Details of my next stand-up gig are as follows:

Howling Mad Comedy

Wharf 10 Bar

10 Wolverhampton Street

The night is being organised by my pals at Half-A-Dog Comedy and also appearing on the bill will be Bethany Black and Andy Jones (with more to be confirmed).  The compere is Mr Phillip McCullough.

That will be all.

Dedicated to resurrecting the magazine as a fetish object, giving creative people the room to let their minds go. No ads. No rules.

That’s the mission statement of Dirty Bristow, a new magazine that my friends Danny Smith and Jon Bounds will soon be launching in the general direction of an unsuspecting world near you.

I’ve written an article for the magazine and provided an illustration, too.  The illo – a homage to legendary comics artist Jack “The King” Kirby which accompanies an article by Mark Parfit – is now available as a T-shirt.  It looks something like this:

The T-shirts will help raise funds towards the printing costs of this ambitious, ad-free project.  If you’ve ever felt the urge to help a worthwhile cause by wearing a T-shirt that features something drawn by me (and who amongst you hasn’t?), then you can find out more by going here.

I’ve been digging through the archives again…

After a seven year wait, the final volume of cult filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky’s graphic novel series The Metabarons is getting a long-overdue English language release this week.  What follows is an interview I did with Jodorowsky back in 2002 for the much-loved, but sadly no-longer-with-us, comics magazine Borderline.

Back then, LA-based Humanoids Publishing were busy releasing sumptuous volumes of Jodorowsky’s comics translated into English.  At the same time, two of his most famous movies - El Topo and The Holy Mountain – were fiendishly difficult to get hold of due to a decades-long feud between Jodorowsky and former Beatles and Rolling Stones manager Allen Klein, who owned the rights to the films.

That’s no longer the case as the two men finally reconciled prior to Klein’s death last year and both films were subsequently restored and released on DVD.  English translations of Jodorowsky’s comics, on the other hand, are now fiendishly difficult to get hold of.

Typical.

‘Alejandro’ or ‘Alexandro’?  I’ve seen it spelled both ways, but I figure you’d have the definitive answer.

Alexandro is used for the books printed in French.  Alejandro is reserved for the books in Spanish language.  [Consequently] for the US it would be Alexander.  I like that my name offers little variation possibilities, therefore, I do not identify myself with any.

Many comics readers [myself included] first discovered your work during the 1980s with the publication of The Incal.  For those unfamiliar with the details, can you tell us how this remarkable collaboration with Moebius first came about?

We worked together on the script of Dune for about two years, but in the end the movie did not get picked up.  The script contained at least 3000 drawings, the majority by Moebius, some by [H.R.] Giger, [Chris] Foss and others.  Dune by Herbert is a very literary book, therefore we had to create about 50% of visual scenes. Moebius suggested that we treat this failure as a change in the path, that we would create a comic with my ideas.

Furthermore, I had a dream where I travelled through space.  There I saw two interwoven pyramids, one white and the other black.  I enter into this image and I am converted into the pyramids, [before] taking off in a galaxy of light.  With all this material we started the work on The Incal.

Besides The Metabarons and The TechnoPriests, are there any other characters from The Incal you’d like to explore in comic form?

For the children  I would like to expand the world of the concrete birds with Deepo as their hero.  For the adults I would like to further explore the repulsive adventures of Gorgo Le Sale.

Humanoids is currently publishing The Incal in its entirety, complete with gorgeous recolouring by Fred Beltran which adds – in my opinion, at least – new depth to Moebius and Janjetov’s art.  How do you feel about this ‘new look’ Incal?

That satisfies me.  The old colors prevented the audience from experiencing the dramatic depth of the history [meaning story] and the excellent quality of Janjetov’s drawings.

Prior to The Incal you collaborated with Moebius on a wonderful horror story called Le Yeux du Chat [The Eyes of The Cat].  You have said that this was to be the first part of a trilogy.  Do you intend to return to the story?

