Writer: Grant Morrison
Artists: J.H. Williams III, Dave Stewart(c)
Publisher: DC
The best thing about Seven Soldiers of Victory isn't the writing. Grant Morrison's talent, as well as his loopiness, is quite evident in these pages, but J.H. Williams' artwork is the real star for the concluding issue of Grant Morrison's experiment.
Remember Seven Soldiers of Victory was Grant Morrison's experiment. This was his first attempt to create a living, breathing universe in comic book form through the use of characters that DC has neglected. I'd have to argue that this experiment was an interesting failure.
Competing Big Stupid Events hamstrung Morrison’s experiment. The Infinite Crisis for instance should not have tainted Zatanna. 52 should never have distracted Morrison from completing Seven Soldiers of Victory, and the elephant in the room, Seven Soldiers of Victory should never have been this late.
The lateness affects the coherency of the story. It's a testament to Morrison's innate ability to write that I remember any of what happened in previous Seven Soldiers books, and when this series is collected into a handy trade paperback, it will without a doubt read in a less syncopated fashion, but as it is, this first and final issue of Seven Soldiers of Victory feels a little too disjointed to act as the grand finale.
Morrison opens the book with the metafictional tailor--who like Ambush Bug, seems to know he's in a comic book, witness the DC tie-tack. He relates the story of the Seven Soldiers of Victory with Justina the Shining Knight emerging from the Cauldron to confront Gloriana, the Evil Queen of the Faerie, excuse me Sheeda. He cuts from that, only one page, to the birth of Aurakles, the blind giant seen in Mister Miracle. It's at this point that Morrison really ties The Seven Soldiers of Victory to the very fabric of the DC Universe--Jack Kirby's Fourth World.
Morrison, who has clearly read his Joseph Cambell and von Daniken, audaciously unites the New Gods with Arthurian Legend. In a sense this is the explanation of the archetypes. What is the relationship between Justina the Shining Knight and Mister Miracle? Answered, and quite well.
We turn the page to the Manhattan Guardian. Literally, we turn the page to the Manhattan Guardian because Morrison has set up his section like a newspaper, complete with crossword puzzle and cartoon, also infected by the Sheeda influence.
Morrison then juxtaposes the very terrestrial life and death struggle of the Bulleteer with the very extraterrestrial life and death struggle of Justina against Gloriana. The hero in the next section provides the segue. Zatanna is very down to earth with her position as arch illusionist, but she is also mystical with spoken spells that can break the laws of science.
In Zatanna's moment on stage, Morrison answers the question of where Zee and Misty went and why. The answer, which Morrison foreshadows in an earlier section of the book, comes storming down with a vengeance upon the Sheeda. You see, this is what many people do not understand about Grant Morrison. While yes, he's a man of many ideas, while yes, some of those ideas appear to have been formed from mists of really, really good drugs, he is also a professional. He does things like foreshadow. He does things like shape distinctive characterization. He basically takes care of the mechanics. He sets his mad ideas on a skeleton.
In a classic moment of melodrama, Misty "decks" Zatanna to take her place, but Morrison throws this moment off kilter with witch-boy in the works. The outcome of the meeting between Misty and Klarion was foreshadowed by chance symbolized by the super-powerful dice.
At this point things look mighty bad for mankind, but Zatanna pulls a rabbit out of her hat. Morrison gets that magic is about "doing the impossible." However, he sells it all with the foreshadowing of the previous series. All of the module mini-series were foreshadowing to place each soldier in the vicinity of where he or she needed to be for Zatanna's spell to work, for Zatanna to in fact save the cosmos through the soldiers. One can argue that Zatanna's spell in fact alters time by shaping the past to save the present and the future, possibly represented by the cards she fires from her sleeves depicting scenes from The Seven Soldiers of Victory series as well as the white outlines of clocks in the backdrop. The Doctor would be proud of Zatanna at this moment.
As impressed as I was by Morrison's writing, J.H. Williams just blew me away. Every section is clearly illustrated by him, but he alters his style in so many ways. The first page is what we expect from Mr. Williams--all shadows and darkness, but on the second page, his style grows more substantial--almost like Escher. When the New Gods make their appearance, he morphs into Kirby. As Arthur treks to find Excalibur, I almost swore I saw Wyeth. In Stewart's sepia tones, Williams puts to press the Manhattan Guardian. He breathes a little with his own style for Zatanna, a style I might add that perfectly suits the raven-haired beauty. He changes his art again for Klarion and brings Windsor McCay to the séance. For each section of the story, Williams creates a signature look for that chapter, and he finds a way to turn all these shifts into an artistic cadence rather than a cacophony.
Dave Stewart's colors must also be recognized. The opening page almost blares at you with psychedelic purples, greens and reds. Stewart in fact almost opens up on the story with primaries that basically belie what's ahead for the eyes. Turn the page, and you learn of all the shades green can have in Gloriana's domain. For Williams' Kirby period, Stewart makes the colors bolder as if to acknowledge Kirby's larger than life products of the brush. Subdued, natural shades swathe Arthur's quest, and with Klarion the colors grow sprightlier. Stewart emphasizes one color, the faerie blue, amid the oranges and browns of the natural world. Outwardly, Mr. Miracle is urban, but the subtext is the outre as influenced by Jack Kirby's Fourth World. For this section, Stewart creates neon flashes and Cherenkov rainbows, and that's how Seven Soldiers of Victory ends with a rainbow of hope.
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