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Underground > Comic Books >

The "Hell"'s back in Hellblazer

22:37 / 09.06.03

Just wandering if anyone's reading up on Hellblazer lately with Mike Carey now as the current writer. A lot more magic lore and occult are being thrown back into the mix and Johns traveling to learn more of it just as the reader is. A big change from the Azzarello "crime" element.

I've read a few posts, mostly Azzarello bashing and if anyone here has stopped reading the title because of that then I suggest picking up anything you can find by Carey or even stopping in the Staight to Hell website for some up to date information. Mike's doing a stand-up job.

23:04 / 09.06.03

I started reading Hellblazer only after Carey took the helm. Now it's one of my regular pick-ups. I've never been a big fan of Constantine before and while this one hasn't had any compelling arcs whatsoever, it circles pretty nicely. Just waiting for a big boom soon.

Murray Hamhandler

02:57 / 10.06.03

Having finally completed my collection of the more or less interlocking Vertigo magic titles (I'm a sucker for big, multifaceted, serialized fictional universes), I'm currently reading through the lot as a whole. Only just wrapped up Delano's run on Hellblazer, but I'll toss in my two cents on Carey's run in context w/Hellblazer as a whole once I get there.

Off the top of my head, though, having only read his Hellblazer work on a month-by-month basis thus far, I have to say that, between his work there and on Lucifer he's the best thing to happen to the Vertigo universe in quite a long time (although fingers are crossed in anticipation of Andy Diggle [writer on the Lady Constantine mini]'s upcoming Swamp Thing project, as well). Which is a good thing, given that the imminent cancellation of Hunter will leave him pretty much running the show by himself (at least until the arrival of the aforementioned Swampy project, the revamped Books of Magic, whatever's being done w/the Phantom Stranger and Madame Xanadu, and the possible [and hopefully forgotten] Paul Dini Zatanna series).

Sorry. I do tend to go on about that mess.

15:03 / 10.06.03

I'm with you on the speculated new Swamp Thing title. I'm sure somethings definatly going to be in the make. I don't want to spoil anything for you but with his latest apperance in the latest Hellblazer I'm sure theirs wheels in motion.

16:20 / 10.06.03

I've been a pretty big fan of hellblazer for some time now & have totally dug Carey's work on Lucifer...

However I just couldn't get into his John Constantine... Not sure exactly why but after struggling through the first story arc (which wasn't bad)the book was just becomming less 7 less interesting. The last issue I picked up was the one where he's chased around london by messenger demons of some sort & gets his whole body tatooed for protection.

for me Lucifer took a little while to kick into gear so the same may be true for JC. Maybe I'll check this latest issue out. Swamp Thing you say? will that could be cool as I've been rereading the Original Alan Moore run.

Not to big on this Andy Diggle either. His Lady Constantine was mostly fluffy to me & I still have a major BAD taste in my eyes after that last Swamp Thing revivial...

Murray Hamhandler

19:58 / 10.06.03

for me Lucifer took a little while to kick into gear so the same may be true for JC.

Yeah, that's what I'm figuring on. I haven't been terribly thrilled w/Carey's run on Hellblazer on an issue-to-issue basis, but I stopped buying Lucifer for that very reason, only to get really into it again upon reading the trades. I think Carey works much better on big, sprawling stories than he does in monthly chunks, so I'm sure his Hellblazer will be much improved once he's got a bulk of it under his belt.

Not to big on this Andy Diggle either. His Lady Constantine was mostly fluffy to me & I still have a major BAD taste in my eyes after that last Swamp Thing revivial...

Having just read Vaughn's Swamp Thing again recently, it's not as bad as I'd remembered...but it's certainly no masterpiece. I personally thought that Lady Constantine was one of the better-written Vertigo magic universe titles in a while, so I'm much more comfortable w/Diggle handling Swampy in the future.

20:26 / 10.06.03

I think the way Carey writes is a good ability that fits into a title like Hellblazer. Most of what he's writing now all builds on continuity. His first storyline dropped him back into familiar territory with Mike hinting at what was to come. His secound arc, a much longer one, dropped John in the middle of a London gang war. Its all builing on the last issue, one by one and I'm sure everything will building itself up for an very elaborated final. Something Azzarello never accomplished, I'm afraid.

