Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Comics, journey into mystery, kieron gillen, marvel

Journey Into Mystery #645 – Once More, With Feels

You know the bit in Buffy The Vampire Slayer, the Once More With Feeling musical episode, where mid-way through her finale song, she turns, looks at the camera and sings "and you can sing along…" Freaked me out the first time I saw it, still get a chill when I think about it, and I totally had that experience when reading the new, and final Journey Into Mystery, beautifully painted by Stephanie Hans. This bit.

Loki lies of course. It is in our power to stop the story whenever we want. And there are a number of places in Journey Into Mystery #645 when we could do just that. We could save all sorts of grief. But we don't. We keep going to the bitter, tearful, angry end. In his outroduction, writer Kieron Gillen says we can write our own happy ending. Because there is no way on Earth he is going to give us one. He hates every single one of you. Every. Single. One.

It's not the final Journey Into Mystery of course. Next month, the book has a new cast and a new creative team. And Kid Loki is putting Young Avengers together. Or whatecver is left of him is. It's not the end of his story but it is most definitely the end of this one. It goes right back to that flight of the ravens that I enjoyed so much, and expands upon it.

So it is the final Journey Into Mystery in any way that matters. In the way that this has become my favourite Marvel book month after month,, and born from some of the most basic editorial needs rather than any desire to tell a good story.

It began in a crossover spinoff, a way to deal with Loki both during and then after Siege, rather than just have him be dead. The book's birth was in editorial necessity, and almost straight away it was time for Fear Itself shenanigans, Journey Into Mystery being used as some bridging plot device. It's had New Mutants crossovers, it's had Thor crossovers, it's been spat out two, sometimes three times a month, it has dropped artists as editorial has demanded exclusive creators work on better selling books, but for all that, possibly even because of all that, the book has absolutely shone. The sticking plaster has become a fully functioning organ that outstrips much of the host body. Okay, I creeped myself out with that analogy, but there you go. A story about stories was a perfect solution to fill this need, a metafiction that managed not to be cold or aloof but injected characters with real humanity, often because they were just characters. The snake served up its own tail in a light bearnaise sauce with curly fries. Seriously look at that third panel up there…

No wonder that, for such a relatively small audience, it gained such dedication. After this issue, I fear for Kieron's life a little bit. Certain his internet-sanity.And I found myself part of that dedicated if small, fan base, which I found myself sucked in against my will. I'm there on Tumblr, expressing feels with the rest of them. I am an almost-forty year old white male in London, what have I become? Is Journey Into Mystery responsible for me going to that My Little Pony party at NYCC? Curse you Kieron for making me this way!

So here we have it. Loki's final fate. The truth about Leah.And a betrayal.

To Marvel's credit, they have believed in this book and this use of the character. Another Marvel, another time, there would have been an insistence that Loki look as much like Tom Addlestone as possible. Marvel didn't do that, or at least they held off as long as possible, and they let Kid Loki live and breathe. There must have been a lot of pressure but it was resisted. And in the end, we got a great story, a continuing character a shared experience.

Just remember that, reading the final few pages of Journey Into Mystery #645. If you want to. There's a really nice place to stop and somewhere inside me wishes I did. Oh for the "Love Conquers All" ending to Brazil…

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