One more person calling Mike Mignolia a genius

After reading Lobster Johnson, which is a weird, little subdivision of the Hellboy-verse, I decided to go back and read the first few Hellboy collections.

And, oh my, it is tasty stuff. People have been saying Mile Mignolia is a genius for years and there is not much I can add to that. (Man, I hope there’s nothing scandalous in his personal life and I’m not praising a real jerk)

What I feel I can bring to the table is a probably delusional sense of historic perspective. I remember Hellboy’s early appearances, mostly due to friends saying ‘Hey! You got to check this out!’ I’m not going to claim my younger self (or possibly current self) had the taste or wisdom to find Hellboy on my own.

One thing I had forgotten was how much of early Hellboy were short stories, scattered among issues of Dark Horse Presents. As someone who didn’t find the stories in order, it wasn’t always easy to figure out what was going on.

But the art was always fascinating, so different from so much of what was out there. We are talking about the era before that particular comic book bubble burst, a world of massive splash pages and gimmick covers. Yes, Mignolia owes a lot to Jack Kirby. Yes, he makes use of light and shadow in a way that would make Robert Wiene nod approvingly. However, the art is also very stylized and distinct when it felt like everyone wanted to be Rob Liefield or Todd McFarlane.

Looking at Hellboy now, it feels like the harbinger of things to come. Comic books have never been only superheroes. Archie Comics and Disney have been making serious bank since the 40s. But in the decades since Hellboy first showed up,  horror and crime and urban fantasy and so many other genres have become more acknowledged in comic books. I’m not saying The Walking Dead wouldn’t exist without Hellboy. I’m just saying Mignolia was ahead of his time.

And the old stories hold up surprisingly well. Mignolia establishes when the stories take place, as opposed to a nebulous present, which helps keep things from feeling unintentionally dated. He mines folklore and older creaters so there’s a foundation to the work. And it’s also just good.

Lobster Johnson was fun but his biggest impact on me was taking me back to Mignolia’s other works.

Is Lobster Johnson an homage or deconstruction of pulp fiction?

I have been reading the different books in Mike Mignolia’s Hellboy-verse off and on pretty much since it began. I was lucky enough to have friends with taste recommend it to me early on. (One of the same guys who introduced  me to Catan, come think of it) 

With that said, bingeing the Lobster Johnson books has been a weird experience. In part because they are not as weird as the rest of the Hellboy-verse. 

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First off, the title character is just called the Lobster. Apparently the Johnson part of the name was added, _in universe_, by pulp writers after his death. His ‘actual’ adventures take place in the 1930s before Hellboy was summoned/born. Honestly, the in-universe pop culture history of the character is the most fascinating part.

The Lobster is a guy who wears a leather jacket and goggles and goes around shooting bad guys with a pistol. That covers so much of the total description of his character that it’s not even funny.

At first, I felt that the Lobster Johnson stories were pure homage to classic pulp fiction. However, as the stories progressed, I changed my mind, that it is a subtle deconstruction.

As I mentioned, the Lobster is breathtakingly one dimensional. However, the people around him are not. He has a ragtag band of misfit assistants who are much more fleshed out than he is and I sometimes wondered why they kept hanging out with him.

Another standup example is Wald, a crime boss who is active in the first story and is in the background for several more volumes. His journey of madness and failed redemption makes him a lot more interesting than the Lobster.

Ultimately, I am gojng to argue that the real protagonist is Cindy Tynan, a reporter who is a reluctant and critical ally of the Lobster. She conveys how he is both a hero and total lunatic. And her arc ends with her walking away.

A touch that I find fascinating is that the Lobster routinely loses fights and takes ridiculous amounts of damage. At one point, someone even tells him that he’s not very good at this and it felt valid. I feel like the underlining message is the Lobster thinks that he is more of a pulp hero that he really is.

In true pulp fashion, though, he is always able to still walk and breathe after each adventure. After he survives a Zeppelin crash, I was starting to wonder if he was actually human.

While Lobster Johnson is no Hellboy, the pulp action hides a slow burning story that has some hidden gems.

Post Script: Couldn’t find a good way to add this in to my main text but I wanted to cover this. While Mignolia is on writing duty for these comics, the art was handled by other artists.  And they do a bang up job of creating a world made up of mostly shadows, particularly Tonci Zonjic. It’s still very much in Mignolia’s line and I can’t help but think of Will Eisner, who was a master of shadow and lights.