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Underground > Comic Books >

7 Soldiers: Frankenstein

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Yotsuba & Benjamin!

15:56 / 26.04.06

See, that's my problem though. How does he get OBYL? How does the whole STORY get OBYL? Maybe SS#1 will contain the rest of Frank's message to SHADE and clear this up. In June.

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

16:13 / 26.04.06

CONGRATULATIONS, CASSANDRA! IT'S OFFICIAL!

Battle For Bludhaven #2.

SOME LADY: So, this year's look is Colonel Sanders, Time?

Everyone congratualte Cass for such astute hypotheticizing.

16:27 / 26.04.06

Oh really?

Yay! Thanks Benji! I seem to finally be getting the hang of this comic book precognition thing.

Hallo, Paper Spaceboy

16:39 / 26.04.06

I get to go get Franky in an hour! Whee.

16:59 / 26.04.06

So, questions...

1. The Ultramarines didn't succceed in their efforts, but instead released "medicine" into Nebuloh's egg state to make him "small". Could someone extrapolate that for me?

2. Bride dropped into NYC's streets, hopefully running into Guardian, Miracle, and Klarion. Zee's still on the west coast, so's Alix. But Ystin had a cameo in Frank 4! So there may be another timetravel smuggler in Castle Revolving.

3. Frankenstein didn't exactly "die" the way all the otehr soldiers did in his fourth episode. Ystin is a woman, Guardian gives in to hero work and bosses his boss around, Zee meets dad on the other side, Klarion saves his people by using the Horigal spell, Miracle escapes Omega, Alix quits... Frank joins S.H.A.D.E., instead of being alone? How do others see the final issue turnabout for him?

4. What was that thing, an altar? That Nebuloh was next to eating a pegusus?

Hallo, Paper Spaceboy

18:56 / 26.04.06

Cass - I betcha bean dip to boron that there altar's the final resting place of Wing, the original Dead Soldier of Victory. He was, I believe, buried in Tibet and that looks to be where Franky's been sent, yeah?

DEAD SEXY. I loved this whole thing. "Can you imagine...Frankenstein in Fairyland?" Le sigh. Yes!

The time-travel routine didn't read too difficultly for me, actually. Frank teleports to SHADE base and gets a new arm, then to Arizona. He gets up aboard one of the Sheeda Anti-Monoliths and rides to the Future. And: "There is a flaw in me!" I think, utterly, that Seven Soldiers #1 is going to end with Neh-buh-loh's final maturation.

Incidentally: #1 is the alien invasion of the body snatchers. #2 is Frankenstein, Warlord of Mars. #3? #3 is the post-apocalyptic arms race biohazard. #4 is the time-travel epic. Sci-Fi keystones as sliced from Frankenstein's sick flesh.

More soon, but sexysicksexygoood.

19:07 / 26.04.06

I'm still processing the issue, but if you have specific questions, I can try to answer.

19:13 / 26.04.06

Papers:

#1 Pestilence of the body snatchers

#2 War on Mars

#3 Famine as water turns men mad, bad, while Frank gets sad

#4 Death of hero's old ways... Frank is no longer a self-styled executioner, but an agent of a higher power, who doesn't attack head-on, but instead attacks around the enemy.

19:16 / 26.04.06

Internet download = bigger picture. Something we hadn't seen since Helen Helligan. RIP

Hallo, Paper Spaceboy

19:24 / 26.04.06

Cass: #4 Death of hero's old ways... Frank is no longer a self-styled executioner, but an agent of a higher power, who doesn't attack head-on, but instead attacks around the enemy.

Almost like a soldier. Frank is a soldier for an organization, the Guardian builds his own little army, Zatanna pulls herself out of the reserves and into the big leagues again, Klarion declares himself a soldier. Shilo escapes a cosmic "Prisoner of War" camp, Shining Knight is still a knight, and only Alix refuses to take up arms...

19:27 / 26.04.06

HOLISTIC WORLDVIEW

An elegantly balanced system of interlocking forces. Universal holistic system, holons/waves of integrative energies; unites intuition with knowledge and emotion with reason; multiple levels interwoven into one conscious system. Universal order, but in a living, conscious fashion, not based on Witchperson external rules or the group bonds of the New Gods. A “grand unification” is possible, in theory and in actuality. Involves the emergence of a new spirituality as a meshwork of all existence. S.H.A.D.E. thinking uses the entire spiral; sees multiple levels of interaction; detects harmonics, the mystical forces, and the pervasive flow-states that permeate any organization.

TURQUOISE MINDSET
Experience the wholeness of existence through mind & spirit.

• Focused on a global holism/integralism, attuned to the delicate balance of interlocking life forces.
• Synthetic and experiential, emerging focus on spiritual connectivity.
• Work must be meaningful to the overall health of life.
• Feelings and information experienced together, enhancing both.
• Able to see and honor many perspectives.
• Structured in multi-dimensional ways.
• Conscious of energy fields, holographic links in all walks of work and life, urge to use collective human intelligence to work on large-scale problems without sacrificing individuality.

