4 out of 5

As this is my first opportunity to read Miracleman, the rating reflects both the story/art as well as what the reprints bring to the table.

It’s hard to say if the herky-jerky opening is due to Alan Moore’s youth at the time or if its meant as something of a tribute to cheekier Golden Age times… though since our story starts already with a relatively dark tone, I’m honestly leaning toward the former.  There’s definitely a traceable arc to these first four issues (collecting the bits from ‘Warrior’ and the initial Eclipse re-representations) in terms of the author’s ‘comfort’ with the storyline, getting the feel for Mickey Moran / Miracleman and put pieces in place for what’s to come.  The main hump to get over, I suppose, is the setup.  And perhaps we can attribute the rush to the 2000 AD-like setup of ‘Warrior,’ allotting only a few pages for a story, and – though I’m sure this is documented somewhere – perhaps Moore didn’t realize what he’d end up building toward.  I know he had sat on the seed of a hero having forgotten he was a hero for a while, and that’s the story we’re initially told.  But things blossom, coincidentally right when Gary Leech had to be given some time to catch up with a ‘fill-in’ issue from Steve Dillon that jumps ahead in our narrative, and it’s at that point that Moore’s flow starts to feel a little less forced…  I wouldn’t call it world-building, exactly.  It’s not quite there yet.  The flash-forward feels like the aside that it is, but it might’ve been the narrative shakeup needed to get the ideas churning.  When we return (in issue #3 by the Marvel reprints), our direction feels more assured, the poetry in the author’s voice more natural.  We have also ‘transformed’ our look to something sleeker with Alan Davis, an interesting juxtaposition for the more grounded emotions that start to play out beneath the superhuman ridiculousness on the surface.  Yes, about which other sources (including Grant Morrison’s ‘Supergods,’ I believe) have pointed out is a theme Moore’s been working with in most of his large tales since… but I’m not informed enough to put my own spin on that, so blah blah blah.

So: we have our original ’50s Miracleman, who, by uttering the work ‘Kimota’, is changed via ‘atomic power’ from the human boy Mickey Moran to the titular hero (originally named Marvelman, of course).  This power extends to a couple of other members of the Miracle Family – Young Miracleman and Kid Miracleman – all of this orchestrated (somehow) by a funny named scientist who disappears into the clouds when done.  Moore picks up the thread in the 80s, with Moran grown up and his experiences as Miracleman relegated to dreams, until a traumatic episode makes him realize the dreams are true and he remembers his ‘Kimota’ keyword.  More memories solidify: that in the 60s, the Miracle Family explored a space wreck of an enemy which turned out to contain an atom bomb… it’s explosion causing Mickey’s forgetting of his powers and, to his knowledge, killing the other Marvelers.  …Until Mickey’s Miracleman reappearance causes another survivor to contact him – Kid Miracleman Johnny Bates.  Book 1 deals with realizing the reality in which Moran lives, where Johnny has gone crazy, using his KM powers (vaguely) for his own good and the ‘funny named scientist’ origin turns out to be a drug-induced suggestion to cover up the government experimentation that was truly involved in the Miracle origins.

On one hand, this is no less silly than any other comic, but the hiccup is that it feels a bit silly and over-serious at first.  Gary Leech’s art and scope do so much to give the first few chapters credence, but Moran’s meeting with Bates feels a bit rushed a clunky, and the introduction of the government aspect via an assassin named Evelyn Cream similarly flashy.  The fill-in issue stars the Warpsmiths, a god-like race with such ethereal powers that it seemed to force some perspective on matters: as mentioned, from thence forth, despite the general absurdness of the goings-on, Moore’s telling of it becomes smoother, finding that right balance of contemplation and awe that’s made fantastic stories like ‘Watchmen’ and ‘V’ work.

Marvel’s final reprinting of the material is admirable.  The restoration coloring is amazing, the pages really doing justice to Eclipse’s then-revolutionary colors without it carrying the present day gloss that the IDW Turtles Color Classics have (but that’s a totally different style, so no criticism to IDW – just saying it’s appreciated that Marvel maintained the feeling of the source material).  The books are also wrapped admirably, full-bleed covers and a sleek black back cover.  The backmatter is something of a mixed bag: the first issue is packed with interviews and original strip reprints, but it gets whittled down to art sketches, mostly, by issue 3 and 4.  The price tag shrinks to match that, but they make such a big deal of the backmatter in book 1 that I hope they follow it up with a bit more unique material.  The strip reprints are nice because they give us the proper scope on what Moore was trying to rework, so perhaps those will reappear when they’re applicable to that issue’s story.

Overall, we’re off to an interesting start.  The bonus material, professional presentation, and sense of history leading up to these reprints definitely heightens the reading experience, and the first arc, after some setup hiccups, absolutely leaves us in a compelling spot for things to springboard into even more complex issues.