rexphantom

I've been a big, big fan of Mike Allred's work since I picked up MADMAN COMICS back at Don Parker's Records and Comics in Milford, Ohio in my early high school days. There was always a spiritual aspect to his work in some form or another, usually a Christ-like figure in the form of Frank Einstein or in the pages of Red Rocket 7. I wasn't down with it, but I rolled with it. I liked his pop art inspired pencils, Laura's bright colors, and the themes of love and redemption that ran through his work. I even followed him to Marvel when he took over the art chores on X-FORCE, and later X-STATIX, even though he wasn't going to be writing his own scripts, and even though I'm not all that interested in super hero books these days. I really dug X-FORCE at first, but I think the series has been suffering since U-Go Girl was killed off. It was an interesting and dynamic choice, but the result was that the most interesting and dynamic *character* was now absent from the book. They had some difficulties in their recent "Back from the Dead" storyline, and though they tried their best to save the story from being butchered by editorial edicts, it fell flat in the end. And with the new regime in place at Marvel, it seemed that X-STATIX was the last holdout from the Marvel Revolution from a few years ago.

Well, Allred has been hinting at new projects just over the horizon for some time, including a new Madman series, and a super secret project he sounded really excited about. On his message board he recently announced the end of X-STATIX with issue 26, and his next project--adapting the entire Book of Mormon into comics form.

He always came across as a spiritual dude, but I didn't know Allred was a practicing Mormon. In the post he alludes to some kind of spiritual awakening in recent years that led him back to the church he hasn't been a part of in years, and he sounds like a true believer. He's using terms like "Light of Christ" and he's calling the Book of Mormon (the original, not his adaptation) the source of absolute Truth in the universe.

I'm not quite sure how I feel about all of this. I'm an open-minded guy, and though once again this isn't my bag, I'm all for Allred expanding his artistic horizons and the horizons of comics and doing something outside the mainstream. But it sounds pretty preachy--it sounds like his intent is, one, to show his appreciation and love for this book that means so much to him, which is entirely fine; and two, to lead his readers to the Truth and the Light of Christ, which exists in all things. That's the thing that I get stuck on. I imagine it's simply my own attitude and prejudices toward religion coming through, but I'm a little disappointed that one of my favorite creative types is doing something I disagree with spiritually and philosophically. But when you're an artist, you have to work on what you have to work on. I'll check it out when it comes out, and I hope it's the sort of book the non-believers can enjoy too.

But man, if he ever goes back to telling Frank Einstein's story, and if it ever matches the stories he was telling in the mid-90's, I'll do a backflip.