Moebius is extremely busy in producing drawings of this complicated quality.  Maybe I should try to do the sequel with a different artist. How do you like this?

A few years ago I’d have flinched at the notion of anyone other than Moebius illustrating the sequel.  After seeing Zoran Janjetov’s stunning artwork on Before The Incal, however, I’ve learned to loosen up a bit.  You once said: “I ask of film what most North Americans ask of psychedelic drugs.”  Do you ask the same of comics?

Yes.  You just have to read the Castaka of The Metabarons number 7.   It is a true delirium!

Your stories are always rich in sub-text and symbolism.  Would you prefer your audience to actively seek out these ‘hidden meanings’, or do you prefer it to go by unnoticed, to bypass the conscious mind?

I write in multiple levels at the same time.  I direct myself to different levels of the readers in the same story.  The kids have fun with it, the cultured adults can find hidden messages that I place on every page.

While The Incal and The Metabarons share the same universe, they are two very different animals. Looking at your various collaborations, I’m struck by how effortlessly you seem to adapt your stories to the strengths of the artists you work with.  How do you set about achieving this creative synthesis?  I imagine it differs from artist to artist…

Yes, it differs for every artist.  When I begin a new partnership I investigate the mentality of the artist.  I find out about his preferences, what he does not dare to imagine, his methods, his emotional life, his ideas.  Last, in a concealed fashion I psychoanalyze him.  Soon I write a story tailored to his psyche.  The subject matter has to entice him, he has to be able to identify himself with the characters, etc. I don’t write just for myself: I write for an artist.  And through the artist I fix them up to express my views.

You’ve worked with some of the most talented artists in the business including Moebius, Giminez and Georges Bess.  Are there any other artists you’d like to work with?

For the moment I am like a man that is satisfied with his admirers and who does not need anything else.  Nevertheless, I enjoy working with talented artists.  But now, since I am extremely busy, they would have to come and get me.

If you could go back in time, what artists from comics’ past would you work with?  I ask this because I recently re-read Moebius and Stan Lee’s Silver Surfer comic and found myself wondering what strange magic Alejandro Jodorowsky and Jack Kirby could have created together…

Yes, Jack Kirby, but also Steve Ditko and Steranko.

We’ve seen some teasing glimpses of Travis Charest’s breathtaking artwork on your forthcoming Metabarons: The Dreamshifters book.  How did this collaboration come about?

Through one of these magical coincidences – Fabrice Giger, my editor, being apart for thousands of kilometers – we had the same idea at the same time: that Travis should illustrate the Dreamshifters. Fabrice suggested it to Travis and he accepted immediately, even came to live for some time in Paris to work on it.

Could you give us a ‘teasing glimpse’ into the story?

Impossible! I am capable of writing any type of long stories, but I am not able to deliver summaries.

I believe that this is the first time you’ve worked with an artist more commonly associated with American superhero titles.  Are there any other artists who work in this genre that you admire, and, if so, can you envisage working with them?

There are four artists that I admire, and with whom I would like to work together, however, since they are sometimes artists and writers, they do not need me for anything.  The deceased Harold R. Foster.  The super neurotic [Robert] Crumb.  The classical Stan Sakai.  The profound Will Eisner.  Four genii!

Are there any comics you are currently reading?  Any recommendations?

These days I broaden my life in reading Lone Wolf and Cub.

Did you read comics as a child?

Oh, Yes! Prince Valiant (I fell in love with Aleta). Mandrake the Magician, Flash Gordon, Popeye, Little Orphan Annie, Buck Rogers, etc.

Another thing that distinguishes you from other filmmakers who write comics is the fact that your earliest work in the field – such as Fabulas Panicas Weekly in the 1960s – actually pre-dates your movie career.  Would you be kind enough to tell us how you first became involved in writing comics?

In the Fifties an artist from [Cuban newspaper] Vanguardia declared that comics are the poetry and the novels of the future.  He believed it to be a form of art as big as the movies.  Taking advantage of my celebrity status in Mexico, I proposed to a big newspaper to illustrate in their weekly culture segment one comics page per week.  They hired me immediately and so we continued for five years.  We had one million of readers each week.

