[books] GRANT MORRISON - Seaguy

Morrison was the first Vertigo writer I developed a serious personal attachment to, which also makes him the sole reason that my renewed teenage interest in comics survived the realization that I didn't like The Sandman anymore. In the years since then, the flaws in his work have gradually trashed any loyalty I felt toward the guy, but I still usually like his stuff.

He scales his flights of fancy to the size of the story he's writing brilliantly, which may be part of the reason I keep giving him second chances. The first few issues of The Filth gave the impression that he wanted to rewrite The Invisibles in 12 issues and had actually figured out which parts he needed to drop to make that work. The middle section of his time on X-Men, where he started introducing his own new characters, had perfect balance between establishing the new folks and keeping up with the core X-Men (whom some readers exclusively cared about). And Seaguy bristles with ideas that would fall apart if expanded beyond a three-issue miniseries but are genius within it.

Except Morrison can't write endings. I'm not sure he ever could, and once he found what became his essential themes-- systems of control, meta-universes, conspiracies-- the temptation to end every story with a thin update of the old "it was all a dream!" copout became irresistible.

I have no idea how many times Morrison goes over his scripts, but regardless of what's behind the curtain, his best ideas have a similar spark to good improv. And one of the rules in improvising which he's sadly never twigged to is that you don't say "no" to your own existing framework for a cheap laugh or a cheap freak-out. If you've set up that your mother is coming over for dinner, when the doorbell rings it could be your mother, or a policeman telling you something has happened to your mother, or an unexpected friend who has to be dealt with before your mother shows up, but it can't be the Wolfman, who-- oops!-- you turn out to have sent email to instead of your mother because, you know, people make mistakes.

Fantastical frameworks make it easier to take bizarre left turns in a story without denying what's gone before, and I don't have a problem with that. It's on the other end of the spectrum of self-unraveling blunders that Morrison gets into trouble: when one character is omnipotent and manipulating another character, plot is meaningless.

The first 90% of Seaguy is absolutely worth reading; Morrison's usual inventiveness gives us the horrifying kids' show Mickey Eye and a world left peaceful by the defeat (years earlier) of the malevolent Anti-Dad, but he breaks new ground with the painfully sincere Seaguy himself. Morrison has said that he wanted to vitiate the comics industry's obsession with tough guys, but Seaguy is neither a wimp nor a self-aware pacifist. What he is is simultaneously treacly and calm, a 1950s Buddha pressed into service as a ruined hero. With only minor lapses (a stray reference to Alzheimer's felt out of place) the dialogue does what it intends, giving every character a distinct sound without ever giving the impression that they understand each other. But geez, what a letdown at the end.