THE FOUR COLOR GRIMOIRE
MEDITATIONS ON COMIC BOOK DAEMONS
This is part of No Gods But My Own, Volume 2. Read this if you’re just joining in.
KRACKLE KANON, PART 2
INHUMAN, ALL TOO INHUMAN
Jack Kirby had a thing for crafting pantheons. Over and over again, he would boil his ideas into a set of archetypes and let them loose. The Inhumans were one of the earliest examples, first appearing in issue forty-five of The Fantastic Four in 1965, but they could easily stand toe-to-toe with any of Kirby’s other later creations.
Just stop and think about how strange the setup had to look to people then:
On the dark side of the moon exists a menagerie of mutants and oddities gifted with powers beyond those of any human, presided over by a silent king in black. His bride, whose hair writhes and twists with life all its own, translates the slightest gestures of her husband and ruler. It’s hard to tell which job is more important: the queen for her work as conduit and translator or the king for his vow of silence because just one utterance from him can raise mountains and destroy worlds.
It’s epic, poetic, and potent. The Inhuman story displays a complexity that stood far and above what mainstream comics had to offer at the time.
Metaphor was potent in the origins and main cast of The Inhumans. They were introduced as a forgotten race, one that had gone to great lengths to hide from the eyes of man. They did this not only as a shield from violence and persecution but also to maintain their toxic culture of racial purity and eugenics.
The home of the Inhumans was never moored in one place for too long. Since being introduced in 1965, the city of Attilan has been an island in the North Atlantic Ocean, a refuge in the Himalayas, and safe haven in the blue area of the moon. The Inhumans did what they could to insulate their home from the outside world and this started with constantly transporting their dynamic and ever-changing home.
The Inhumans subscribed to a strict caste system. When a resident of Attilan came to age they were exposed to the Terrigen Mist, a powerful mutagen that brought forth astonishing changes. Though individuality was treasured due to the resultant mutations, there was a strong demand for conformity. Everyone exposed to the mist would be assigned their roles in the society of The Inhumans based upon their abilities and could not stray from that position. Those who did not mutate would be exiled to the belly of Attilan to toil in the darkness as Alpha Primitives, a class of slaves left to operate the basic systems of the city.
Due to their seclusion and their insular culture, Inhumans were not allowed to get involved with outsiders. Relationships with non-Inhumans was considered taboo but notable exceptions had occurred. Partnering and breeding within the Inhuman society was mostly decided by their Genetic Council through biological screenings and arranged marriages. Again, these rules were rigid and those who were unwilling to live within those structures would be cast out or executed.
Most stories featuring The Inhumans centered around the dysfunctional nobility and the chaos that emanated from its foibles. They were the melodramas of gods and royalty, creating Kirby's foundation for the myth-building that made the Inhuman stories so unique in comics at the time.
Black Bolt, the king of The Inhumans, otherwise known as Blackagar Boltagon, was exposed to the Terrigen Mists far earlier than most and was gifted with a power stronger than any that had been seen in the history of his people. Bolt’s mutation had made him strong and fast, which were mundane amongst their race, but had also been given the ability to manipulate electrons and the curse of a voice so volatile that it could shatter Attilan with a mere whisper. Due to this devastating power, Black Bolt was held in a soundproof chamber until he could be fully trained to control himself. At the age of eighteen was released after vowing to never speak again.
At this point it’s impossible to talk about Black Bolt without bringing up his brother Maximus, otherwise known as Maximus the Mad. Each of them were defined by shared childhood traumas and the rivalry that spun out from them. Like Black Bolt, Maximus was exposed to the mutagenic mist at a young age. His psionic abilities and amplified intellect didn’t manifest until he was much older leaving him an outcast. He was sixteen when his older brother was released from confinement and his reaction to his brother's freedom was to try goading him into using his voice so that he would need to be put back into imprisonment for not being in control of his massive power.