When legendary film critic Pauline Kael reviewed El Topo, she linked Fabulas Panicas to the works of Robert Crumb and other 1960s underground comic creators.  At the time, did you see yourself as part of this movement?

I never considered myself [aligned] to any movement nor to any political party.  I have an anarchistic spirit or, better, am very liberated like a Metabaron. However, I collected all the underground comics.  The only one that communicated with me (and had a homage to El Topo) was by Spain Rodgriguez.

With Fabulas Panicas you illustrated your own scripts.  Have you ever felt the urge to return to the drawing board?

No. Watching Moebius draw I suffered an everlasting complex.  I feel ashamed of my drawings.

Now that films based on comics are back in vogue, have you ever thought of adapting one of your own titles to the big screen?

I prefer that others take on to it.  The level of idiocy when Hollywood adapts a comic script repulses me.  Actually, for me, I see greater artistic possibilities in creating a comic than making a movie.

Personally, I think The Metabarons would work better as an opera than a movie.  As an artist who has worked in many fields, can you imagine any of your comics being adapted for a medium other than film?

What idea is this, wanting to adapt one art into another form of art?  Comics are comics and they are doing perfectly well in continuing to be comics.

Have you ever considered returning to characters from your movies in comic form?

Once again the same mistake: movies should remain as movies and comics should continue to be comics.  When I write comics I don’t think about the movies.  When I’m shooting movies I don’t think about comics

Humanoids English-language publication of The Metabarons has created a new generation of Jodorowsky fans.  Many will be eager to see your movies El Topo and The Holy Mountain, but will be surprised at how damnably hard they are to get hold of.  For the benefit of those unfamiliar with the grisly details, can you tell us why these films have been hidden away from the public?

These films are in the pseudo-legal possession of the producer Allen Klein. This man hates me to death and he has decided to deny the public from watching my movies.  At the moment we are in a legal battle, where I am trying to recover what is mine: the right to show these movies.

In a television interview with Jonathan Ross a decade or so ago, you described how you felt after seeing David Lynch’s Dune movie.  I seem to remember it made you laugh for hours.  Did you see the Sci Fi Channel’s recent adaptation and, if so, did it provoke a similar response?

All this belongs to the past and it does not concern me anymore.  I watched one minute into it and I turned the TV off.  It wasn’t the Martians that invaded our planet, it was the imbeciles.

Your Dune project featured an amazing cast of collaborators including Orson Welles, Salvador Dali, Moebius and H.R. Giger.  If you had the chance to make an epic science fiction movie now – and money was no obstacle – who would you recruit this time around?

As actors I would only recruit talented people, but not famous.  I find that the poison to the movies are the stars.

While we’re on the subject of your films, can you provide us with a status report on Abelcain [AKA The Sons of El Topo]?  Is Marilyn Manson still involved?

Yes. M. Manson is still involved.  However, the weight remains on my shoulders of getting the money together for the production.  I don’t know if I will succeed in getting it.

Let’s hope you do.  Thanks for taking the time to talk to us, Alejandro, and I hope you continue to shock and amaze us for many years to come.

In 1970, the year I was born, Rolling Stone magazine published a review by learned rock journalist Greil Marcus of what was then Bob Dylan’s latest album, Self-Portrait.  The review’s high impact opening sentence has since earned itself a place in the annals of popular culture for its succinct precision and evocative use of language.  It simply asked the question:  ‘What is this shit?’

It’s 2010 and Bob Dylan and Greil Marcus are both nearly 40 years older and I’m nearly 40 years-old.  Dylan has just performed a storming set on a sizzling Saturday night in front of Clare, the kids and me -- and some tens of thousands of other people, too -- in a field somewhere in Kent.  As the crowds disperse, making their way to their tents, cars or wherever, many can be seen gazing wistfully, smiling blisfully and generally indulging themselves in that warm glow of post-gig euphoria.  Some of them are even singing.

