Zeb Larson reviews Wicked + Divine #5…
Showtime.
The Wicked + The Divine #5 is yet another enjoyable issue, but not for the reasons that Kieron Gillen and Jamie McKelvie might have intended. This is the end of the first story arc for Wicked + Divine, and the creators are determined to send it out with a bang. For once, I feel like I can discuss this issue without delving deeply into spoilers, so read on without fear of having the story spoiled.
The basic premise of the issue is the showdown between Lucifer and the other gods. Lucifer seems to be giving the middle finger to all of existence as she duels Sakhmet and Baal. Laura wants to help Luci at any cost, though Luci is truthfully beyond her help at this point. Even Morrigan can’t really make a difference here. This may be a conclusion of this particular story arc, but it’s clearly far from over for these characters, especially Laura.
I can’t help but read this comic as being sharply critical of celebrities and the whole idea of fame. Maybe there’s a love-hate component to this book, and critical Cassandra that I am, I just read into the hate portion of it. So much of what these gods spend their time doing seems to be for the sake of their vanity rather than anything actually interesting. Even the fight with Lucifer is more about her breaking rules of godhood on principle, rather than any attachment to humanity. Ananke says as much when she says that “Generally speaking, gods desire nothing but adoration.” Somebody so attention-seeking and vain would be absolutely contemptible and intolerable to be around.
It also can’t help but be critical of fandom. We as readers might have a hard time understanding the attachment to these beings. Their music can’t really reach us in the way that it does the characters, and what you feel is an odd sense of detachment. Laura is an especially odd character because her sole motivation seems to be becoming part of this pantheon. She has no real artistic voice, she seems to have nothing to say, and she’s basically obsessed with the image of fame rather than any creative process. Her interest in Lucifer is confined, as far as I can tell, in the hope that somehow Lucifer can make her another god. It’s hard not to see her as a stunted human being, and stunted at least in part because there are gods that seem to dwarf everything else around them. Art exists independently of pop culture or fame, and without art, the latter two are basically image.
Kieron Gillen seems to be in on all of this, though. On the one hand, he writes about the lure of fame, saying that the book “is about everything I’ve ever done to turn from obsessive lover of pop culture to creator of pop culture, and all the people I’ve met along the way.” But he also acknowledges that “the cast are all awful people I’d have killed to be.” He seems to pretty explicitly acknowledge the duality of family and celebrity, and this is why I keep coming back to this book even though I deeply loathe just about every character in it.
Zeb Larson
Originally published October 22, 2014. Updated April 13, 2018.
