In the midst of all the DC hoopla this week, you may have noticed something else: Multiversity has been running Morning Glories related content all week. Every day at noon, Study Hall has been going up, covering the first five issues of the book full of notes and annotations that we had previously not done. And why did we do this? Because this week, if for no other reason than we decided it to be, is our Morning Glories Week! Not only do current readers of the book get an in depth analysis of the content, but now I will be providing new readers the reason why they should be reading it if they somehow aren’t. Hello, new readers!
So if you’re already a fan of the book, stay tuned as next week we will be discussing the incredibly complex issues #6 and #10 in Study Hall. Wish us luck.
However, if you’ve never read an issue of Morning Glories, click behind the cut to find some reasons why you should.
On September 22, 2004, the world of modern entertainment changed forever. The show LOST aired for the first time, and with it began an incredibly in depth and cinematic adventure into the realm of science-fiction, offering up a complex and seemingly unsolvable mystery from the minds of JJ Abrams and Carlton Cuse. The show crossed all forms of genres and media, having a corresponding ARG (or alternate reality game) that involved curious websites, hidden easter eggs, and even a fully published novel full of clues and secrets. There may have been things somewhat like it before, but there would seemingly never be anything like it again; the bar had been raised and set. Then on May 23, 2010, the series came to an end, leaving a lot of fans of complex interwoven mysteries at a loss as our beloved show walked off into the light (literally). There was nothing that could fill the void, although several shows tried to do their best.
Then came August and the release of a new book called Morning Glories. Written by a “critically acclaimed” writer I didn’t know and illustrated by an artist whose work I was unfamiliar with, the comic was billed as “LOST meets Runaways” and centered around a school where mystery was afoot and the children who had to deal with said mystery. Well hey, in a world without LOST, all we can do is try and fill the void, right? Nothing will ever be LOST, but it’s always possible to find something like LOST. And boy, has this book decisively delivers on it’s intial promise.
So let’s stop talking about what the book is like, and start talking about what it is. Right from the get-go, Morning Glories pulls you in rather viciously to the unorthodox world of Morning Glory Academy: a school where students actively fight against their teachers with science and explosions, and where death quite literally lurks around every corner. As our story opens, six students who all share the same birthday are accepted as students to the school and are brought in from around the world to attend the prestigious academy. However, the students quickly learn what we already know – things are not quite right here at Morning Glory Academy. With missing parents, mental RA’s, and sadistic nurses lurking around the corner, I clearly mean that in the worst way possible. All of this for a better future.
So what do we have in the first arc alone? Murder. Mayhem. Cylinders. Ghost-things. Pits to Hell. Several explosions. Quantum theories. References galore. Clones (maybe). Secret ceremonies. Bone chisels. Writing on the wall – in blood. Really, just about everything you could want from a comic book that can set itself efficiently apart from the other books on the shelves. And as the book continues into it’s second arc, things get even more intense. Secrets begin to come out, there are twists at literally every turn, and even after having been able to read the 10th issue of the series for about two weeks now (out next week – cool brag, I know), I still can’t fully tell you what happened. Morning Glories is not your average comic book, specifically because it doesn’t want to be. Nick Spencer and Joe Eisma are crafting a story here that looks you dead in the eye and dares you to question what you see in the same way a great Grant Morrison book like the Invisibles (a heavy influence on the book) will, although it does so in a way that’s arguably infinitely more accessible.
Continued belowThat’s the key here: it doesn’t matter where you come from in your reading and entertainment habits. Morning Glories comes out from Shadowline on Image, a creator owned imprint that gives Spencer and Eisma the full freedom they need to deliver the comic on their terms, with no page cuts and everything that Spencer and Eisma want you to see and read. With that in mind, the comic becomes incredibly accessible across all borders, from avid comic fans to people who have never read a comic before and avoid doing so due to the “capes and tights stigma.” I can’t tell you how many times – and I’m sure Nick and Joe can back this up, let alone other members of this site alone – I’ve recommended this title to readers who have immediately been able to get into the book. Here’s something you may find interesting: Study Hall is written by myself and Crit Obara, a fellow LOST fanatic. Before I shoved Morning Glories in his direction, he had only ever read Scott Pilgrim due to the buzz of the movie. That’s it. No other comics. Now he reads Morning Glories issue by issue and co-writes an article on a comic book website about how much he likes said comic. What more evidence do I need?