But not everyone is happy.  Just as many people look bewildered, disillusioned and visibly pissed off, like first generation Star Wars fans in 1999 stumbling out of a Phantom Menace preview.  They seem hurt, betrayed and are probably asking themselves a similar question to the one Greil Marcus first articulated four decades earlier:

What was that shit?

Of course, over the years Dylan has developed something of a penchant for polarising his punters.  Back in the summer of 1965 he antagonised his core folkie constituency (and endeared himself to a new audience of rock music fans) when he plugged an electric guitar into an amplifier at the Newport Folk Festival.   Five years later and it was the rockers turn to feel betrayed -- and country music fans who were won over -- when Dylan released Nashville Skyline.  Another schism opened up in the late-1970s when he became a born-again Christian and renounced his secular songs in favour of gospel music.  That move pissed off just about everybody, although it might have played some part in securing him a prestigious gig at the 1997 World Eucharistic Conference, where he -- quite literally -- had an audience with a Pope.

Hop Farm Dylan, by contrast, was far less provocative.  Dressed like a Southern US country gentleman in his white Cordobes hat, if anything he was in an uncharacteristically chirpy and crowd-pleasing mood.  Together with his tight as drum-skin band, he kicked off proceedings with a suitably rambunctious rendition of ‘Rainy Day Women # 12 & 35′, and of the seventeen songs that made up his set list,  six of them were culled from Blonde on Blonde and Highway 61 Revisited, two of his most popular and most enduring albums of the 60s.  He unleashed upon the audience a veritable cavalcade of classics.  ‘Just Like a Woman’, ‘Like a Rolling Stone’, ‘Stuck Inside of Mobile with the Memphis Blues Again’, ‘Ballad of a Thin Man’ and ‘Simple Twist of Fate’ were all present and correct, while newer tracks (which I really like, but casual festival-goers probably wouldn’t be so familiar with) were kept to a minimum.  Gospel songs were kept off the bill, and -- bearing in mind his most recent album release -- there wasn’t a Christmas carol in sight.

It should have been enough to keep everyone happy, but sadly it wasn’t.

Nowadays, there are two things that divide crowds at a Bob Dylan concert.  Firstly, he doesn’t play his songs the way he used to play them, and, secondly, he doesn’t even sound like Bob Dylan anymore.  During his current touring cycle (which, it must be mentioned, is now well into its 22nd fucking year) he has consistently, persistently and relentlessly deconstructed, reconstructed and -- at times -- rendered unrecognisable the entirety of his not inconsiderable back catalogue, much to the annoyance of many of his fans.  If that wasn’t bad enough, his voice, too, has transformed -- mutated, even -- into something that’s even more alien and unfamiliar.  That nasally sneer of yesteryear  has given way to something more akin to a raspy death rattle of a fatally wounded frog.

Both of these charges are absolutely and incontrovertibly true, and -- at the same time -- utterly meaningless.  When Dylan plays his old songs now they do sound different, but this is the man who once memorably declared that The Times They Are a-Changin’ and starred in a documentary film called Don’t Look Back.  You can’t say he didn’t warn us.  His career has always been characterised by change, growth and genre-breaking innovation.  Admittedly, over the years this strategy hasn’t always been successful -- pioneers, after all, are the ones with the arrows in their backs -- but at Hop Farm he kept hitting the mark time after time.  Old songs were immersed in even older musical traditions, which had the paradoxical effect of making them sound both newly-minted and even more timeless.

Dylan’s voice, however, must have come as quite a shock to more casual fans unfamiliar with his more recent material, let alone those innocent bystanders who probably expected him to sound like The Byrds.   It wasn’t always easy listening to some of popular music’s most perfect lyrics barked out in a voice so cracked and weather-beaten it made Tom Waits, Johnny Cash and Louis Armstrong sound like the Bee Gees.  However, its worth remembering that Dylan’s early vocal style -- which David Bowie once memorably described in song as ‘a voice of sand and glue’ -- was considered abrasive and far-from radio-friendly back in the 1960s, and it’s been steadily sliding down the octave scale ever since.  Dylan’s voice on a 70s classic like ‘Hurricane’ doesn’t sound like the same man who sang ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ a decade earlier, while the voice of his 80′s Travelling Wilbury persona sounds like someone else again.  I knew what to expect , managed my expectations accordingly and got along fine, although being a fan of Tom Waits, Johnny Cash and Louis Armstrong probably helped.

