The Extremist

Vertigo Resurrected

by Peter Milligan, Ted McKeever

Dopo che qualcuno ha ucciso il marito di Judy Tanner, il desiderio di vendetta della donna la porta ad indossare i panni di "The Extremist", l'identità segreta che suo marito portava sia come assassino prezzolato, sia come frequentatore dei più estremi club privé.
Ritorna finalmente in volume una delle miniserie Vertigo che hanno reso famoso Peter Milligan (Justice League Dark, Hellblazer).

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Mystery, Sequential Art, Graphic Novels Comics, Erotica

96 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Librarian note:
There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name

Peter Milligan is a British writer, best known for his work on X-Force / X-Statix, the X-Men, & the Vertigo series Human Target. He is also a scriptwriter.

He has been writing comics for some time and he has somewhat of a reputation for writing material that is highly outlandish, bizarre and/or absurd.

His highest profile projects to date include a run on X-Men, and his X-Force revamp that relaunched as X-Statix.

Many of Milligan's best works have been from DC Vertigo. These include: The Extremist (4 issues with artist Ted McKeever) The Minx (8 issues with artist Sean Phillips) Face (Prestige one-shot with artist Duncan Fegredo) The Eaters (Prestige one-shot with artist Dean Ormston) Vertigo Pop London (4 issues with artist Philip Bond) Enigma (8 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo) and Girl (3 issues with artist Duncan Fegredo).

Series:
* Human Target
* Greek Street
* X-Force / X-Statix

Reviews

[Baba · Rating 4 out of 5]

Clever and compelling mini-series looking at a clandestine Order, whose order is maintained by using The Extremist. The Extremist is more than just an individual, it's a way of life, and this is the story behind the masks of The Extremists. 8 out of 12 Four Star read.

2013 read

[J.G. Keely · Rating 4 out of 5]

My continued exploration of Milligan's oeuvre uncovers more surprises. I know from 'Shade' that he isn't afraid to challenge himself and tell a different story, but the sheer breadth of themes and genres he has tackled continues to surprise me.

Looking through Moore's work, you can see his obsession with certain ideas playing out over and over: the power of magic as a symbol, the interaction of violent political structures, and the way stories are built from half-truths and zeitgeist. Milligan has none of this translucence: each story is different, and the author remains strangely opaque.

It produces a kind of mystery for me, the same sort that encircles Shakespeare. When an author can write so much, on so many topics, with humor, wit, and vibrancy, and yet keep their own preferences from interfering, one marvels at the control they exert over their medium, and over themselves.

The story even unfolds differently. There is still that sense of unfinished pieces which must be put together until they can finally be seen as some kind of whole, but the tone and structure are very different from his other works.

The story is still one of human experiences, told through the particular views of characters, but the variance of experiences and characters ensures that there is relatively little overlap. Clearly, Milligan is not satisfied to pick apart the same ideas over and over, instead constantly driving himself towards unusual and difficult challenges, a goal admirable to pursue and impressive to achieve.

As I continue to work through what he has created, I hope that he continues to maintain this standard, not that it would be reasonable to expect. Already, he has shown himself capable of not merely one masterpiece like 'Shade', but to keep creating wholly new, brilliantly realized visions.

The Extremist is not his most groundbreaking work, and for all its concentration on conspiracy and mystery, it wraps up rather cleanly in a confrontational twist that recalls the overplayed conclusion of 'Skin'. But it otherwise bears the hallmarks of a strong Milligan story, transplanting you wholly to a new world of inexplicably familiar people, all bound up in a dreamlike skein of overlapping emotions and experiences.

Yet there is always something that reaches through the clouds to cruelly and unerringly transfix the reader, some combination of verisimilitude and sympathetic confusion. Truly an idiomatic style.

