Subcultural engagement for the 21st Century...
Barbelith is a new kind of community (find out more)...
You can login or register.

The Invisibles are here!

deja_vroom

16:28 / 02.04.02

Yes, indeed, after some time waiting, the first issue just arrived at specialized comic shops. I bought it yesterday (I had read the three first issues already, but anyway...)
Say, this thing spawned Barbelith Underground, so it must be good. Give me your impressions, anecdotes related to this comic. Just as sort of a little celebration 'cos I finally can know what all the fuss was about...

Spatula Clarke

19:12 / 02.04.02

The Invisibles led me here.

Talking to the people here led to me realising how utterly boring my life was and quitting my job in response.

In an indirect manner, The Invisibles changed my life.

Utopia

20:22 / 02.04.02

the invisibles was what made me really start thinking about what direction i wanted my writing and film work to go in.

still haven't decided yet.

and Jade, what i wouldn't give to get that new, utterly confused feeling again (i started with v.2 #11...).

Mystery Gypt

21:37 / 02.04.02

you should read each issue's annotation in the bomb as you finish reading to get some sense of the kind of panicked revelation that would go on for us as that thing went down. as m. utopia says, the feeling of being in the middle of the invisibles as it was going down was amazing and probably will not be repeated...

Tamayyurt

21:56 / 02.04.02

I happened to pick up the invisible's first trade on an Impulse and nearly put it down when I saw the horrible art...but it kept pulling me so I bought it. The next day I went to my comicshop and the guy had just gotten THE WHOLE THREE VOLs. I bought them read them over the weekend and mutated. I have never been the same. My life has never been the same. I imidiately got out of a sucky relationship, traveled, had fun, and basically bacame a man. The last issue's letter's page brought me here and now I love you guys

Mazarine

22:09 / 02.04.02

I remember stumbling here ages and ages ago, just cause I was curious about what would be at the URL Barbelith.com.

I do envy you, Jade, I wish I could relive reading the Invisibles for the first time. It was so damned fun.

Seth

23:10 / 02.04.02

Back in 1997 I was doing full time voluntary youth work for a vastly dysfunctional church in the arse end of Swansea. I lived about three miles out of town and survived on about £40 per month disposable income. The loneliest time of my life. Three things kept me sane: prayer, hip hop, and the monthly pilgrimage to the comic shop to buy the Invisibles.

Hieronymus

00:07 / 03.04.02

[Southern old man on his front porch, rocking] Yep. Yep. Them's were the days [/Southern old man on his front porch, rocking]

The Natural Way

06:03 / 03.04.02

The Invisibles: sent me a bit weird and made me go on a bit.

Our Lady of The Two Towers

09:49 / 03.04.02

Best line; "What are we looking for darling? A small charcoal briquette that says 'fuck' every five seconds?"

After the first series was out I read all twenty-five issues in one go over a three hour period. It really did something strange to my head, like something unlocking. Never managed to recapture that feeling again, probably one of those things you can only do once...

deja_vroom

11:59 / 03.04.02

a small threadrot here:
expressionles, how you, as a christian, dealt with some of the more amoral concepts of cthe comic book (I don't have to point them out, do I?)
I suppose that if you consider the whole thing as a piece of fiction it might be easier, since the story in itself doesn't have to be moral. But if you consider the series as something else, something bigger, as Grant Morrison constantly tries to reminds us - something that means something, a secret message to the youth, how do you feel about that?
Just curious, perhaps I'm seeing too much here...

gozer the destructor

12:02 / 03.04.02

I first read the invisibles after Grant MOrrison was in Bizarre and then on Disinfo Nation-bought the first volume on the monday and by tuesday I had read everything bar the last volume...im biting my fingernails as I write this, hard...very hard to type,..when is it out?

The Natural Way

12:10 / 03.04.02

What? That the Invisibles is amoral and Grant had a message? Revelation!

Sorry.....

There are as many shades of Xtian belief as there are small, bald gnomes (and, as we all know, there's a shit load of them...), so it's hardly surprising that some christians (and, let's be clear on this, The Invisibles is choc-a-bloc fulla esoteric christian/gnostic stuff) might enjoy it. Some might even applaud its attempts to transmit/popularise the religions more occulty, mystical side.

Whoops....

Just realised...I'm not expressionless (and a good thing too. Buffy still brings me big joy....).

I'll shut it now.

deja_vroom

12:41 / 03.04.02

Take it more to the sexual side of the books and you'll be closer to what I meant. And I don't know that much about christian tenets, I'm genuinely asking so I can learn a little bit more about it...

yawn - thing's buddy

13:09 / 03.04.02

I found the Invisibles useful in seducing a 17 year old Govan beauty. I told her she was being 'initiated'.

Turned out she fancied Ragged Robin more than she fancied me.

which was nice.

ONLY NICE THINGS

13:19 / 03.04.02

It's an intermittently interesting boy's-own story. Lots of half-digested mysticism and half-assed stabs at postmodernism, some good characters, lots of adolescent boy wish-fulfilment trying to excuse itself with self-awareness. Good fun, mind, but Flex Mentallo is better and shorter.

Laughing

15:54 / 03.04.02

(sigh) I always count on Haus to take the piss out of something.

Spatula Clarke

16:26 / 03.04.02

I don't think he's taking the piss. I agree with him, to an extent.

Grant Morrison is very much the Douglas Adams of comics; while he's got a head full of exciting ideas, he frequently stumbles over the double hurdle of his own enthusiasm for those ideas and his (in)ability to express them coherently. This is most obvious in The Invisibles as it was his 'pet project'; this was his, and he was going to do it exactly how he wanted.

Sometimes we all need a little bit of discipline.

Add Your Reply