There were so many highlights of the night that its hard to single any out.  Memories of ‘Stuck Inside of Mobile With The Memphis Blues Again’ still make me smile as it prompted my girlfriend Clare & 6 year-old stepdaughter Lily to bolt towards the stage as it’s currently Lily’s favourite song (it’s one of my favourite songs, too, but someone had to look after Lily’s 14 month-old sister, Edie).  ‘Simple Twist of Fate’ managed to be even more heartbreaking than the original, Dylan’s age and broken voice adding a new layer of poignancy to the lyrics.  The incandescent performances of ‘Highway 61 Revisited’ and ‘Ballad of a Thin Man’ also deserve mention, especially the latter which -- unless I’m mistaken -- featured Dylan surreptitiously doing a jig.

I was carrying baby Edie in my arms as he started singing his final song for the night.  Appropriately enough, it was ‘Forever Young’:

May you grow up to be righteous

May you grow up to be true

May you always know the truth

And see the lights surrounding you

May you always be courageous

Stand upright and be strong

May you stay forever young

To those in the crowd who were still asking themselves ‘What was that shit?’ let me offer a suggestion.

That, my friends, was good shit.

_______________________________________

Some footage courtesy of public-spirited YouTube donors:

Ballad of a Thin Man:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzVUD2Jciyg

Simple Twist of Fate:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=2-c0zFUqNhk

Highway 61 Revisted:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=pQeX9hjnpXc

]]> http://tomlennon.com/2010/07/bob-dylan-at-hop-farm/feed/ 3 http://tomlennon.com/2010/06/capello-cook-and-alan-latchley/ http://tomlennon.com/2010/06/capello-cook-and-alan-latchley/#comments Tue, 29 Jun 2010 19:43:02 +0000 Tom Lennon http://tomlennon.com/?p=1432 The mounting speculation over Fabio Capello’s future as England coach reminds me of a character that legendary satirist Peter Cook created shortly before his death.  Football manager Alan Latchley was one of three Cook creations that Clive Anderson ‘interviewed’ in a special edition of his early-90s Channel 4 chat show, each a perfectly-formed slice of improvisational brilliance.  When Anderson grilled Latchley over rumours that he was being lined up to replace that era’s disgraced England manager, Graham Taylor, Latchley’s response was a priceless and strangely prescient given this week’s events:

“He did a cracking job.  When you look at the potential that he had there and his ability to transform it into those results… you have to realise you are dealing with somebody unusual.”

Genius.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=oeG9r6HxJgE

Lee is also a filmmaker.  Here’s a rather charming short film he made for this year’s Film Dash competition (the one where Brum-based filmmakers have to make a flick in 48hrs):

www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Fe2bth0ck0

Anyhow, tickets for the 11th July gig are only £3 and I plan to pop along myself.  I recommend it to anyone seeking an alternative to the World Cup Final, comedy-shaped or otherwise.

Some seven years after it was first published in France, the concluding volume of The Metabarons -- cult filmmaker Alejandro Jodorowsky’s brilliantly insane graphic novel series -- is finally getting an English language release next week.  This is something of a big deal for Jodorowsky fans like me who have a poor grasp of French and rely too heavily on Babel Fish.

Here’s a substantially revised and updated version of an article I wrote some years ago about Jodorowsky’s life and work. I’ve embedded some video clips from Jodorowsky’s films ‘El Topo’, ‘The Holy Mountain’ and ‘Santa Sangre’.  If you’re unfamiliar with his films ‘El Topo’, ‘The Holy Mountain’ and ‘Santa Sangre’, then it’s worth pointing out that they are -- as they say -  NSFW (or ‘Not Suitable For Work’) and leave it at that.