My Suggested Reading In Comics

[Devon Munn · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

Quite an interesting and twisted story. Although i found that when the book then jumped into a flashback to explain the history it made the story feel disjointed and i found the ending anticlimatic

[Benjamin · Rating 5 out of 5]

An unflinching psychosexual thriller. Milligan's poetic script is perfectly paired with McKeever's expressionistic visuals. I read this over the course of the evening and could not put it down. An essential stop on any survey of Vertigo's golden age.

[47Time · Rating 5 out of 5]

There's a long list of rules, some written some not, that define modern civilization. This story explores what happens when someone ignores the rules, becomes a killer and turns taking the life of his targets into a sexual obsession. The four parts of the story aren't chronological, which adds some fun twists, though I expect even the normal timeline would have been just as enjoyable. Each issue is narrated in the first person by the main chracters, which reveals each character's inner struggles that lead to pivotal changes in their lives. The Extremist suit doesn't destroy the lives of just its targets, but also its wearers.

Jack Tanner was the assassin called the Extremist who works for the Order. With Jack killed, his wife Judy decides to don the latex suit and assume the Extremist identity to discover Jack's killer. The Order has influential members that engage in orgies where the Extremist is a star attraction in the dominator role.

Judy is obsessed with her alternate identity, even with the suit itself and takes great pleasure in wearing it. Punishing Jack's killer isn't as fulfilling as she expected. With her mission completed, she tries to put the suit away, but Patrick convinces her to reconsider. He is Jack's real killer and worked with him when he was the Extremist.

The second issue goes back in time to when Jack was alive, in the suit of the Extremist and working with Patrick. He silences a journalist that infiltrated the Order, but sees killing his wife as wrong, though she tried to expose the Order with her husband's findings. Jack reluctantly does the deed, but the Order's rapings and pedophile acts convince Jack to leave it behind forever. He gets killed before he can do it.

Judy finds Jack's audio journal and, in her grief, gets drawn to the Extremist costume. Her first kill for the Order makes her commit to the suit wholeheartedly.

A nighbour named Tony Murphy finds one of Jack's tapes. He is quite distraught by what he hears. His curiousity makes him break into Jack's apartment where he finds Judy's tapes recorder while she was wearing the suit. He becomes obsessed by the Extremist suit, just like Judy was, and with finding out what happened to Judy. This causes troubles in his family. It ends tragically for him when Judy tracks him down and kills him.

[Sophia K · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ok, finished! Took me soooo long because I lost the book for about 3 months... (I actually removed it from my currently reading list because I have given up all hope of finding it)
I don't think it was my think. I found the story a bit tiresome and repetitive .

[Derek · Rating 4 out of 5]

this is a noir, weird and fetishised but brilliant murder mystery that doesn’t stray too far into that place where art loses its edge and becomes tasteless. it’s well written and drawn and beautifully paced. i loved it. wish there was more.

[Drew Canole · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoy Ted McKeever's art but don't like his writing. So a matchup with Milligan in the 90s feels perfect! Except it's also a bit of a letdown.

Milligan writes an odd story here. "The Extremist" is a BDSM-like costume worn by Jack - who in all other things seems like a normal guy. After he dies his wife discovers his secret life and picks up the costume. The Extremist goes around to creepy clubs, basically Eyes Wide Shut sorta sex cult underworld but a bit more seedy. Also doing lots of murdering.

It's about normal people putting on a costume and living out their secret deep-seated fantasies.

[Paul · Rating 4 out of 5]

Originally published as a four-issue mini series. The miniseries took what we're supposed to see as superheroics to their most risqué. Murder, sex, amorality – anything is permissible with the suit on.
THE EXTREMIST follows three ordinary people who succumb to the allure of a mask and a costume and all the power that comes with it, creating a shocking and controversial exploration of the nature of freedom and sexuality.

Problem is, not once did I associate the Extremist with superheroics. The leather clad character reminded me more of a serial killer in S&M leathers than anything else. The only interesting twist is that the "costume" is taken up by 3 different characters (geez, I hope they took it to the dry-cleaners before putting it on). All 3 characters are easily mainipulated by the S&M mafia-like-chief hedonist bi-sexual boss.

