Animal Man Vol 3: Deus Ex Machina

Writer: Grant Morrison
Pencillers: Chas Truog and Paris Cullins
Collects: Animal Man issues 18-26
Published under Vertigo

Review by Aalok Joshi

As promised, this is the review of the last of the three collections of Animal Man by Grant Morrison (you can catch previous reviews here and here) which is quite superior to the previous two volumes, in that much it presents a series of events without missing a beat. Most earlier stories seemed like collections of single issues (which worked pretty nicely, in fact) but here it’s nice to see Grant tackle a serial storyline, well until the last issue at least, but here we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

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Animal Man: Origin of the Species

Writer: Grant Morrison

Artist: Chas Truog, Tom Grummett

Published under VERTIGO

Collects: ANIMAL MAN issues 10-17, origin story from SECRET ORIGINS

(SPOILERS continue, though no interior pages this time around! )

And I continue into Vol 2 of the unbridled harrowing rollercoaster ride that is Animal Man. I think the only problem I’m going to have in this series is I’m going to hate to see it end. But end it must, eventually.

Animal Man by Grant Morrison

ANIMAL MAN

Writer: Grant Morrison

Artist: Chas Truog

Published under VERTIGO

Collects: ANIMAL MAN issues 1-9

Reviewed by Aalok Joshi

Colossally MAJOR SPOILERS ahead…if you have decided to go and buy this book and read it, STOP RIGHT HERE! If not, well, this post gives you umpteen reasons to, including select samplings.

With the slowly and steadily growing mess that is my life pushing my insides out, I find far and few books that are as satisfying a read; driving me towards the fringes, far from the relative comfort zones of the standard Superman , Batman or Flash story and into the morass where the more seedy characters lurk…not all of them are seedy, just…odd. Places inhabited by THE QUESTION , GREEN ARROW, SWAMP THING & ANIMAL MAN.

In particular, when I was reading Batman under his current scribe Grant Morrison (I know that other people do write Batman currently, but the one Grant is writing, whichever it is becomes THE Batman book, just like there are starters, appetizers, desserts but there is always THE main course) I figured that Morrison has always brought some sort of interconnection between his titles, so his titles, whatever they are would always benefit from an individual comprehensive read, and later point out to where they fit into his whole picture. His first work for DC Comics was a portrayal of a lesser known character ANIMAL MAN.