20:28 / 10.06.03

Lady Constantine was BAD. I bought the whole series, yet it was nowhere near the quality of what such a vertigo title should have been. The whole thing could really have been done in a big format one-shot. Similar to the ZANTANNA one-shot which I actually enjoyed.

20:31 / 10.06.03

Bad, really? I happened to find it quite good even though it didn't nessesarily approve to my tastes in plot. Diggle has a good hand for writing dialect, and given the ending of the last issue I would guess we'd be seeing Lady Constantine sometime in the future aswell, wouldn't you say?

Murray Hamhandler

21:04 / 10.06.03

Funny, because I thought the Zatanna one-shot was pretty crappy. Different strokes and all that...

21:48 / 10.06.03

opppssss I ment to type that

Lady Constantine wasn't BAD but bla bla bla...

Decient but not great.

As for Zantanna, The art was exquisit!!! The writting was charming. Perfectly suitable for the Charactor.

the rake at the gates

20:44 / 11.06.03

hellblazer's really picked up after carey took over, its clearly building to a big story, but still manages to keep each issue interesting, which is great considering how low the series was on the last writer, after a great start in 'hard time' it nose dived into 'good intentions', but careys really managed to bring the magic back in.

lady constantine on the other hand was crap, a bad mish/mash, rip off of moores 'swamp thing' and gaimans lady constantine in 'sandman'. the art was cartoony, the story was just a mess of other people work retold, no doubt to make it seem like theres somekind of pattern between constantine and swamp things (elementals), it just came off as plagarism, for example the way the contempory swamp thing (ye oldy) was dispatched, not only that but it took characters that were only supposed to appear once or twice and pull them in a direction they shouldn't have gone, tarnishing their early appearences with an unnessisary back story, the whole thing just screamed 'secret origin!' and 'guest appearence of swamp thing!', thats not what i buy vertigo for, pointless and crap

23:59 / 11.06.03

The Swamp Thing that was written in Lady Constantine was actually an older elemental retold in Moores "The Parliment of Trees". His name if I'm not mistaken was Jack in the Green, given to him by the locals. The origin behind that character is vauge to me, something about a farmer burning him in his crops over an affair, but I do belive it was at the same time as Johanna so it did provide beleiveabilty to me. True, I didn't exsactly like the idea of having another Constantine manipulate another elemental. It did seem like telling the same old story, and with Lady Constantine it seemed kind of fake like the pair weren't really combining well.

the rake at the gates

14:22 / 12.06.03

not to mention what happens to jack in the green doesnt seem to make sense seeing as im sure he turns up in one of the swamp thing annuals, the one with 'brother power' or what ever that hippy things was called, its in the collected gaiman stories trade, which i think has another story about jack in the green, which could be the origin of the character

17:00 / 12.06.03

The only one I'm familiar with is the one collected in Gaiman's "Midnight Dreams" collection. Its set back in England during the Black Plague. A neat little story, but I agree I didn't know what happened to him at the end of Lady Constantine. It seemed an elemental couldn't be done in so quickly, and easily.

17:03 / 12.06.03

Alright... I'm sold.

Picked up the latest issue & it has everything that I felt Carey's earlier issues lacked!!!

Thoroughly enjoyed Swap Things appearance both visually and charactoristicly. Fabulous art & a great mini-story in the frame of a larger one building up...

00:35 / 13.06.03

The pocker theme I thought was very creative. The idea at the send of the Brazilians way of bluffing was neat. I'm starting to feel, though, as if Carey is using too many magical elements. I just got done reading over the Ellis run not to long ago and I favor it as the best run even though it quite abrupt. I miss the days were magic was a tool rather than an major factor in the story. I'm starting to get tried of Constantine spouting off magical phrases to get out of trouble (ie: Black Flowers). There were other alternatives and being Constantine I'm sure he could think of them.

08:12 / 12.12.06

Bump (and possible change to summary needed?)

Seems like Andy Diggle is taking over the book from January or February. Any one still interested in this? Any one likely to go back to the book or pick it up new because of Diggle?

18:32 / 12.12.06

Probably not. I kept picking up and droping Diggle's Swamp Thing... ultimately leaving it behind. I may pick up the TPB's of the recent Hellblazer runs but I find I really haven't missed reading about this character.

21:25 / 13.12.06

The recent trades are odd. I dont know if they've finished off Carey's run. The last Carey trade ends with the amazing issue 200 special. And the next book that came out was buy the Scotish woman author (whose name escapes me) and runs from 216-