The Wicked + The Divine vol. 1: The Faust Act

First it was “Young Avengers.”  Then came the announcement of this title.  At first, all those titles meant to me was that we were going to have to wait that much longer for the promised third volume of Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie’s “Phonogram.”  Yet, “Young Avengers” turned out to be a very clever and inventive story about teen superheroes rebelling against the adults who only think they have their best interests in mind.  “The Wicked + The Divine” isn’t quite as inventive and this whole volume reads like an extended introduction to the cast and its high concept.  It’s still a very fun read and suggests that the ongoing wait for “The Immaterial Girl” won’t be as excruciating as I was expecting it to be.

As the back of the book says, every ninety years twelve gods are reincarnated as young people.  Their talent burns bright for the brief time they are on Earth, as they’re all dead again within two years.  It has happened before (as we see them briefly in the 1920’s) and it’s happening again now.  Determined to be a part of it as a young college student named Laura from South London, and we’re introduced to her as she attends a club performance by Amaterasu, passess out in ecstasy after making eye contact with the goddess, and wakes up to find Lucifer (Luci to her friends) by her side.

You may be inclined to think that this is only the tip of the iceberg of craziness for a series about reincarnated gods, and you’d be correct.  Luci’s troubles, which involve exploding heads, provide both the narrative focus and means of introduction to the pantheon as we see Laura try to help to the best of her abilities.  This doesn’t make for the most compelling of stories as Gillen takes the long way around with the five issues collected here and leaves the central mystery unresolved.  Very little is accomplished in the first volume, save for making sure that we have a decent understanding of why Laura would want to be a part of this group, and introducing us to the key members of the Pantheon.

With Gillen as the writer, however, all of this is far more entertaining than I’m making it sound.  Easily one of the best there is at what he does in the industry right now, his dialogue is alternately clever, funny, biting, incisive, and sometimes all four at once.  He not only has the balls to make Luci the breakout character of the book — “devil may care” as a personality type has never been as fun as it is here — but to consign her to that specific fate at the end of the volume.  The rest of the Pantheon also make striking impressions, from Baal’s “makes Kanye West Look humble” arrogance, Baphomet and The Morrigan’s sneer-and-bitch-off in an underground station, and Sakhmet’s cat god who can’t stop following the red light of foreshadowing.  Even Laura comes off as a particularly developed everywoman, as we see her to be a college student with a stable family life who is willing to push both to the side now that she knows what she wants from life.  Though the narrative didn’t grab me, the characters did as they and their thoughts are made thoroughly entertaining by Gillen’s efforts.

That’s not to say that the efforts of his frequent artistic collaborator are substandard in any way here.  McKelvie crafts striking visual designs for each of the gods that tell you as much about their personalities as their detailed facial expressions do.  Take Luci, for example, who displays her rebelliousness by going around in an all-white suit, and barefoot at the same time.  Baphomet also makes an impression in his first appearance with his open-chested leather getup, complete with occult accompaniments, sunglasses, and a sneer to let you know that he means business.  (Which The Morrigan proceeds to take the piss right out of when she starts speaking.)  The character-driven approach to this volume plays directly to the artist’s strengths and, as always when he works with Gillen, I can’t imagine I’d have enjoyed this as much without McKelvie’s involvement.

One thing worth noting with the art is that it’s not as relentlessly creative in playing with the form and style its chosen medium.  If you go into this expecting more of the clever double-page spreads and moments where characters broke out of their panels from “Young Avengers,” then you might be disappointed.  The thing is that I can see the creators intentions to go completely balls-out on that title as a necessity to try and keep their superhero audience entertained as well as a bit of envelope-pushing in order to have some fun experimenting and seeing what they could get away with on Marvel’s dime.  That’s not to say there aren’t some memorable visuals here.  Once again, see Luci’s “descent” into becoming herself, or Laura’s own descent into The Morrigan’s lair.  It’s just that for a team that is known for visual invention in their works, there’s not as much of it on display here as we’ve seen from them before.

I’m willing to bet that could be down to the fact that they’re in it for a much longer haul on this series.  No sense in blowing your load early, particularly since if you’re the kind of reader that has followed them to Image for this creator-owned title you’re going to trust them to deliver in the end.  We’ll probably see more creative visuals as the series goes on, and as I’ve made clear here my bigger issue is the fact that this whole volume is basically one extended introduction to the cast and concept.  Except it’s a very engaging introduction, like meeting someone new for the first time and finding out that they’ve got a lot of things to say and a way to say them that leaves you in anticipation of what will come next.  That’s “The Faust Act” in a nutshell.