19:29 / 26.04.06

What I thought was defining was Frank's declaring that he was taking Gloriana back for "judgment". Normally, I think he'd just set her on fire or something.

21:14 / 26.04.06

1. The Ultramarines didn't succeed in their efforts, but instead released "medicine" into Nebuloh's egg state to make him "small". Could someone extrapolate that for me?

Perhaps they instilled an appreciation for beauty in him. They may have been flawed but they were that universe's only heroes. Presumably the Ultramarines encountered organisms and societies with-in that infant universe. There they inspired that awe and hope that heroes are supposed to inspire. This may have effected the collective consciousness and history that sums up Nebuloh and is manifest in an appreciation for Misty. Maybe she reminds him of the Squire.

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

21:18 / 26.04.06

AH HA!

I figured it out. (Study your comics carefully folks!) On that two page spread when Frank arrives OBYL, I had assumed the person he had by the throat was Gloriana herself. On closer examination, you can see the leash for the Fly-Mount in the Sheeda's hand. So it was just a random soldier Frank killed upon his arrival OBYL. And it makes sense for him to be able to make it there, what with all the Castle Revolving stuff everywhere and SHADE's new Government Funded Budget. I had assumed it was Gloriana herself, which made things very very confusing considering the next several pages.

Phew!

21:28 / 26.04.06

I wonder... was the message the Bride was getting the same one Frankie was sending at the end of thie issue?

BTW, when he stabbed Ne-Bu-Loh with the spear, he was quoting Paradise Lost.

22:31 / 26.04.06

isn't it lovely how in every issue frankie is presented with all these moral nuaces, tragic villians and pleas for empathy and understanding and every issue has the same punchline. ie; FRANKENSTEIN DOESN'T GIVE A FUCK.

neb-u-loh is all ' ooh i'm so maladjusted, undone by beauty and inner turmoil am I " and frank just shoots him in the fucking face. your lame excuses and postmodern rationalisations will be your epitaph.

it's almost like an antidote to every pollyanna silver age comic and poor imitator therof that's ever been. in any other comic they'd try to rehabilitiate, arrest, defuse or undo the poor fucked up sheeda and their evil doings. but here frank just kills them all and wrecks their whole society, while all the usual comic book moral bollocks is just lost on him. the fact grant keeps putting it in and frank keeps saying he doesn't fucking care is a pretty clear statement of theme, all right.

it sure is fun to watch grant 'the king of pacifist superheores' morrison tell himself to shut the fuck up.

22:41 / 26.04.06

That's quite a reading. I seriously doubt that Frank "doesn't give a fuck", more like Frank is dooing what he can to ensure what he cares about survives. Sometimes some brutality and murder is called for.

I see Frank as an officer of The Fist.

22:51 / 26.04.06

Regarding Father Time...

He's a bastard in the latest Battle for Bludhaven. I regret buying the mini, I know, but still! FT there is all: the weak poor are killing my country! And kill the Justice League.

Weird.

22:56 / 26.04.06

oh i fully agree, although it isn't ever entirely clear what it is that frankie does care about, besides making hammers fall like rain on anyone who tampers with his understanding of innocence.

i mean it goes so far as frank at the end of time, passing judgement on the last humans left, and finding them wanting.

I'm not implying he's absent of morality either, it's just pretty damn clear that his implementation of it is totally devoid of postmodern sentiments of socially constructed evil and empathetic interiority and all that politically correct shit.

frankenstein is kinda like the post-postmodern superhero comic, where yeah we are made to understand everyone's got thier own perspective and all that, and yeah everyone's sympathetic in some way, but sometimes evil is still evil and deserves a good shitkicking.

it's mostly the quite obviously delibrate juxtaposition of elements that tickles me is all.

23:02 / 26.04.06

post-postmodern. Yeah, I can get with that.

23:14 / 26.04.06

Post-mortal, even

23:22 / 26.04.06

postmortem?

00:13 / 27.04.06

Mr Tricks, I think you're spot on - the 'medicine' the Ultramarines introduced into Neh-Buh-Loh was love, Compassion, The Life Equation.

He couldn't reconcile the schism, and so our little Nebula Man could never grow up. Tada!

(Mhwuuiiielmeth=Melmoth)
(Errhiachnnon=Ariachnon? Arachnid derivation)

Cue Gloriana's rationale for the creative and emotional stripmining techniques we see in comics that Morrison's referenced before (see the 'Hush' arc of Batman, associated comics, relentless 'Best Of' mentalities that forage no new ground). Easily juxtaposed with humanity's own stripmining of the past for meaning, raiding 60's/70's/80's culture for identity, dead-end spiritual behavior that believes there is nothing new or good under the sun, Hollywood-topsoil obsessions with 'Kabbalah'.