Judy Tanner, grieving after the murder of her husband Jack, desires to get revenge on the murderer. She submerges her identity into that of "The Extremist", an alias her husband went by in both his life as a patron of the most extreme sex clubs, and as a hired assassin for a shadowy organization called "The Order". Judy eventually murders a woman she believes to be her husband's killer, but later learns the real killer was a man named Patrick, the "Chief Hedonist" of the Order. Patrick claims he killed Jack in order to manipulate Judy into becoming the Extremist, and manipulate her into killing an innocent woman to "liberate" her from her bourgeois moral system.

After Judy goes missing, her neighbor Tony Murphy attempts to find her, while discovering more and more about what "The Extremist" really is, and is both ashamed and titillated by his discoveries. In his quest to find Judy, Tony's obsession prompts his wife and newborn child to leave him, although he does eventually manage to track Judy down, after which a thoroughly indoctrinated Judy kills him to prevent him from exposing her activities or those of the order.

[James Schneider · Rating 5 out of 5]

I knew going into this that this book was completed during McKeever's dark period, and he is less in love with his for-hire work than his creator owned stuff, but this book is fantastically beautiful. The story isn't anything groundbreaking, but the art his heartstopping and worth the price of purchase alone. Enjoyed this one enormously.

[Vittorio Rainone · Rating 4 out of 5]

Il costume guida l'eroe, il costume lo trasforma. Lo eleva dalla sua condizione precendente, lo rende meno umano, più estremo. La storia di extremist è questa: 3 persone girano intorno a un costume in lattice, maschera del protettore di una setta di depravati. C'è l'estremista iniziale, che vive la sua doppia vita con una moglie per cui nutre affetto ma un poco celato disprezzo, e si libera solo quando indossa la sua identità estrema. Peccato che il gioco lo logori, finchè non esce di scena, ucciso da uno dei capi della sua stessa setta. La moglie raccoglie il suo lascito: trova per caso il costume, viene per caso a scontrarsi con la vita nascosta di suo marito, ci si immerge per trovarne gli assassini, li scopre e ci va a letto. Cambia, accetta la sua condizione. Il terzo personaggio è il vicino, che per caso conoscerà il costume, ne subirà l'influsso riuscendo a neutralizzarlo, ma finirà vittima inevitabile. The extremist è una riuscita riflessione sul rapporto fra uomo e costume, fra azioni e autorità (auto?)imposta. Il racconto è bello e soprattutto ben architettato, con storie ad incastro che si avviluppano fino alla conclusione. I disegni sono carini, non eccezionali, volenterosi ma non stilosi come vorrebbero.

[Gonzalo Oyanedel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Tras enviudar en violentas circunstancias, Judy Tanner descubre la vida oculta que su esposo Jack mantenía bajo una sórdida identidad; supuesto protector de una sociedad secreta cuyo traje fetichista libera el lado oscuro y reprimido de quien lo calza.

Publicada en los primeros años del sello Vertigo, The Extremist acusa la intención transgresora compartida por muchos títulos de esa etapa inicial al no buscar la empatía del lector, sino enfrentarlo con los deseos que anhela bajo su máscara personal sin las restricciones ni los convencionalismos cotidianos. Al enfundarse el traje, el ente que surge desecha tabúes y abraza un filoso hedonismo al costo de su individualidad; barrera última contra la que arremete este iconoclasta alter ego impulsado por su guía, el manipulador Patrick. Judy, Jack y hasta el vecino Tony serán el canal de un relato gratamente incómodo que firma el magistral Peter Milligan e ilustra con maestría Ted McKeever, dupla perfecta para una miniserie aclamada en su momento, aunque de pobre respuesta en ventas.