These days a visit to the cinema is not complete without someone tripping over a cape.  From superheroes like Iron Man and Kick-Ass to less obvious adaptations like The Losers and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World, films based on comic books have been cluttering up the multiplexes at an exponential rate.  As A-list actors and respected filmmakers now embrace this once despised sub-genre, this growing trend has given rise to another:  high profile creators from the glamorous world of film, TV and literature are queuing up to become comic book writers.

Britain’s chat show king Jonathan Ross is only the most recent addition to an illustrious list that includes the novelists Michael Chabon and Ian Rankin, slacker bard Kevin Smith and Joss (Buffy the Vampire Slayer) Whedon.  In Europe, however, this particular media migration path is nothing new.  For decades now, one of the hottest names on the sophisticated French comics scene has been an eightysomething Chilean who also happens to be one of the most outspoken and notorious film-makers in the history of cinema.

Alejandro Jodorowsky -- writer of the critically acclaimed comic series The Metabarons -- has carved out a unique career for himself as the creator of cult, controversial movies and crazed, uncompromising, visually stunning comics. While his Anglophone counterparts are – for the most part, at least -- content with rejuvenating the superhero genre by breathing new life into a bunch of middle-aged DayGlo demigods, Jodorowsky has created a complex fictional universe of interconnected characters, concepts and stories that are uniquely his own.  Fans call it “The Jodoverse” and, in the words of acclaimed comics scribe Warren Ellis, it’s “astonishingly beautiful and totally mad.”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dzOm0UFzs6w

For the uninitiated, The Metabarons is a science-fiction saga that chronicles the rise of the galaxy’s most formidable warrior clan from their humble beginnings as stonecutters on a marble planet.  Try to imagine an interstellar Forsyte Saga with nukes and mutilation -- or One Hundred Years of Solitude set 30,000 years in the future – and even then you’ll still be woefully unprepared for its scope, originality, audacity and relentless insanity.

Published by French comics publishing house Les Humanoïdes Associés -- and featuring sumptuous painted art by the veteran Argentinean illustrator Juan Giminez -- The Metabarons is a multi-generational cosmic epic of heroism, sacrifice, blood and honour that’s brutally violent, emotionally-charged and loaded with symbolism.  In other words, it’s a thoroughly operatic space opera and there’s nothing quite like it in any medium.

In the decade since it made its English language debut, The Metabarons has attracted rave reviews and a word-of-mouth buzz that continues to entice new readers and inflate the cost of its increasingly rare early volumes.  With The Metabarons you never know what demented notion, wild concept or surreal image Jodorowsky and Giminez will smack you over the eyes with next.  It might be a huge fleet of alien vessels hidden within a fake planet, a coven of scheming witches who travel through space on a giant fish or a floating boy who mutilates his feet so he can earn the respect of his warrior dad.  To quote Ellis again, “There is literally a new and mad idea on every page.”

From 'The Metabarons vol IV - Aghora & The Last Metabaron'

◄ Back

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Picture 1 of 2

Jodorowsky, it must be said, is no stranger to buggier-than-batshit craziness. He made his name directing cult, avant garde movies like El Topo, The Holy Mountain and Santa Sangre - three of the undisputed Goddamn weirdest films in the history of cinema -- and once claimed that “most directors make films with their eyes; I make films with my testicles.”  Is it any wonder, then, that his comics are so deliriously nuts?

His fiery, feverish imagination permeates and saturates The Metabarons and the rest of his Jodoverse and, unlike the work of most other media migrants, his comics -- with their combination of visceral imagery and esoteric depth -- are thematically inseparable from his movies. Both are the culmination of a lifetime of artistic experimentation, reflecting his passionate obsession with self-transformation, mysticism, religion and violence.

To put it another way, his comics are a continuation of the same artistic alchemy by different means.