By the time Maximus had attempted his first coup he was already insane and alone, preferring the company of Alpha Primitives over that of other Inhumans. It wasn’t companionship that inspired his time spent among the slave class, though. It was experimentation and the need for cannon fodder in his constant battle with his brother for the throne of Attilan. This would be Maximus’s modus operandi, attempting coup after coup. Mostly he would fail but there were times that he succeeded, wasting his genius and inventiveness on power grabs and petty grudges with the royal family.
Black Bolt and his brother each embody traits that find themselves in a constant state of opposition. Black Bolt is the personification of dignity and leadership. His story, over and over again, demands he sacrifice for his people and that cycle began with him having to silence his own voice.
Maximus, on the other hand, represents greed and chaos. Through his incessant provocation of Black Bolt he caused not only the eventual death of their parents and innocent inhumans caught in the crossfire but also brought about his very own madness and Black Bolt’s ascent to the throne. His story always settles back to that selfishness and perpetual conflict which brings us to the focus of both men’s affections: Medusa.
Like her legendary namesake, Medusa’s power came from her snake-like hair. Through psychokinetic control she was able to manipulate her prehensile locks, utilizing them as a weapon, a tool, and sometimes to imprison her enemies in a tangle of crimson hair. As the bride of Black Bolt, Medusa was the queen of The Inhuman royal family but also served as his interpreter, an ally in battle, and was well versed in the bureaucracy of Inhuman society.
Medusa appeared far earlier than the other Inhumans, showing up as a villain and member of The Frightful Four, a group brought together as a tonal antonym to The Fantastic Four. The amnesia that caused her to join up with that group of ne’er-do-wells was a direct result of one of the many conflicts between Black Bolt and Maximus, one rooted in spurned love and romantic competition.
During Black Bolt’s time of isolation he had just one repeat visitor, his distant cousin Medusalith Amaquelin who would later be known as Medusa. It was during these visits that she learned to read Black Bolt’s body language and the two of them not only developed a non-verbal rapport but also began falling in love. This love would be seen by Maximus as just another thing that Black Bolt had stolen away from him and would inspire him to pursue her with just as much fervor as he did the throne.
The Inhuman Genetic Council responded strongly when Medusa became pregnant with Black Bolt’s child, requesting that they abort the child out of fear for the potential within the child to manifest Maximus’s madness or Black Bolt’s raw power. Medusa, unwilling to bend to the council’s decree, fled Attilan with her unborn son and hid amongst the humans until his birth. Later her and Black Bolt would reconcile but only after she turned their son over to the council for evaluation.
Medusa embodies love and commitment like few other characters in comics which is especially potent since she first appeared during a time when females were treated more like whining accessories than strong, independent human beings. She is a ferocious protector of her family and her society and is always ready and willing to provide her special talents on the frontlines beside her husband and cousins Karnak, Gorgon, Triton and her sister Crystal.
When the Inhumans were introduced in issue forty five of The Fantastic Four, it was in the form of an unlikely duo who went on the run from the royal court and landed on Earth. Crystal and Lockjaw, her gigantic dog-like companion with powerful teleportation abilities, came to New York in search of Medusa during her villainous years. Crystal’s power was to control the four elements: earth, wind, fire, and water. Like her sister she was the essence of pure loyalty and fearlessness in the face of sometimes apocalyptic circumstances.
Karnak and Gorgon displayed the impact of forces in opposition choosing to work in tandem. Gorgon was all anger and bluster, his hooved feet able to emanate seismic blasts of great strength, while Karnak the Shatterer wielded powerful insight and could see the weakness present in any form. When faced with a labyrinth one would destroy the walls in waves of noise and fury while the other calculated a path of escape, finding the slightest crack in the problem to achieve the same outcome.
As Black Bolt’s bodyguard Gorgon had to train to be an unyielding fighter and took his knowledge to the classroom, helping train newly mutated Inhumans with their newfound powers. The strength Gorgon displayed over and over again came not only from the physical mutations brought on by the Terrigen Mists, which gave him enhanced strength and the legs of a bull, but also from his sense of civic duty.
Over the years Gorgon had found himself on the side of social justice, fighting both for the rights of his cousin Medusa but also for the freedom of the Alpha Primitives. When the genetic council attempted to take Black Bolt and Medusa’s baby, he assisted in her escape to Earth from Attilan and helped keep her hidden away from her pursuers.
