Punk Rock Jesus

Product Information

Joe the Barbarian (with Grant Morrison, 8-issue limited series, Vertigo, March 2010 – present, hardcover, February 2011, ISBN 1-4012-2971-9) Murphy tangles the story in some really absurd parts, "there´s no alcohol in the island, but we have seen Gwen become and alcoholic before and the audience digs that"

The characters are pretty interesting. Chris is certainly interesting for many reasons but the side characters grabbed my attention throughout too. Evil Parents Want Good Kids: Thomas' father agreed to turn informant against the IRA because he didn't want his son to get involved in the conflict. Unfortunately, his brother happened to be a member of the IRA, and killed him before he could reveal anything, then ended up recruiting Thomas into the IRA anyway, making his father's sacrifice meaningless. Although this story has some interesting ideas, and it roots in some real problems of religion and mass media, the main characters are not strong enough or well developed to support a story of the level of the criticism it attempts to make. Chris is accuesed of being preachy and this is how the story feels sometimes. (May it be noted that I am an active Atheist who shares almost all of the ideas Chris preaches about, but they are not quite fitted in the story). Also the general audience opinion of the whole show is never adressed, and we never see a moderate religious person, all of them are one dimensional characters.Break the Cutie: Almost everyone in the story who isn't Slate gets this at some point. Most notably Gwen (who at one point nearly gets Driven to Suicide) and Dr. Epstein. As a collective group, those of us who don't believe in God need to stop acting like belligerent teens and start acting like the intelligent, thoughtful people we claim to be. The next time that Jehovah's Witness is standing on your doorstep, maybe you should offer them a bottle of water before sending them on their way?

Took a Level in Jerkass: The need to debate and fight against a religious norm is debatable. Calling your perpetually-depressed mother who died trying to save you a media whore is not. A few times I asked myself, “would this be as interesting if the clone wasn’t Jesus?” If you took away the Christ element, you would have a story of a boy and his mother broken by the manipulation of media and religion. I think we’d have a story with potential insight into our media-hungry world. The story never proves that Chris is a clone of Jesus. The scientist behind the cloning even has her doubts; she never saw them extracting the DNA from the shroud. Is there anything you've learned or taken from other writers you've worked with in recent years that helped you when writing this book? Batman: Beyond the White Knight (script and art, with Dave Stewart, sequel to Batman: White Knight and Batman: Curse of the White Knight, eight-issue limited series, DC Comics, March 2022 - February 2023) Imagine the Truman Show, except with a clone of Jesus Christ, made with DNA samples taken from the Shroud of Turin...and implanted in a Teenage Virgin.Murphy's comic book work includes the miniseries Batman/Scarecrow: Year One with writer Bruce Jones for DC Comics and the graphic novel Off Road for Oni Press. Usually of a group of religious zealots hoarding guns don't have to wait too long before they meet their maker... 'round these here parts. Batman: White Knight (script and art, with Matt Hollingsworth, eight-issue limited series, DC Comics, October 2017 - May 2018) Shout-Out: Several futuristic guns from various sci-fi films/series are seen throughout the story, including weapons from RoboCop, Blade Runner, Star Wars, Aliens and Appleseed.