‘El Topo’ trailer:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=3joYVNyyi5w

Few comic creators have entered the field via a route quite as colourful and circuitous as that of Jodorowsky. Born in Chile in 1929, he left his home country at the age of 24 with a troupe of travelling puppeteers, eventually settling in Paris.  There he collaborated with the legendary mime artist Marcel Marceau, wrote stage plays for the actor Maurice Chevalier and introduced composer Michel Legrand to Parisian audiences. In Paris Jodorowsky met a group of artists who shared his interest in Modern Art, Eastern mysticism and the occult and together they formed the guerilla art movement The Theatre of Panic.  Seeing themselves as natural heirs to the Surrealists, they embraced many of the things their heroes rejected, including science fiction, rock music and -- quite tellingly -- comic books.

During the 1960s Jodorowsky moved to Mexico, directed stage plays and created a weekly comic strip called Fabulas Panicas for one of country’s leading newspapers. His comics career had to be put on hold, however, once he became involved with the fledgling “Mexperimental Cinema” scene. His first film, 1967s Fando Y Lis, almost resulted in him getting lynched by an outraged crowd for its perceived attack on traditional values. He followed it up with El Topo [1970], a mystical, allegorical, dreamlike Western (or, more accurately, “Eastern”) which made his name internationally. A stylish head-on collision between the spaghetti westerns of Sergio Leone and the Surrealist cinema of Luis Bunuel -- a ‘Fistful of Dalis’, if you will – El Topo is a brutal film brimming with violent sexual imagery, Taoist philosophy and some of the most blatant phallic symbolism you’re ever likely to see. Upon its release in the US the following year it quickly gained a cult following on the midnight movie circuit and made a fan out of John Lennon, who convinced his notorious manager, Allen Klein, to produce Jodorowsky’s next film, The Holy Mountain [1974].

‘The Holy Mountain’:  One Froggy Conquest

www.youtube.com/watch?v=ce-UAmIESd4

These films contained many of the themes, tropes and obsessions that would later permeate The Metabarons and the other Jodoverse titles.  The spiritual quest, transcendence through pain and personal transformation – leitmotifs that dominates all three films -- would be further explored in his comics, particularly in his groundbreaking series The Incal.  The highly idiosyncratic symbolic language of his films would also spill over into his comics work.  In El Topo, for instance, the hero has to prove himself by killing four master gunslingers, while in The Incal protagonist John DiFool has to confront his four conflicting spiritual elements:  on both occasions, these hostile quartets represent obstacles to the evolution of man.   His 1989 film Santa Sangre, in which the youthful protagonist’s cruel father forces his son to have a bird-shaped tattoo carved on his chest, has a direct parallel in The Metabarons, in which each new generation undergoes a ‘mutilation initiation’ and inherits a bird-shaped birthmark.

‘Santa Sangre’ trailer:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJjXq6oj7Tg

While this illustrates the weird connective tissue of themes and symbols that link Jodorowsky’s films with his comics, it doesn’t explain how The Metabarons and the rest of the Jodoverse came into being.  To do that, we must turn to one of the most influential science-fiction films that was never made.

Jodorowsky’s Dune is one of those legendary unmade films -- like Orson Welles’ Don Quixote or Terry Gilliam’s Watchmen – that cinephiles will speculate about in hushed, reverential tones for years to come. Based (albeit fairly loosely) on the classic science fiction novel by Frank Herbert, the film was going to be a colossal project.  Pink Floyd, at the peak of their creativity, agreed to score the soundtrack while a bizarre cast was assembled that included Salvador Dali, Gloria Swanson and the aforementioned Welles. Jodorowsky also gathered about him an unprecedented cadre of artists to help bring the story to life; the late Dan O’Bannon was hired as special effects supervisor while Swiss artist H.R. Giger, British fantasy illustrator Christopher Foss and French comics legend Jean “Moebius” Giraud designed characters, environments and storyboards for the film.