Karnak was just a child when his life mutated in unexpected ways. After seeing his brother's mutation go wrong Karnak's parents disallowed him from getting his mutation, choosing instead to leave him with the monks at the Tower of Wisdom to train. This is where his ability to suss out the flaws in everything originated and implanted the deep indoctrination that put him at odds with the royal family many times, bringing him to join the search party to find the pregnant Medusa while she was hiding in Earth. Although he eventually did receive a mutation from the Terrigen Mists, he didn't need them to metamorphose into something else. Discipline and training was all he needed to see the world from a perspective askew of his peers.
Karnak personifies the concept that focusing only on the flaws in everything, no matter the consequences, you are left with a life of only flaws without room for beauty, happiness, or true companionship. Karnak lives with logic taken to its farthest conclusion and always finds himself in a lonesome and anxious world that is in a constant state of falling apart or being destroyed by his own hands.
This leaves the most distant and isolated member of the family, the aquatic Triton. His isolation wasn’t by choice. It was by necessity. When Triton was exposed to the Terrigen Mist his skin was replaced by scales and he could no longer breathe outside of water without mechanical assistance. Not only could he remain underwater indefinitely but his body had also adapted to travel in the deeper sea because the mutation had given him resistance to cold and the strength to not buckle under the pressures of the deep sea. His was the change so extreme that his parents refused to allow his younger brother Karnak to receive the mutation that was his birthright.
Triton shows us that sometimes the price of change is complete and total ruin, that wreckage also has the potential to open gateways previously unimaginable. He also shows that once those pathways have opened they are truly difficult to forget or close off. When Triton chooses to return to the world he was born into, he needs a costume, his breathing apparatus, to only find an approximation of the life he once had. It’s only within the change that he can be truly comfortable.
I wanted to start here, with The Inhumans, because they can serve the same purpose here that that did when they first appeared in 1965. During that first appearance Crystal and Lockjaw took Johnny Storm of The Fantastic Four on a trip that opened up his world and served as a true gateway to wonder. It was when that series truly found its footing as a place of exploration and the pursuit of awe, which is what we all look for when we begin the process of finding the path toward magic in our world. No occultist ever started to practice because they wanted a world with walls too high to scale. They start because they want to tear the walls away and find a world without the overbearing confines of mediocrity.
The story of The Inhumans is also significant because it espouses a kind of cultural shadow work that is missing from many superhero narratives and carries underlying themes of eugenics, caste and racial divisions, sexism, familial dysfunction, and generational abuse. Where other stories might shy away from the dark, opting to remain in the light of utopian dreams of wonder, The Inhumans never shied away from wallowing in the darkness beneath that dream.
Though we may never find ourselves stumbling through a portal ripped through space by a dog the size of a Volkswagen Beetle to a city forgotten to time but we are looking to have our minds blown and perspectives broadened. The Inhumans are just the first step on a much longer journey toward Jack Kirby’s broader ideas and philosophies, his most idealistic and human ideas, hidden well beneath bestial shapes and behind masks of obscurity.
That's the real core of it all. Jack Kirby saw us all as beings who could transcend and be luminous, finding our better angels in the adventures of costumed heroes and inhuman oddities.
Take my hand, mutate, and follow me through this portal of wonder. There’s so much more to see.
SUGGESTED READING
The Inhumans: The Origin of The Inhumans by Stan Lee and Jack Kirby (Marvel Comics, 2013)
Marvel Graphic Novel 39: The Inhumans by Ann Nocenti and Brett Blevins (Marvel Comics, 1988)
Marvel Knights Inhumans, issues 1-12 by Paul Jenkins and Jae Lee (Marvel Comics, 1998-99)
Tune in next week for the third installment of THE KRACKLE KANON-WHEN THE OLD GODS DIED.
I want to thank y’all for sticking around and indulging me on my esoteric deep dive of super-heroes, comics, and cartoonists. This has been an absolute pleasure for me and I hope it has been for you, too.
Until next time,
EJM