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Underground > Comic Books >

What happens when you die in The Invisibles world?

  
 
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21:16 / 09.12.02
bear with me (god I say that a lot). Ever since I've started coming here I've been illuminated on certain aspects of the comic book that I failed to grasp before. However, there is still a big issue that bugs me (well, more then one big issue, but let's not get overboard here...) I've asked this question before but never got a reply I deemed significant, so I'll toss it out again as a topic and see if that nets me a result.

That issue is: In the world of The Invisibles, what happens when you die? This is a theme that seems to come into play especially in Volume 3. Comments are made about it: "Edith being dead is like being born", "Nobody ever really dies", "You'll rise again", etc... So what happens?

Do you become a 5dimensional entity? Are you simply re-inserted back into "the game" (ie. reincarnation?) Does the massive timeworm that is you simply halt growing but still merges with the supercontext in 2012?

"Nobody ever really dies". H'mm. I take that line as meaning "you can't really die because you're part of everything else, so even if you die you'll still be alive in some sense". Or, "nobody ever really dies because it's all just a game". And no one dies in a game, right?

"Edith dying is like being born" (I may of misquoted this line, I don't have it in front of me): So when Edith dies, what is she born as? A 5D being? What happens to her time worm? Or Sir Miles? Lines like "You'll rise again" and the one I just quoted seem to indicate some type of rebirth, or death as initiation (The blind chessman says something to this effect towards the end of "Invisible Kingdom"). And when Roger dies she has the words "tommorow" and "life" near her. Of course, if we are all part of one and individuality does not exist, how could Miles as a character "rise again"?

I guess how one answers this depends on how you look at the end of the series. For example, if you look at the merging with the supercontext as a world where everyone gets exactly what they want/becomes gods/gets a blank page to create their dream world etc. (which is kinda the view I side with) or if we all become one and individuality ceases to exist as we all become one (I'm a bit more dicey with this proposition as it reminds me of Quimper's speech at the end of Black Science 2).

Bear in mind I'm not looking for definitive answers (because there are none anyway). I just want to hear different interpretations on the topic. Now, I know you all love to put your conceptual/thematical hats on for this kind of question, so if you feel you must do that okay. But please try to put some plain speaking into it, "I'm in the mood for some basic vocabulary".
 
 
Jack Denfeld
22:30 / 09.12.02
I don't know that there's any evidence to support this, but I think if you die in the Invisibles world, your body stays dead on earth, but an exact copy of your body that is immaterial rises from the dead body wearing a white robe, with a halo over your head, and playing a harp. Even if you're a bad guy.
 
 
dlotemp
22:56 / 09.12.02
Sypha - I love you and your questions. You never quit. :-)

I think it's a decent question and one that twists and turns quite a bit because it depends on your perspective of the story. Is it a book about a woman in the future who has written herself into the story? Is it a video game with multi-players? Is it simply a comic book? Answering that question helps to determine a proper response.

I think the Invisibles is a comic book (smart ass that I am) and I think Grant's cosmology revolves around the Supercontext. To sum up: no one dies because there is only one key consciousness. When a person dies, like Murray or Edith, it is simply the one consciousness discarding a personality husk, or fiction-suit if you prefer, which can be re-used in the future. This original consciousness is that of the reader, or writer, who wears the character husks as they read the story. I think the nature of the Harlequinade is a hint at this nature since they are a gestalt entity formed by everyone. Furthermore, we know that John A'Dreams was several characters in the story and twice existed in the same storyline with himself. At the very least, it is possible, based on this evidence, that a single mind could be all of the characters at once.

I'd like to add that these character husks are viral in nature though. Even when they die, or you finish the story, you remain infected by those characters to whom you are most susceptable. So they don't necessarily die even when the story ends.

just my $.02.
 
 
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02:31 / 10.12.02
That's pretty interesting. I'll have to ruminate on that.

Regarding the Harlequinade as everyone... I'm seriously considering drawing my own panel and taping over Ridgeway's. It would probably take forever to draw all the characters (and I'm not exactly the best artist) but it's such a crucial point and I feel the story is incomplete without the panel drawn that way.
 
 
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02:50 / 10.12.02
I find it odd, however, that, if a single mind is all these characters at once, that this single entity is fighting with itself. Of course, this is probably because the entity is not yet aware of itself yet (and doesn't get aware until 2012 I suppose). And according to the last issue, the whole conflict depicted in the series is a sign that the entity/larva is developing self-awareness...
 
 
The Natural Way
07:50 / 10.12.02
It's an analogy for the human condition: you fight with yrself. Don't you? The fact that distinguish we between mind and body, for a start... Dualism...blah. Memes don't necessarily agree....

If you think as Jack and Miles in the Abbey as one mind (the double headed/hermaphroditic "Baphomet" Helga refers to them as) - opposites disolved as Sabaoth descends (check the text) and the eclipse, the black sun, dawns - it's easy to understand what happens. The shell (Miles) is husked and the emerging butterfly (Jack) merges with the supercontext. "Edith [the husk] being dead is like something [the 5D entity] being born." Only one death. Only one time. Outside of time, outside of the suit, everything is simultaneous.
 
