i liked ultra. will need to reread it at least one more time though. the book was created as a trap that....failed? i sort of thought this was the book that STARTED it all but that can't really be the case. not sure exactly HOW the series goes in chronological terms yet. while i enjoyed the book, i guess i was hoping it would answer more questions. instead, it just raised more for me. maybe a second reading will clear things up--it's helped with the other issues.
Originally posted by leonidasThe entire book is meant to represent the 'Oblivion Machine'. The first 2 pages serve as both the beginning and the end of the book. So if we take those pages into consideration, the trap definitely worked, as Ultra Comics appeared to be caught in the Oblivion Machine's endless cycle.
the book was created as a trap that....failed?
...That's how I interpreted it, at least. /shrug
Originally posted by leonidasYeah, Ultra Comics was originally intended to be a trap of sorts by its human creators on Earth Prime--designed to protect their universe from an imminent invasion(or "Hit" as they refer to it) by The Gentry:
what i meant was that it was intended as a trap for the gentry i thought, and in that sense it failed.... like i said, i gotta reread it....
But like you mentioned: this turned out to be a trap within a trap. As evident by one of the first few pages of the issue, The Gentry were already in position to overtake Earth Prime(and subsequently Ultra Comics itself) from the very start:
http://i.imgur.com/Bd4VrzM.jpg
(As you know, that reporter/narrator ended up being Intellectron in disguise.)
So instead of Ultra Comics becoming a weapon for us to use against them, it was ultimately flipped into a weapon for them to use against us--the Oblivion Machine, as they called it.
...Which, in hindsight, likely explains the warning inscribed on the cover page:
http://i.imgur.com/DXcJGNR.jpg
"You must NOT read this comic!"
From an in-universe POV: Ultra's ability to 'skip scenes' enabled him to hop back to the cover page and leave that warning for us, after he had already witnessed/survived the events of the issue itself.
Crazy stuff. Really makes you think.
http://rikdad.blogspot.no/2014/11/multiversity-message.html
This is probably the "clearest" interpretation of what the Gentry are, that I've come across.
Hm. That's an interesting opinion on The Gentry.
Here's what Morrison himself said about them:
"In a world where everything is protected — people live in houses with locked doors, they put their valuables in safes, they keep their information safe behind passwords and antiviral controls — we allow pretty much anything into our heads. Particularly since the Internet age has really got its teeth in and we’re starting to see some of the effects it’s having on people.
I think, to some extent, that’s a glut of information and a tide of information that’s almost too much for people to take. It has resulted in a kind of sickness in people, exhaustion or resignation. So, ultimately Multiversity is about that, because I like to write stories about stuff that I’m seeing in the world around me, or the stuff I’m feeling. It’s about, are you sure you should be letting all this stuff into your head? How do you honestly feel about all the porn and all the things you see, all the beheadings? What’s it doing in there?
The Gentry kind of represent all those things that we just accept. To me, the result I’m actually seeing is a kind of soul weariness, a cynicism, a sickness that permeates culture. I think we’re all fed up with ourselves and we’re just waiting to be destroyed by the other."
__________________________________
"At the same time, I’m trying to talk about real things. That’s where the symbolic content comes in, where the Gentry represent all these bad influences, but really each one of the Gentry is kind of a villain archetype taken to the limit. Intellectron is the mastermind taken to the limit. Dame Merciless is the femme fatale taken to the demonic limit. Demogorgunn is the zombie horde taken to the limit, and so on through the rest of them. Lord Broken is the madhouse, Arkham Asylum taken it to the limit. Each of them represents a fairly understandable villain type once you think about it.
So the symbolism becomes, well what do they represent in the real world? For me, they represent forces of nihilism and anti-human hatred, ignorance and greed and stupidity that I see every day. Those aspects of the story, how do you deal with those? How do you communicate those? What happens when there are too many of them in your head and you’re starting to feel sick with it? That’s the symbolic element in the comic, but at the same time I still have to show what happens with Red Racer’s affair with Flashlight [laughs]. I still have to show what happens to President Superman at the end and make sure everyone gets returned to their homes and all the crises are brought to an end satisfactorily."