Black flowers powered on CFC's and Red Sun Energy. Waiting for them to show up in ASS.

Frank has grown up. He's joined up with something larger than himself, making a kind of peace by partnering up with his ex.

More importantly, he's finishing the work that his father started - at the end of the issue he's at the helm of Castle Revolving, the Sheeda Flaghsip, stopping Gloriana's plot to destroy the mankind Melmoth grew fond of, and that Frankenstein has seen fit to protect and decided not to mete vengeance of his own doing on the Sheeda Queen, but to retrieve her and return her to face trial for her actions.

Gorgeous cover, if a bit of a tease for hot monster-on-monster action that we have to wait til 7S#1 for.

00:21 / 27.04.06

It's also pretty definite now that JLA-Classified: Island of the Mighty is/was the real-deal Chapter-0 of the 7 Soldiers saga. Solid prequel.

Making it more of a travesty that they still have no plans to put the thing in trade...

00:44 / 27.04.06

Errhiachnnon = Rhiannon, I think. AKA Misty.

00:47 / 27.04.06

Oh, and one etymology of the name is "Maid of Annwn".

Hallo, Paper Spaceboy

01:35 / 27.04.06

vajra: I'm not implying he's absent of morality either, it's just pretty damn clear that his implementation of it is totally devoid of postmodern sentiments of socially constructed evil and empathetic interiority and all that politically correct shit.

But how postmodern is that empathy? Big Bad Daddy Heroes have been saying FUCK YOU to compassion since the '80s and all those "grim and gritty" postmodern deconstructionist epics. Frank in fact goes against what Superman said to the Ultramarines in JLA Classified #3, the quote of which escapes me at the moment (the bit about the world of time travel and jet-apes) - in a lot of ways, what appeals to me about Frank is that his reactions to the world are at times as sick as the sickness he's responding to. He was created by Melmoth, part of the problem, he is flawed as much as Neh-buh-loh.

Keith, like a scientist

02:08 / 27.04.06

So is everyone else reading that Ystin went OBYL as well? You can see her crouching in the shadows at Miracle Mesa as Gloriana is making her preparations to travel forward in time. Then when she is taunting Frankie, she says something about wanting a "pair" of undead soldiers at her side... it's possible that SS#1 is going to show us Gloriana battling Ystin OBYL just before Frankie shows up.

anyway, this issue was like Seven Soldiers orgasm. Oy. Now I need to find that chronology of issues some of you worked up and read this whole series in proper order before SS#1 comes out.

Keith, like a scientist

02:11 / 27.04.06

But Ystin had a cameo in Frank 4! So there may be another timetravel smuggler in Castle Revolving.

Ah, sorry, Cass, I missed that sentence you snuck in there.

Also...I was getting a serious Matrix "real world" vibe off of OBYL. Is it possible that GM is working out a little angst on his immortal foe?

02:29 / 27.04.06

the difference between frank and some of the grim and gritty postmodern superhero comics is that the former typically contain a deconstructed conflicted anithero chewing up unsympathetic cyphers to the tune of interior monolouge expressing overwrought turmoil, while conversely, frankenstein is utterly unconflicted in any way, and chews up slightly postmodern deconstructed villians who all try to challenge his sense of moral clarity.

frankenstein, the archetypal fragmented man is able to transcend the ambiguities of his conflicting parts to reach clarity of purpose, if you like.

the dialouge and plot show that frakie is aware of multiple interpretations and perspectives, is aware of coherent rationalisations for amoral behoavior, but he is sufficently integrated within himself to breeze past these without falling into pangs of typically postmodern angst and self recrimination.

or maybe he's a crazy fucking undead grundy-man who carries around an angel's sword and likes to go sickhouse on bad people.

miss wonderstarr

13:16 / 27.04.06

I'm sorry if anyone's already pointed this out, but I think the theories that Spyder or Misty will provide the "death", leaving all official Seven Soldiers alive, is nixed by this issue's end page, with its additional phrase.

"a soldier will die! So that six will live, one soldier must die!"

That's not "so that seven will live, an eighth must die." That means one of the big names, as I read it.

13:33 / 27.04.06

Then either the death is only temporary, there's been an art error, or Ystin is doomed.

miss wonderstarr

15:26 / 27.04.06

I'd say Ystin is the character I would miss least, by a country mile. I'd quite enjoy a Bulleteer or Frankenstein miniseries, and many people are obviously real fans of Guardian. Klarion has a lot of originality and promise; Zatanna is too established to kill, if there are others you could sacrifice in her place: canon vs cannon-fodder. I would suggest the same for Mister Miracle (although Shilo Norman could of course be lost, and the name continue).

Hallo, Paper Spaceboy

16:54 / 27.04.06

Wonderstarr: I'd say Ystin is the character I would miss least, by a country mile.

But...but...I love them all. Especially Zee and Klarion, of course, but.

17:42 / 27.04.06

Ystin = Girl Frankenstein

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