Nick Spencer is the devious mind behind the title, and it’s easiest the sharpest title that he writes. Spencer is a rather prolific writer at this point, with several books over at Marvel, a nice exclusive, and a creator-owned project or two coming down the line in addition to his current work load. Spencer was able to explode onto the scene with his shorter creator-owned work, but Morning Glories was the title that aggressively demanded the attention of the comic reading public, going through four consecutive sell outs and a recent trade sell out. While I think the sales of the book adamantly speaks for itself, the reason the book keeps selling out on these multiple levels is the content inside. Spencer has crafted a story that only he knows from beginning to end (not even artist Joe Eisma knows how the book ends), and with every issue that comes out the question of what that end is grows stronger. It takes a lot of careful skill to weave a long form mystery in a way that doesn’t entirely polarize the reader from wanting to continue forward, but also becomes more intense upon re-reads. The more you read issues of the book, the more apparent Spencer’s goals become with dialogue revealing new meanings upon different reads. A simple line in issue #1 with no apparent alternative meaning changes after the 9th issue, a spot of dialogue inherently changes after issue #6, and issue #4 makes twice as much sense after the 10th. While many comics become better with multiple reads and time, very few books become better to such an extent as this.
On top of that, all the characters for the title are engrossing. We’re not just following a group of static and typical teenagers dealing with hormones and “just wanting to go to the proooommm!!!”, but rather a diverse cast of identities whose origins are just as odd as the school they’ve ended up in, save one. Thanks to artwork from Joe Eisma (which, as a side note, gets better and better with every issue), we are watching fully formed characters that feel both realistic and fully dimensional in a world that couldn’t possibly exist. Morning Glories was never supposed to be just another comic in your pull, and it’s characters prove that with every issue. With the second arc currently showing us the history of the students and how they got to the school, it becomes all the more clear that these characters are perhaps more complex than your average run of the mill comic book hero or heroine, and I would wager that the character arc Morning Glories has in store for it’s Fab Six and pals – due to the incredibly in depth and interwoven mystery nature of the title – will probably be far more satisfying than arguably any other average comic book currently being published.
Although, as a complete side note, I would love to see what a prom or school dance at Morning Glory Academy would be like. I imagine it’d be like the dance from Carrie, but with more blood.
Continued belowOf course, no great title is complete without a great artist backing the writer’s scripts, and Spencer has truly found a hidden gem with the talent of Joe Eisma. As Eisma told us in an interview, he only ended up on the title for answer a post on the Bendis boards, and given Morning Glories subtle fate-based theme I would wager that such a match is rather fitting. Eisma is an incredibly underrated artist whose work consistently is evocative of everything needed to make a book look great: proper and intriguing angles, great visual pacing between panels, and rather decisive and emotionally evocative characters. It’s impossible to read the book and not care about the characters from the visuals alone, and that is all Eisma’s territory. Eisma is able to try and something new within every issue for the story, and he manages to nail to proverbial landing every time. Morning Glories may be a title with an intriguing and in depth mystery here to pull you in, but it’s Eisma’s art that ostensibly helps the book become as accessible as it is due to the thematically appropriate, brightly colored and eye grabbing artwork.
LOST certainly left a void for media that dares to make you think, research, and question everything; something that becomes truly engaging beyond the realms of simpyl sitting back and enjoying an hours worth of a well constructed mystery program. Thank the Cylinder that Morning Glories was so quick to pick that baton up, because the amount of time I’ve spent with the title at this point is far more than I’ve ever involved myself with a book before, spending hours at a time researching things via Google and becoming familiar with movies, books, science and history that I may never really have taken the time to study before. Nick Spencer has a very apparent goal with the title, and the further you get into the book the more things begin to become somewhat clear while still being infinitely out of your grasp in the most entertaining way possible. With Joe Eisma in the car with him, Spencer and Image/Shadowline have given us a book that – for me – is quite literally at the “do no wrong” status that very few creative teams and titles can earn, and that is very much the highest form of praise I can give the book. With every issue I am impressed more and more, and as the book continues to pick up steam I don’t see that changing any time soon.
Long story short? Just buy the damn book already.
If you are somehow still unconvinced, we do have a myriad of Morning Glories related content on the site for you. Please check out my interviews with Joe Eisma and Nick Spencer with Joshua Mocle about the title (assumedly the first of many to come over the years the title is coming out, provided they let us). We also have Study Halls up for every issue except the 6th and 10th (both of which will be up next week). If you search the site hard enough you can even find my original review of the book when it first came out and I had zero expectations (back when I admittedly was not as good a writer as I am now, assuming you like my writing), as well as my review of the seventh issue that was the catalyst to doing Study Hall with Crit for this site, and I think that the change in tone and excitement between so few issues is rather amusing/indicative of the quality of this title.