 
The Natural Way
07:52 / 10.12.02
Oh, and one more thing: the conflict implies a sense of "self" - "I" - "YOU"; "ME" "THEM".... So, yeah, it does describe an emerging consciousness. Really simple metaphysics.
 
 
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13:14 / 10.12.02
Is this what you meant by all that Westminster Abbey stuff you went on about in one of those other threads (assuming you're Runce, you seem to go under a lot of different names).

Well, I guess that finally clears up that whole "Diamond Baphomet" thing for me. I didn't know that Helga was referring to them when she said that though. But if Jack merges with the supercontext, how come he comes back out of the mirror (uh-oh I'm linear thinking again ain't I?) Is it because he needs to spread the message of the supercontext?
 
 
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13:17 / 10.12.02
Actually, you hinted you'd post your thoughts on Westminster Abbey but you never got around to doing it, I wish you would. I think I get most of it all but there's still some things I'm iffy on (Helga going on about the toilet and the black grail, for example: I know this refers to Judas and the Gnostic hylic grail but I'm having trouble fitting it into the story).

I get the merging of the opposites as Sabaoth descends, I recall Harper mentioning something about "The alchemimal marriage of moon and sun, the merging of opposites, the good guys and the bad guys" etc.
 
 
The Natural Way
13:22 / 10.12.02
Well, "Baphomet" is a cosmic principle, but, y'know, Dane and Jack appear to be embodying that principle...so...yeah, I'm pretty sure she's referring to them. I think it's Jack's role as a good little Buddha to come back and fight the good fight fr all us sinners.
 
 
yawn - thing's buddy
13:28 / 10.12.02
I'd always thought that 'Baphomet' was the name given to the head of John the Baptist.

Well, since I was 2 or 3 anyway.
 
 
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13:43 / 10.12.02
I always get Baphomet and Pan confused. Isn't Pan a version of Baphomet? And in terms of hermaphrodites and butterflys, wouldn't Lord Fanny be a better representation of Baphomet, seeing as she has both male/female qualities and her guardian spirit/totem animal is a butterfly?
 
 
The Natural Way
13:49 / 10.12.02
I think the Helga stuff (which is a bit tricky) is bound up w/ Grant's ideas about the interaction between fiction and THEREALWORLD (tm). She's creating a narrative within which to snare Miles and use as an operating system/working cosmology through which she can perform Magick. I mean, basically the cell hijack the summoning ritual: the terrible all-consuming Sabaoth emerges as the unity at the heart of the two schools. Miles, locked in hell, is devoured; Jack, Helga and Six achieve "their high reward".....
 
 
The Natural Way
13:56 / 10.12.02
The Goat of Mendes (who is kind of Pan-ish) is normally associated w/ Baphomet. Ol' goaty and Baphomet represent the unity between above and below - the basic principle at the heart of the hologram. Miles is below (the shell that is husked), Jack is above (the emerging star-being). In the end, they're different angles on the same process. But it depends where the attention is focused.
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
14:08 / 10.12.02
Sypha Nadon I find it odd, however, that, if a single mind is all these characters at once, that this single entity is fighting with itself.

But they don't all know they're one mind. And the Outer Church is cancer, good cells gone awry.
 
 
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16:12 / 10.12.02
I know that Misgendered. That's why I backed up and said that the entity didn't wake up until the year 2012, when it became self-aware.

As for Helga and the whole real world/fiction stuff, I found that plot line very interesting. William S. Burroughs wrote a lot of stuff on changing your reality through the use of fiction, and of course the topic crops up big time in The Invisibles (Robin writes herself into the story). I write a lot too and, looking over the books I've written over the years, it seems a lot of stuff I've written about has actually manifested in reality, in my own life (probably because I usually put myself or a version of myself in the books I write).

I seem to recall a scene where Helga mentions that she lies about everything and uses pictures and words to change reality or something. So she snares Sir Miles in the "web of Kali", the "cup of blood", makes him think she's Orthontochristi (sic) so he'll help hi-jack the ceremony for them... um... That cut and paste grimoire she was working on, it had a picture of a knight and a toilet, right? So she got Sir Miles to become obsessed in this whole black grail stuff and become the next Judas, sacrificing himself for the age of Horus. Very interesting.
 
 
dlotemp
22:00 / 10.12.02
Yes, that's about right concerning Helga.

Over and out.
 
 
Templar
12:28 / 15.12.02
The thing is that a lot of the stuff in the Invisibles is not supposed to be translated into other media or recepticles. It works as it is, and shouldn't be repackaged or represented, as whatever the Inivisibles is then becomes diluted through the process. A lot of the sloganing comes across like pseduo-koans - you're not meant to understand them, not meant to translate them into the level of scientific reality (x plus y minus z squard = life after death) but rather understand them on the level of mysticism, which is to hold them in your mind without knowledge but with feeling. You can't dissolve "The Invisibles" down into a package of philosophy and infered rules without making it pointless.
 
  
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