi" (Latin, "King of the World") was the Cathar name for the Demiurge, the half-wit creator of the physical world and its archons (Greek, "princes"), known to the early Gnostics as Ialdabaoth. The Cathars were a Gnostic sect in southern France that was violently wiped out by the Catholic Church, which in typical fashion, then proceeded to justify such action on the necessary on the grounds that the Cathars (often ascetics) were sexually deviant heretics. The Cathars are also connected to Arcadia, the Holy Grail, and the motherlode of conspiracy theories through Rennes le Chateau and Nicolas Poussin's painting, both of which are near the very heart of Catharism in southern France. [DMD] Panel 5 Number 10 at the door is a clue that this is Downing Street, traditional home of Britain's Prime Minister. [PV] "Cabinet ritual ... up to our knees in blood and spunk" - American readers might want to know that "spunk" generally means semen. [EB]
PAGE 21 Panel 4 Myrmidons are the opponents' agents (Invisibles 1,5, page 17) [RL] The Myrmidons were the warriors of Achilles. Achilles was pissed off because his rival Agamemnon had claimed as his prize a beautiful slave who "rightfully" belonged to Achilles. The Greeks wrote a book about it. The Invisibles have just claimed their prize. [DMD] Panel 5 Notice Boy writing on the chalkboard. [CG]
PAGE 22 "The old Dane died in the fall... you can sit by his grave for the rest of your life." This is exactly what Dane is doing in Invisibles 1,23 [CGU]
PAGE 23 "Forth...mad": This is Tom O'Bedlam's last speech in King Lear as well as here. [CG]
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