Welcome to The Multiversity Projections, our monthly column focused on the Image Comics series “The Manhattan Projects” from Jonathan Hickman and Nick Pitarra. Each month, we’ll be taking a look at the most current issue of the series and comparing notes from actual history and the alternate version presented in the book, and trying to use actual historical data to predict where the series is going next. This is a spoiler-heavy column, so if you have not yet read the most current issue of “The Manhattan Projects”, be warned that many major plot points will be discussed.
The column logo is designed by the incredible Tim Daniel, whose work can be found here.
Disclaimer: I am not an expert in either science or history; all of the information I will be using in this column is either easily found on the internet or is purely my opinion.
If you’ve been granted security clearance, read on for your briefing.
This title is an interesting choice for this issue as, for the first time, it appears that everything is falling apart.
“Clavis Aurea: the Recorded Feynman” is excerpted three times per issue. The Golden Key (the English translation of the book’s title) deals with those quotes.
“Things fly apart. It’s only gravity that brings them back together…and we had no center.”
This quote details how the scope and ambition of the Projects became its downfall. In this issue, we see that the men of the Projects were subject to being overtaken because their focus was on their individual sectors, and no one was looking out for the whole.
The initial feeling I had at each turn this issue was “They should have been ready for this.” But when you’re so powerful/smart/well-funded/isolated, it can be difficult to see just how exposed you are. In addition, after seeing how insane Oppenheimer is, that the other men (no saints themselves, mind you) never suspected him leads to almost a Walter White/Jesse Pinkman level betrayal in this issue – that is, if they even know (yet) that it is Oppenheimer behind everything.
This is not a particularly happy issue for the characters, but this is a hilarious issue for a lot of reasons. From Hickman’s Pronea logo on the spiked whiskey, to the way that von Braun is picked up and tossed around like a ragdoll, there are a lot of really funny visual images that accompany the downfall of the Projects. However, none may be funnier than this image of Daghlian catching Ustinov’s loose brain.
“We don’t talk about the dog. We don’t ever talk about the Goddamn dog.”
Oh, our poor Laika.
First of all, how did I miss that Laika was a girl? It sounds feminine, and the real Laika was, in fact, a female. But for some reason, I just assumed it was a male dog.
Regardless, seeing her come face to face with unexpected aliens doesn’t seem to bode well for the adorable little pooch. How will Yuri survive without her?
A new antagonist joins the Oppenheimer/JFK alliance, and that is legendary general William Westmoreland. Westmoreland is best known for his time as commander of military operations from 1964-1968 in Vietnam, and later serving as the Army Chief of Staff.
This is an interesting guy to bring into the book (which I’ll explore more in the ‘5 Projections’ section), but an even more interesting guy to spend 5 minutes reading about on his Wikipedia page. Ready for some rapid fire Westmoreland trivia?
-He met his wife when he was already enlisted in the Army and she was NINE YEARS OLD
-Until his death, he still claimed the US didn’t lose the war in Vietnam (he didn’t say they won, either, just that they “held the line for 10 years and stopped the dominoes from falling.”)
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-He once said this incredibly terrible thing out loud: “The Oriental doesn’t put the same high price on life as does a Westerner. … We value life and human dignity. They don’t care about life and human dignity.”
“We were so busy looking at Oppenheimer’s left hand, we missed the knife in his right.”
The betrayal of Oppenheimer seems to be a legitimate surprise to Feynman and the rest of the men of the Projects. However, the end of this issue shows that not all is right with Oppenheimer either, and perhaps the schism going on within him can be used to take back control.
When this column started, it was much easier to look at what was being discussed in the book and make some guesses, based on things like timeline, new characters introduced, and a general understanding of history. However, the book has become a gloriously inaccurate alternate history, so the projections I make tend to be one of two things at this point: an observation mixed with a slight prediction, or absolute conjecture. I’m fine with this, and am enjoying the hell out of taking wild stabs at the book’s goals. But, if you’ve missed the more scientifically/historically accurate prognostications, my apologies.
