February 16, 2000...March 2000
(24 pgs.)
TITLE:
A Warrior Princess of Hy Brasil
Grace Brannagh's version
of Promethea is the warrior princess.
Note: variant titles for this issue
could be
Amazing Grace! - after Grace Brannagh
The Scheme of the
Scarletine Sorcerer! - Marto Neptura is the sorceror
The 5 Swell Guys in
Firefight on 5th Avenue (Marv's last memory mix) - shown on pages 2-3 of this
issue
There is a 1947 film called It Happened on 5th Avenue.
Marv's
last memory is of the painted doll shooting him at point blank range.
SYNOPSIS
Whilst Sophie lies asleep in hospital in the kingdom of Hy
Brasil Grace Brannagh's version of Promethea saves Sophie from some manigators
or man lizards. Using reductionism Sophie manages to help Grace to get rid of
Marto Neptura who had usurped Promethea's Kingdom. Meanwhile Benny Solomon
arrives in New York and summons a host of demons to get rid or Sophie/Promethea.
QUOTES
"You're another Promethea" - Sophie
"No, dear. You're
another Promethea. I am the Promethea. I'm Grace Brannagh, and I'm rather
the classic model" - Grace Brannagh, pg. 8
"You've no idea how throughly sick
one can become of torture chamgers, demon altars, hunchbacks and skeletons" -
Grace, pg. 10
"If you're going to be Promethea, I'm sure you'll end up with
much stranger things between your knees" - Grace, pg. 10
"Every time I leave
her alone I come back, she's unconscious and there's some old bald buy feeling
her up" - Stacia, pg 16
"I've finally had about as much of your shaky grammar
and leering descriptions as I can bear" - Grace, pg. 19
NOTES & ANNOTATIONS
Page 1, panel 1: Nice effect of
Kenneth's glasses reflecting the patient in the bed which is repeated on Page 5,
panel 2.
Page 1, Panel 3: Kenneth seems to be able to read minds
better when he is touching the side of a person's temple.
Page 1, Panels 5
& 7: Very nice effect of zooming out from an extreme close-up of the
Panel on the next page.
Page 2: The Dollogram and the Painted Doll are extremely
athletic.
Roger appears to have superhuman powers having just ripped up a
streetlight. Lots of ads in the background a la Blade Runner. Most of the ads
appear to be of a sexual nature. Note numerous bullets in the air as the
dollogram fires off his submachine gun.
Claire Jordan asks a good
question:
Why is the pipe-wrench which Stan is brandishing on pages 2-3
surrounded by mauve light and bubbles, as if it had occult significance or was a
source of static electricity? In a subsequent issue we get the same effect with
a spanner - is this some special power of Stan's? I note there is a flying
eyeball, or a flying camera resembling an eyeball, on page 2 just to the right
of the street lamp which Roger is waving.
Page 3, Panel 1:
Dollogram seems to be a variation of hologram - " a 3 dimensional image
reproduced from a pattern of interference produced by a split coherent beam of
radiation".
Page 3, Panel 4: If you ever wanted to know what it
looked like to see someone firing 3 hollow points into your chest at close range
here's your chance.
Bottom of an Elastagel Street Sign visible besides the
Painted Doll.
Page 4 middle panel(s) Uses the perspective of what I
like to refer to as a Hitchcock shot after Alfred Hitchcock who used this sort
of camera perspective for effect in some of his films
Page 4, Panel 5:
Ally McBeal.
Page 5, Panels 4
& 6: Repeat of same effect shown on Pg. 1, panels 5 & 7.
Pages
6-7: The manigators conversation is almost enough to turn you into a
vegetarian.
Note that there are two suns in the sky. This planet with a
double sun idea was used in the original Star Wars film (1977).
Note the
grasshopper transforming into a missile at the bottom of these
pages.
Pages 8-9: Our first view of Grace Brannagh's Promethea in
action. Nice swordplay
Claire Jordan notes
the band of Maori decoration
on pages 8-9 (or could be Northwest Coast Native American art, which is similar
in style - but the pink bits look like shell inlay which is typical of Maori
art). The Maori-style sun is Grace's personal sigil.
Pages 10-11:
Nice Aztec like figure separating the two pages
Page 10, Panel 3
Lizard Men...Manigators- No doubt from man + alligator
Page 11, Panel
4: Fairyland
Tir-na-nog
Pages
12-13: The planets and constellations in the night sky behind Neptura are a
slight foretaste of a later issue of Promethea.
Flying fish, floating rocks,
Arabian style city with miniarets and two large statues overlooking the walled
city.
Page 12, Panel 1: 1927 issue of Astonishing. There was no pulp
magazine called Astonishing but there was one called Astonishing
Stories and another one called Astounding Good
information about Pulp Magazines can be found at the Pulp Zone.
Panels 2 & 3: Note
the consistency in the typewritten 'a's which are placed just slightly above the
other letters.
page 13 Panel 4: Note the name Ectopia on the barred
door
Definition from Dictionary.com
An
abnormal location or position of an organ or a body part, occurring congenitally
or as the result of injury.
[New Latin, from Greek ektopos, away from a place
: ek-, away from, out of; see ecto- + topos, place.]
Probably the Greek
definition is more relevant than the medical one
Page 14, Panels 1, 2
& 3: "Claws of the Cat Cult, Eyre of Evil...Leech-leaves" - Marto
Neptura seems to have been overly fond of alliterative allusions.
Page 15
Panel 2: More planets visible in the night sky.
Page 17, Panel 4:
We finally learn Stacia's surname Van de Veer although in later issues there is
a slight change to Vanderveer.
Page 19, Panel 2: Glob-goblins -
Another alliteration.
Page 20, Panel 1: Sophie's reductionism reduces
Marto Neptura to 5 smaller versions of himself- one head, two arms and two
legs.
Page 21, panels 4 & 5: The fish are back swimming in the sky
again.
Claire Jordan notes that
when Sophie sets out on "the highway
east from Hy Brasil," Grace is still standing in a quasi-early-Mediaeval archway
but Sophie is walking along a modern tarmac road, with centre-stripe and
electricity pylons.
Page 22, Panel 2: Benny Solomon's full name
appears to be Benjamin (M)eyer Solomon.
Page 22, Panel 3: Note that
this must be an old poster of the 5 Swell Guys as Roger is still a
male.
Claire Jordan adds
I noticed that Marv has been marginalized and
is just a pair of eyes peering over someone else's shoulder. Is this because he
is naturally retiring/more of a "backroom boy" - or has he been marginalized
because he is "the black one"?
Page 22, Panel 4: William Blake
Verve
Pages
22-23:
Claire Jordan notest that
the plane which is taxiing along
Kennedy Airport is made to look like a blue whale, with the folds of the neck
painted on, and the windows where the mouth would be, and a little painted eye.
Do we know what the brown and pink advert which is reflected in the windows of
the car at the bottom of page 22 is for? The visible letters say AXO, plus part
of a letter after the O.
Page 23, Panel 3: Goetia Links
1
2
3
Full Text of
Goetia
or just click this link to download the
pdf.file
Key of
Solomon
Lesser Key of
Solomon
Sigils from
above
72 spirits
Page 24: The demon sitting in a chair with a bandage over his eye
appears to be Marchosias.
The Goetic Spirits and their seals can all be found
here.
The
most visible sigils above the demons' heads include:
Crocell,
Balam,
Bifrons,
Murmur,
Gremory
and Decarabia.