Probably in my personal top three...VIMANARAMA #1-3, DC Comics/Vertigo, 2005
It's the comic most will remember as "the one that sounds like Bananarama", but personally? I freakin' love it. Morrison gives us a comic based on Indian/Pakistani mythology when we've been brought up on Norse and Greek. It's by necessity quite a trip. It's not just Pakistani superheroes either, it incorporates a variety of Eastern styles, such as musical number that comes out of nowhere on page 2, ripped out of your basic Indian movie:
The story centers on Ali, a slacker who gets no respect from his family and has some anxiety about a prearranged marriage to a girl he's never met. "If she's ugly, I'm hanging myself."
He's not kidding! Romantic melodrama, Grant Morrison-style! Actually, Sofia turns out to be quite pretty and clever, but that's not gonna help him when they both awaken some steam-driven demons and some weird-ass Pakistani superheroes from the dawn of time. The end of the world is upon us, but what really gets Ali is that the main super-guy recognizes Sofia as a reincarnation of his long-lost love, and well, Ali's just not in the same league. That noose is gonna come in handy after all!Meanwhile, the "Sons of Flame" (the Kirbyesque steamers) are laying waste to London, and keeping the UK government naked in a room so that they can't act. (It's parliamentary politics, they just need to start a debate about a non-issue like same-sex marriage for that, but I guess they don't know it.) More entertainingly, they rip off the leader of the Opposition's head and make it kiss Tony Blair. That's what I call some hardcore nonpartisan politics, right there!
Did I mention Philip Bond's artwork yet? It's just beautiful and full of little details. After Ali indeed hangs himself, he gets warped into a really wacky afterlife where, as reality breaks down, Bond gets to draw him as signifiers (sorry to bring out my Linguistics course, but this is the first use I've found for it in 15 years):
Ali does get help from his relatives who all die or fall into a coma so are on hand in the Great Beyond, and from Sofia who, it turns out, isn't ready to transcend and become a goddess. I won't tell you how it ends, but it's not how you think. How could it be? This is a Grant Morrison comic and that guy's operating on a whole other plane of existence.
Further Morrison reading:Doom Force
Weird War Tales #3
Skrull Kill Krew
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