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Brandon Graham's Prophet from Image Comics

By Dan Horn
April 20, 2012 - 12:25

2012 is the year of Image, and here at the Bin we've been celebrating various Image comics for the last few months. The book I'd like to spotlight this week is Brandon Graham's Prophet.

Prophet is part of an Image Comics reboot of Rob Liefeld's Extreme Studios properties, joined by books like Glory and Bloodstrike and Alan Moore's "lost" Supreme arc. As I'd explained previously in my review of Prophet #21, the opening salvo of the new run, it's difficult to identify the original DNA of Liefeld's Prophet in this series, save for the most rudimentary of concepts, and that's not a bad thing. Brandon Graham's reinvention of the John Prophet character and his strange future-shock universe is closer to a 2000 AD serial in nature than to Liefeld's hyper-stylized super-heroics. While I'm not a fan of Liefeld's work, I do have to commend him for supporting phenomenal and unique projects like this.

Prophet tells the saga of biologically engineered humans that rise from the soil of various planets to repopulate those worlds. Each Prophet is nearly identical in nature, except for differing implants and augmentations that make survival in hostile atmospheres and geographies possible.

Graham approaches Prophet's scripting with a cold detachment, a bare, ontological journey through weird, alien topologies. Graham's dedicated constructivism makes scribes like Grant Morrison look like soap opera screenwriters. The vacant narrative builds a thick, uneasy atmosphere for its reader. Prophet takes you by the hand and forcibly guides you through its bizarre, nightmare sideshow, and stunning visuals from Simon Roy and Richard Ballermann and Farel Balrymple and Joseph Bergin III will drop your guard while Graham subtly, distantly picks at the scabs of imperialism and conquest that crust over your indoctrinated belief system.

Perhaps more interestingly, in issue # 22, Prophet became the home for monthly sci-fi shorts. The three that have been featured have all been solid with fantastic artwork, most notably Frank Teran's surreal interiors for "Initiate, part 1" last month. However, Prophet #24's backup, "Shock Post," by Matt Sheean and Malachi Ward, struck me as the most culturally poignant. In fact, I was quite stunned by its commentary: the expendability of troops, the futility of warfare, the indifference of a bullet vis-a-vis rigorous training. This series is quickly shaping up to be the sociopolitically relevant sci-fi comic book that American audiences have required, but were lacking, for years. Buy this book. Now.

Last Updated: August 31, 2023 - 08:12