The Maxx - Volumes 1 & 2
Written and drawn by: Sam Keith
Dialogue by: Bill Messner-Loebs
Just as famous for being a monthly magazine that came out every six months, Sam Keith's The Maxx became an instant cult classic of the initial "superhero" line to come out of Image Comics. Overshadowed by the company's incredibly popular necro-hero, Spawn--as all of the other Image heroes were, too--The Maxx treated its readers to a story that incorporated elements of dangerously tangled friendships, prototypical dysfunctional families, the notion that phsical entities could occupy the intangible mindscape and dreams within dreams within other people's dreams.
"Is that you, John Wayne? Is this me?"
Taking the notion that each human being occupies two spaces simultaneously--one called "reality" where we are what we have become and the other a place whose title is designated by the perceiver where we are what we have always wanted to be--and begins to question which of these worlds is truer. What happens when the world inside of us begins to shrivel and The City grows to fill the void? Who is The Maxx: a bum who believes he's a superhero or a superhero who thinks he's a bum? What secrets does his mask hold?
What's behind the mask that The Maxx is so afraid of?
Sam Keith's talent is to keep these questions unanswered but to make the reader believe the solution to everything is just beyond the border of the page. He grounds his topsy-turvy Wonderland in relationships so real--yet so dark--that it's difficult to decide what answers will be more satisfying: from finding out more about the Outback (the dreamscape created by Julie, to social worker) to whether Maxx and Julie will be able to liberate themselves from each other's fragmented psyches to figuring out just what the angle is on the delightfully evil Mr. Gone.
Sorta like Carrie, but with a .38 Revolver.
Needless to say, the artwork perfectly complements the prose as jagged frames of other worlds often pierce through the page. There is a primal urgency to every page and every frame, and there is a lot to be said of the kinetic look of the art and the vibrancy of the prose that the MTV version of The Maxx is a virtually direct translation of the first twelve issues of the book to animated form.
Waiting for wisdom from the head of a giant horse.
At its core, The Maxx is just another story about The Journey, except that this journey occurs not in space but in the mind. Characters don't need to physically travel for self-revelation. They occupy two spaces simultaneously--one of space, one of spirit. One space affects the other, and it's all coming apart. The boundaries of the worlds are becoming permeable, but what does that mean exactly. As always, the answers feel like they're beyond the boundary of the pages on the edge of our consciousness in the place where we dream.
D
Like what you see? Drop us an email at: [Nick] bungalowjones@hotmail.com, [Drew] gronix@excite.com, [ESkalac] skalac@uiuc.edu or [Kate] katedickson@occultmail.com
1 Comments:
The Management whole heartedly approves of "The Maxx."
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