1. No Red and Blue
In past issues, the colors red and blue were used as devices to indicate sides in a battle, usually between innocence/good and corruption/bad. But in this issue, outside of the Oppenheimer personalities (including one self-identifying as “Megan,” which just happens to be the name of Nick Pitarra’s girlfriend), that color scheme has been eschewed. My theory is that there is no more good and evil, outside of the hope that Oppenheimer has within himself of his dead brother. Everything else has been muddled to the point of neutrality. There are no more true heroes and villains in this world – only heroic or villainous moments. Get ready for more of the former.
2. Dissent within the Oppenheimers
This is the first time that, other than Robert (the blue/”good” twin) and the constructs from within Joseph’s brain he is able to bring to his side, we see red Oppenheimers openly disagreeing with their human host. Although Oppenheimer has just pulled off a coup against his fellow scientists, his state of mind may be leading to a cracking of the very essence of who he is – hell, even his eyes are turned against one another.
3. Charon – to grow all the personalities/free himself from their bondage?
We still have seen precious little of Project Charon, but we know a few things so far:
1) It is secret
2) It is the most important to Oppenheimer
3) It is being worked on by “other” Oppenheimers (we see constructs in issue #13 physically working on the tubes)
I have theorized that Oppenheimer wants to eliminate everything else from the world, remaking the world as his consciousness, full of infinite Oppenheimers. So, given that logic, could these large-enough-to-fit-a-human-sized tubes be a way for Oppenheimer to let the various personalities within him gestate before become living flesh? I think so – if you recall from a few installments ago, Charon in mythology is the ferryman who brought souls into the land of the dead. Well, reverse that – Project Charon brings the “dead” Oppenheimers to life. We’ll see if this project ever gets off the ground and, when it does, if it is indeed a way to populate the world with Oppenheimers.
4. Westmoreland as the general for another losing war
As I mentioned before, Westmoreland doesn’t believe that Vietnam was a loss for the US. While Oppenheimer is brilliant, and Kennedy powerful, and he himself a decorated and respected war mastermind, he has in a prison cell another military man in Groves, along with geniuses and near-geniuses from all over the western world. This may, too, be a losing effort on his part. Sure, he has won this battle, as he won many battles in the past, but the war? Well, that’s a different story.
Continued below5. Laika pays for Fermi
Again, I truly hope this isn’t the case (because look at how cute the real Laika was, amirite?), but Laika may be the first sacrifice in the coming war with Raal and his alien forces. If you recall from two issues ago, “Enrico Fermi” was actually a drone sent to overtake Earth, and was tortured and killed by the men of the Projects. Now, perhaps, they are coming for revenge, and our cute little Laika is the first casualty. I hope not. Laika 4 Eva.
This month, I reached out to writer Jonathan Hickman about the direction that this issue forces the book into.
One of the aspects of your work that is present in both your creator owned work and your for hire work at Marvel is world building – you clearly love creating large, intricate universes for your characters to play in. This issue is the first one where the growth of the Projects has been curtailed, and the men of the Projects seem to be entering a period of limited activity. Have we, at least for the foreseeable future, seen the last of the freewheelin’ Projects? What do you hope folks get from seeing the characters with their backs against the wall?
Jonathan Hickman: I think if you’ve been reading the book from the start, we’ve laid out a bunch little threads that we would at some point come back to. At the same time that was going on, we’ve been moving at a pretty rapid pace through the decades — streaking past some fairly significant events in the lives of our characters.
In the spirit of paying proper reverence to both of those things, and starting with number 14, I’d expect a couple of issues of playing with connective tissue. Showing the readers some things in detail that might have greater significance and actually represent a foundation for the even bigger things coming down the road.
It all matters. Everything has a purpose.
Issue #10 was the first peek into Oppenheimer’s brain, and this issue is the first time that we’ve seen someone (Robert) escape it. Speaking of his brain…
…we get another issue dedicated to the world between Joseph’s ears, drawn by the incredible Ryan Browne (who, if you act fast, you can win some awesome stuff from!).
This book consistently surprises me, and that makes it so damn rewarding. Can’t wait for next month!
If you have any comments, questions, or want to point out how dumb I am, leave them in the comments. Thanks for reading!
