Product Information
From Nemo Boko:
Grant Morrison has made the Invisibles a masterwork of magick, conspiracies and reality - this is truly one of the most innately and inherently magickal of all comic books. In fact, it was made as one giant magick spell for the evolution of the species by Morrison - who is quite open about his own magickal beliefs and encourages those who practice magick for themselves and the world. This series is so widely known, it has its own entries in the Wikipedia! Unquestionably, this is a very inspirational and magickal journey in comic book form.
It is almost impossible to talk about the series in brief - but lets just say that the idea goes something like this:
The dark and hidden forces that seek to control, repress and manipulate mankind to increase their own power are challenged by the forces of the Invisibles - a loose global network of magickal cells of creative anarchists, who's very presence is in direct opposition to these darker forces. The comics focus on one group's struggle...
This is Book 1 - and focuses a lot on just introducing the characters and setting up a lot of the magickal, mystical and mysterious elements to come! Such as - invoking the spirit of John Lennon and the search for the Buddha of the Future - Maitreya - who might be a British street urchin!
The next bits will be directly from the Wikipedia - which can maybe explain things a bit better than I can - I will also add in a tiny bit about the book from the Wikipedia - although that will also have a spoiler warning - so don't read it if you want to read it without any prior knowledge!
Note: Cover might be different than shown due to varying editions.
From the Wikipedia -
Say You Want a Revolution
This first collection of The Invisibles is divided into three parts: a one issue prologue and two multi-issue story arcs.
The first issue Dead Beatles has the deputy leader of the Invisibles, King Mob, summoning the spirit of John Lennon to help find a new member of the Invisibles to replace a recently killed teammate John-A-Dreams. King Mob is led to a Liverpool hooligan named Dane McGowan who, after burning down his school library and assaulting a teacher, is sentenced to a juvenile detention school Harmony House. At Harmony House, the demoniacally possessed headmaster Mr. Gelt and his master, the otherworldly King-In-Chains, use A Clockwork Orange-style psychological conditioning to force the boys in the school into mindless conformity. King Mob rescues McGowan only to leave him on the streets of London alone and aimless.....
From the publisher :
Written by Grant Morrison; Art by Steve Yeowell, Jill Thompson and others
Throughout history, a secret society called the Invisibles, who count among their number Lord Byron and Percy Shelley, work against the forces of order that seek to repress humanity's growth. In this first collection, the Invisibles latest recruit, a teenage lout from the streets of London, must survive a bizarre, mind-altering training course before being projected into the past to help enlist the Marquis de Sade.
Vertigo | 208pg. | Color | Softcover |
About the series
The Invisibles was Morrison's first major creator-owned title for DC Comics and it drew from his Zenith strip as well as 1990s conspiracy culture and just about every fringe notion he could find, whether or not he believed in it. His intent was to create a hypersigil with the intention of jump-starting the culture in a more positive direction. Morrison hopes that the comic book will, in the long run, be as influential as the Sex Pistols, though it is too early to say whether this prediction will prove true. Some believe that there is a clear influence on the The Matrix trilogy of films, which is visible from thematic and aesthetic similarities between the two. Morrison believes that the Wachowski brothers essentially plagiarized his work to create the first Matrix film. Others note that certain similarities became most pronounced after the Matrix was in theaters, suggesting that possible plagiarism claims could go the other way.
The title initially sold well but sales dipped sharply during the first series leading to worries the series may be cancelled outright. To stop this Morrison suggested a "wankathon" in order to magically increase sales by a mass of fans masturbating at a set time. It is unclear whether or not he was joking.
Morrison became seriously ill during writing the book, something he puts down to working on the title and how its magical influence affected him. After finishing the book he says he has become a different person from the one who started it. He has also said that much of the story was told to him by aliens when he was abducted during a trip to Katmandu. He has since characterized the "Alien Abduction Experience in Katmandu" as more of an experience to which he has assigned that label/name. He believes that the experience itself actually had nothing to do with Aliens, or Abduction.
