Mister X: Condemned #1-4
I’m a lifelong fan of Bob Dylan. His music has been the soundtrack of my life for so long that it’s hard to remember a time when I didn’t know of him. Dylan’s new album was released this week. For the first time since probably 1990, I found myself thoroughly underwhelmed. The songs just haven’t connected with me. Maybe I just haven’t found a way in yet. But I can’t fight the notion that his retreat into the past of American music has changed from a creative force into a troubador, a stylist, a copycat who just doesn’t have as much to offer anymore. I don’t want the host of Theme Time Radio Hour to give me an essay on Gary Lewis and the Playboys. I want the man who wrote “Not Dark Yet” to make my soul weep.
The situation with Together Through Life is similar to Condemned, Dean Motter’s attempt to revive his 80s underground comics icon, Mister X.
I’ve read this new series now, and I just don’t know what to make of it. The cult of classical geometry is a cool idea. And the overall structure–noir, through and through–is pretty great. It’s filled with brokenness looking to be made right. Everyone searches for redemption, but it proves elusive. It also has the same retro-future vibe that I dug on when I was a kid, which is good.
However, a book about architecture featuring a city engineer named Howard Roark, and a mayor named Ian Rand? A reporter who figures it all out named Rosetta Stone? Really? Is this supposed to pass for depth or cleverness or something? It just sort of seems like it’s insulting to the intelligence of anyone over the age of 13 that he assumes such jokes aren’t grossly obvious.
Maybe the originals were filled with corny names and obvious concepts and not-very-veiled references to Ayn Rand and Orson Welles. Maybe I just didn’t get it when I was 14. I’d forgive myself. When I was 14 I thought Anthrax was the greatest band of all time. Things change. Later that year, I discovered Bob Dylan and my life was never the same again.
But with Mister X in the 21st century, the facts are these: fans of quirky self-destructive geniuses would be better served reading Doktor Sleepless. Fans of simple-and-direct throwback art can look to Darwin Cooke and Scott Wegener’s work on Atomic Robo. If you like noir crime stories, let me introduce you to 100 Bullets. And Retro-future fans have all sorts of options. There isn’t really a niche left for this book to fill. All of this work exists in part because of the path that Motter blazed in the 1980s. Somewhere along the line, though, Motter stopped being a part of the conversation and started being the subject of it.
I don’t mean to come down too hard on Mister X or on The Poet. But just like my lack of enthusiasm about the new Dylan album, I find there’s just no itch that requires Mister X in order to be scratched.
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