According to Jodorowsky, he and Moebius formed an instant bond while working on the film; “We worked eight hours a day on that film, for months and months.  We were both in total resonance with each other.  Moebius drew so fast that it was just incredible. His pen almost miraculously created all the travellings, the panning shots, the zooms I wanted. Through three thousand plus drawings he did for Dune, I could feel just as if I had actually shot the picture.  Anyone looking at his work would feel that they had experienced the film as fully as if they had seen it on a screen in a theatre.”

Which was just as well, for after two years of preproduction the film’s financial backers withdrew their support and the project was abandoned.  The significance of Jodorowsky’s Dune, however, was in its failure: it served as a major creative catalyst for his cadre of artists. O’Bannon, Moebius and Giger subsequently collaborated with Ridley Scott to create the classic movie Alien, and Jodorowsky and Moebius started making comics.

Jodorowsky’s Dune (from ‘La Constellation Jodorowsky’ documentary film):

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dT2nkC8B2NA

The cult horror story The Eyes of The Cat was their first comics collaboration -- a fine work in its own right, but ultimately overshadowed by the magnum opus that was to follow. Conceived by Jodorowsky in a dream, and originally released in English by Marvel’s Epic imprint in the late 1980s, The Incal contained many of his more idiosyncratic story concepts from the Dune movie.  It also formed the source text for all subsequent forays into the Jodoverse by providing a thematic template and introducing comics fans to characters like The Metabaron.

The Incal tells the story of John DiFool – a grubby Private Eye living in a nightmare subterranean dystopia some 30,000 years in the future -- who finds himself the reluctant protagonist in a surreal sci-fi yarn of breathtaking cosmic proportions. At the heart of the story is the quintessential Jodotheme of transformation; DiFool, according to Jodorowsky, “never stops changing. He metamorphoses, progresses, sometimes regresses.” The series, in fact, gathered together all the elements that characterised his movies and fascinated him throughout his life -- the spiritual quest, violent transcendence, sexual and esoteric symbolism -- then cranked them up to a cosmic scale in a beautiful synthesis of word and image.

The Incal continues to inspire many of today’s top creators – Kick-Ass co-creator Mark Millar calls it “one of most perfect comics ever conceived” -- and it was successful enough to spawn a prequel, a pair of sequels and numerous spin-offs including, of course, The Metabarons.

The Incal - art by Moebius

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As movies based on comic books continue to clutter up the multiplexes, it may seem ironic that a new Jodorowsky film won’t be appearing at your local cinema anytime soon.  The film industry, of course, is all about compromise – that eternal balance between art and commerce – and Jodorowsky is a notoriously uncompromising artist.  His last film – 1990s The Rainbow Thief -- was beset with interfering producers, and subsequent attempts to get financial backing for a sequel to El Topo and a “metaphysical western” called King Shot have so far been unsuccessful.

There is, however, a place you can still go to immerse yourself in his fevered imagination.  It’s a place that’s unfettered by budgetary constraints, interfering producers and the competing egos of actors.  It contains high octane set-pieces that make the average Hollywood action extravaganza look as pacy as a PowerPoint presentation and eye-popping alien vistas that make Avatar’s Planet Pandora look as awe-inspiring as a business park in Crawley.  There you’ll witness high drama, staggering originality and regular bouts of relentless insanity.

It’s a comic book and it’s called The Metabarons.

'The Metabaron' - art by Travis Charest

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This is an updated and revised version of an article that was previously published in comics magazine Borderline in 2002.

The final volume of The Metabarons is published by Humanoids.

I can think of no better way to spend six minutes and fifty-three seconds.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=I45uklGG4d8

Incidentally, ‘One Froggy Evening’ is included in the Looney Tunes Golden Collection Volume 2 DVD box set which I’ve got and thoroughly recommend.  I wouldn’t normally do this, but HMV are currently selling it at just under a tenner (its RRP is £39.95).  Worth every penny.

Tom Lennon’s First Stand-Up (in COLOR) from Tom Lennon on Vimeo.

The video was recorded by my good pal Gerry Logan and – just to clarify – I’m now available for bookings.