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"The Gentry was one of those names and it just stuck with me when I was thinking about beings from beyond, and we used to call them The Gentry. Then I thought of them as being bad things from beyond. From that, they started to grow, and then as you said, this idea of gentrification. When I’m talking to you about the kind of ideas we let into our heads, and taken as a thesis of, what if we let in so many shitty, shoddy ideas that we have completely ruined the neighborhood in there? We’ve dismantled, we’ve wrecked our inner houses and we’ve destroyed our inner palaces, and we’ve placed crackhouses in there, imaginatively.
I don’t necessarily believe that this is all true. I thought it would make an interesting idea for a story, so the Gentry then are these bad ideas that come in you when you’ve messed up your head [laughs], so they come in and start rebuilding because you’ve now made it comfortable for them to recreate and build in their own image. So that, again, that’s one of the big things it’s about, this notion of gentrification coming into places and places that have been seemingly broken down and left to ruin and then rebuilding for them the benefit of your own kind."
^^That puts them into perspective quite well, imo.
Damn. Love the bit about rebuilding the mind in their own image. Because stuff like that does happen all the time. Watch a movie with a ton of swear words, and your own threshold for swearing is loosened after watching it. Compound that idea over decades and there are some scary implications. He mentions porn; another great example. Harmless in a vacuum, but what changes are happening internally as a collective result of everything we intake? Not just porn, but ALL of it. There's every possibility we'll have absorbed as much information and media-related stimuli in our first 20-30 years that previous generations did in their entire lives.
It's a fascinating thought. Thanks for posting the snippets there.
Originally posted by krisblaze
It reminds me a lot of what he says in the Invisibles, about the dangers of hanging onto all the sad and terrible things that we see.Morrison is so god damned awesome.
To elaborate this is basically what Tom O'Bedlam keeps telling Dane in v1.
“Your head's like mine, like all our heads; big enough to contain every god and devil there ever was. Big enough to hold the weight of oceans and the turning stars. Whole universes fit in there! But what do we choose to keep in this miraculous cabinet? Little broken things, sad trinkets that we play with over and over. The world turns our key and we play the same little tune again and again and we think that tune's all we are.”
And
"There's a palace in your head, boy. Learn to live in it always.”"
as well as a few other brilliant quotes.
There's also the realization that Percy Shelley has, which is one of my favourite quotes of all time;
"I know where utopia lies. It is here. Where is the love, beauty and truth we seek but in our mind? The golden country forever new? The home of all hearts untouched by time and pain? Here. Waiting for us to grow up and recognize it and come home."
Originally posted by krisblazeYeah, the man certainly put a lot of legitimate thought(both metaphorical and literal) into these characters, and subsequently the event itself, instead of randomly spewing them onto paper like so many writers do, just to make a quick buck. Despite the mass fan-pressure/hatred he endured for this event taking so long to come into fruition(6ish years), he took his time with it. He 'clocked out' of comics for a while and pieced this thing together on his own time--only releasing it when he felt it was ready..... And it certainly shows.
It reminds me a lot of what he says in the Invisibles, about the dangers of hanging onto all the sad and terrible things that we see.Morrison is so god damned awesome.
Excellent stuff. 👆
Originally posted by Blockythe1guyIf the world stays as it is, they can't be... Or at least that's what Morrison is getting at, I think.
The Gentry is really sounds like a threat that can never be beaten.
So long as we(ie. humanity) continue receiving/accepting an abundance of sensory input from the various media of today, of which we have become so dependent upon, The Gentry will endure. Morrison's aim here is that said media is breaking down our minds in a sense--and this subconscious breakdown creates an optimal environment in which The Gentry can thrive. If society doesn't change, The Gentry will endure.
But yeah, the final issue of Multiversity should be a real mind-phuck. 👆
