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Banned Hellblazer issue

Axel Lambert

14:13 / 22.07.01

Did you know there was a banned version of Hellblazer #141? By Ellis & Jiminez? Do you know why it was banned. If anyone's interested, the whole issue is available here. It starts rather good, moody and building up slowly, but the conclusion is somewhat uninspired and absurd, though shocking.

sleazenation

16:39 / 22.07.01

The Ellis iminez issue of Hellblazer wasn't banned per se, it was ust never published. Warren Ellis entered into negotiations with the editors and publisher at DC and the solution they apparently came up with was that the story would not be rewriten but dropped and Ellis would stop writing Hellblazer but continue working for the publisher.

But, yeah like you say the story itself was pretty dissapointing and certainly not worthy of its reputation.

17:09 / 22.07.01

Actually I thought that this one was one of the better issues of his run. Nobody has been able to nail down Constantine for a looong time. Check out this entrance That's classic. As well as the the mystery surrounding him up to that point. Everyone who writes Hellblazer now should be required to read Allan Moore's entire run of Swamp Thing and recite it verbatim. Sure this issue isn't Ellis's best work, but it's sure not his worse.

CameronStewart

12:35 / 23.07.01

My problem with Ellis' Hellblazer, which is a problem that i have with a lot of his work, is that he seems to revel in his attempts to "shock" his audience with graphic descriptions of eyeless drugged-up babies playing with the diseased entrails of dead kittens, etc. I understand Hellblazer is meant to be a horror book, but this sort of thing always came off as hopelessly immature and silly rather than truly horrific.

"Shoot" avoids this for a large part and because of this I think it's one of his better stabs at Constantine. But it's still disappointingly un-provocative after all the hullaballoo...

Regrettable Juvenilia

12:50 / 23.07.01

I agree entirely, Cameron - I'm worried that part of the problem is that that stuff seems to be what the hardcore of Ellis-worshippers at his forum seem to love, and they feed it back to him... "haha, you're the kinda crazy guy who'd put dog-raping cyborg whores in a Superman comic, how HILARIOUS..." Whereas in fact this isn't Ellis' strength at all: his best work, Planetary, has virtually none of that infantile nonsense.

It worries me also that his latest announced work is basically "Star Trek with swearing". And people say Marvel's Mature Line will be immature...

CameronStewart

15:37 / 23.07.01

Oh, yes, I must point out that I also think Planetary is four-star excellent.

>>>Star Trek with swearing<<<

Jesus...

Axel Lambert

18:34 / 23.07.01

quote:Originally posted by CameronStewart:
Oh, yes, I must point out that I also think Planetary is four-star excellent.

I second that.

King Mob

19:44 / 24.07.01

i liked Ellis' run, although that first storyline dragged on a bit too long, but i still couldn't get myself to read all of "shoot."
it just didn't grab my attention.

oh yeah, and planetay does indeed kick ass!

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