The Great Reread Project Mark III - The Letter G

After such a success with The Eyre Affair I found myself at the G’s. I have a surprising number of G authors that I actually enjoy rereading. I’d reread Parke Godwin’s Firelord (great take on the Arthurian legend, and if you haven’t read it, you really should. Arthur as he probably never was, but should have been) a couple of years ago and last time around I did Mira Grant’s Feed (another excellent book. I describe it as the zombie book for people that don’t normally read zombie books), my eyes lit on Soon I Will Be Invincible by Austin Grossman. Austin Grossman is the twin brother of Lev ‘The Magicians’ Grossman, and I actually saw Soon I Will Be Invincible before I’d heard of Lev or seen The Magicians. Of the two brothers I prefer Austin’s books to Lev’s. I was taking a bit of a chance with Soon I Will Be Invincible, as I’d only read it once and that was a few years ago when it first came out, and while I could remember enjoying it, I’ve had my memory play me false (or my tastes have altered) a few times during this reread project.

Soon I Will Be Invincible is one of the earlier entries into the burgeoning super hero sub genre. I still think of the books I’ve read in that vein that it’s one of the best. It reads a little bit like a crossover between two eras of superherodom. There’s the Golden Age characters mixing with the more modern type ones. It’s a bit of a love letter to comics, which for a former hard core collector like me, is awesome.

It’s written in first person, from two different points of view, the chapters alternate between old style super villain Dr Impossible (and it’s really refreshing to see a book written from the view point of the villain) and rising new heroine Fatale. Like Austin Grossman’s other books (he’s written 2 since Soon I Will Be Invincible: YOU and Crooked, also both excellent, particularly Crooked) it’s a fake autobiography. It mostly centres around the disappearance of the world’s most powerful and most loved super hero; CoreFire, and he’s also Impossible’s greatest nemesis, and for that reason everyone suspects Impossible of being behind CoreFire’s disappearance/death, even though he was in custody at the time.

Impossible, in particular, spends a lot of his time in the book going back through time explaining his origin and the connection between he and CoreFire. Fatale’s relationship with the missing hero is different, she never met him, even after she had the implants that turned her into a cybernetic crime fighter, she was a fan and finds it hard to fit into the team he left behind and find her own place within it.

I don’t know how much Grossman based on known heroes, but I get a lot of the Superman Lex Luthor story from the struggle between Impossible and CoreFire. The main differences are that Impossible has super strength and seemingly some invulnerability to go with the big brain he never tires of telling people about and that he was ironically responsible for creating CoreFire, or rather turning him from a good looking jock to the world’s mightiest hero.

The first time I read Soon I Will Be Invincible I polished it off over a weekend, it’s that sort of book, you just keep on reading to find out what happens next. I didn’t read it quite that quick this time, but it had the same effect on me. I often read more than I intended just to read that little bit more. I didn’t remember many characters apart from Impossible, Fatale, CoreFire and Damsel, but this time the character of Elphin really fired my synapses. She was the last remaining elven or fairy warrior on Earth, possibly the only one of her kind anywhere. That was reminiscent of some of the characters I can remember Marvel using, like Hercules and Thor, they also had an actual elemental being in Meggan in Captain Britain (that was a majorly weird, but very good title in its day) and DC also dabbled in mythological heroes with Wonder Woman and her Amazonian background. I don’t think Austin Grossman does sequels (he hasn’t yet), but I’d definitely be up for some more stories about some of the more peripheral characters in Soon I Will Be Invincible, especially Elphin.

Let’s hope H can live up to F and G.

The Incredibles 2004

How do you follow up an amazingly successful animated film about searching the ocean for a missing young clownfish? Simple, you do a fast paced comedy about a family of superheroes.

The Incredibles came out in 2004, just before the superhero boom really kicked in. I personally love it. I love everything about this film. It just does not hit a bum note for me.

I read a lot of comics as a kid and I did often wonder about the logistics of superheroes. What did they do when they got older? Could they not be superheroes? Who paid for the damage that they often caused in discharging their duties as super powered people? Could they get married and live normal lives? Would their kids have powers, would they be the same powers as their parents or not? The Incredibles set out to answer all these questions and more.

Bob Parr is Mr Incredible, a retired superhero (he didn't retire by choice, it was forced on him by the government), he works for a soulless insurance company and longs to return to his glory days. His wife Helen, was once Elastigirl, she's now a stay at home mother, who has issues trying to deal with two super powered children (their daughter Violet can make herself invisible and project force fields, their son Dash has super speed), they also has a baby Jack Jack, but as yet he hasn't manifested any powers, and Helen is hoping that he won't.

Secretly Bob goes out with his old friend Frozone and does some vigilante work. but even Frozone wants to give it up and do normal things with Bob, like go bowling, which is what they tell their wives they're doing.

Bob is contacted by a mysterious and beautiful woman who calls herself Mirage and offers him a chance to get back into the game. He passes her tests and after getting a new suit from his old costume designer, the delightfully acerbic Edna Mode, goes off to do a mission on a volcanic island where his new benefactor makes his home.

Helen works out that something is going on, is supplied with costumes for herself and her family by Edna and leaving Jack in the care of a teenage babysitter, flies off to go find out what Bob has gotten himself into. I should point out that it was not Helen's choice to leave Jack with the unprepared adolescent, that happened when Violet and Dash stowed away with their mother.

In the process the kids will discover how to use their powers and not be afraid to do so, Bob and Helen will realise that they both love superheroing and should never have given it up and how much they love each other and their family.

The villain of the piece is someone who calls himself Syndrome, he's kind of an evil genius inventor, who always wanted to be a superhero, but never had powers, so in revenge he killed all the old heroes and set himself up to be one.

The Incredibles take him down, but then he takes Jack Jack hostage, only for the babies powers (of which he seems to have not one, but many) to manifest in a startling manner. This causes his cape to become caught in his aeroplane's exhaust and underlines Edna's point that capes have no business being part of anyone's costume.

The animation in this one was crisp and clean, but cartoony throughout. I believe Pixar still had problems drawing realistic looking people, so decided to make them look like cartoons. It works. What also worked were the frequent nods to James Bond. The island is remiscent of Dr No's residence in that film, the approach to it is directly lifted from The Man With the Golden Gun and the fact that the base is in a volcano is from You Only Live Twice. Syndrome himself is not dissimilar to Blofeld.

There's also a great short cartoon on the DVD about what happened while Kari was trying to babysit Jack Jack.

Casting:

Craig T. Nelson often played the tough guy parental figure, so this made him perfect for Bob, plus he has one of those deep superhero type voices.

I best remember Holly Hunter from Raising Arizona, where she desperately wanted to be a mother, so to cast her as a mother/superhero made perfect sense.

Samuel Jackson was cast as the retired Frozone years before he played Nick Fury, and like with nearly everything Jackson does he makes it work.

The best bit of casting was director and writer Brad Bird voicing Edna Mode. With her appearance and even the voice I always saw her as being based on Linda Hunt, although I can't find anything that says so, however Bird does a great job.

Pixar regulars Wallace Shawn and John Ratzenberger were cast in cameos as Bob's boss Gilbert Huph (who weirdly enough both looked and sounded like a cartoon version of former Australian Prime Minister John Howard) and a tiny role at the end as a villain who went by the name of The Underminer.