[Jordan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very Peter Milligan-y book from Peter Milligan, once again exploring theme of somebody with a dull existence being shocked out of their routine and journeying into some sort of psychotic and depraved lifestyle (think Fight Club, etc.) I've finally taken notice that he explores this quite often, but it always works for me, and the stories are varied and witty and exciting enough to be worth reading every time (he can really stun you with a line of dialogue.) I really enjoyed this one, which had me really hooked by about halfway through. No spoilers...but it's well worth reading and too bad DC hasn't seen fit to properly collect it.

[Terry · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve read this book repeatedly. And by “read” I mean absorbed every aspect of it. I bought it when it first came out and it blew my then mind. The writing and story was one thing (it was/is NOT afraid of its place on the fringe, culturally, especially for its time) but the ART is what completely up-ended my world at that time. Ted McKeever changed everything I thought about comic Art, and I can’t thank the whole creative team enough.

Entirely biased 5-stars.

[Christina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I found it short, but satisfying. Well built story. I can't believe it's just 4 issues, that's sad.

[Tetsuo · Rating 3 out of 5]

Podia ter sido menos previsível

[Variaciones Enrojo · Rating 4 out of 5]

Reseña de José Torralba y Toni Boix para Zona Negativa:
http://www.zonanegativa.com/the-extre...

Introducción y notas a la edición
Pongámonos en situación. Es 1993 y el guionista irlandés Peter Milligan, tras un brillante comienzo en 2000 AD y un paso afortunado por Eclipse Comics –para la que concibió Strange Days junto a otros escritores– tiene desde hace cuatro años un trabajo estable en una de las dos grandes: DC Comics. Así, en plena resaca de la llamada “Invasión Británica”, Milligan desarrolla con bastante libertad creativa miniseries como Skreemer o Skin, guioniza series regulares de la talla de Shade, el hombre cambiante y Animal Man, e incluso se permite el lujazo de marcar los tiempos al mismísimo Hombre Murciélago. Y en éstas, siguiendo su estilo personal e inclasificable, produce dos de los trabajos más convulsionantes de la década de los noventa para un pequeño sello, de reciente creación dentro de DC, y que estaría llamado a convertirse en bastión de las obras personales de muchos creadores: Vertigo. ¿Los cómics en cuestión? Nada más y nada menos que Enigma (de la que hablaremos próximamente) y este The Extremist, que analizamos hoy y que, vista con perspectiva, resulta el trabajo favorito de su propio autor aún hoy en día.
Descrita como un “thriller erótico” –tan salvaje por otra parte como para que su verdadero creador, Brendan McCarthy, le pasara el encargo a su amigo Milligan diciéndole que “era incapaz de hacer el esfuerzo de dibujarlo”– The Extremist se publicó acompañado de no poca polémica al otro lado del Atlántico. Aclamada por la crítica, pero con unas ventas mediocres, el boca-oreja no pareció funcionar y sus derechos se quedaron en el limbo, descartándose la edición española…
… hasta que en 2003, Alecta/Recerca suscribe un pacto con DC Comics y Norma Editorial según el cual adquire los derechos en nuestro país para algunos trabajos “que parecían tener una difícil edición en España”. Y como Norma seguía teniendo los derechos del logo de Vertigo, desde la editorial se sacaron un sello de creación propia –De entre los muertos, en honor a la película de Hitchcock– para sacar adelante el proyecto, escogiendo como primera publicación precisamente el tebeo de Milligan.
Por supuesto, The Extremist está hoy descatalogada y aunque puede conseguirse en algunas tiendas que todavía la conservan, quedan muy pocos ejemplares. Una auténtica lástima, porque tanto su potencia argumental como la edición que realizaron los chicos de “la R que mira” es una auténtica gozada: papel de un gramaje excelente, una reproducción cuidadísima, portadas originales, una traducción estupenda (excepto un par de giros, pero es despreciable y se entienden) y un máximo gusto. La única pega es la ausencia de más extras, pero bueno… tampoco hay que ponerse muy puntillosos. ¿Merece una reedición? Mi respuesta es un rotundo SÍ.

(...)

Valoración personal
El artículo ha sido largo y no conviene pecar de pesado. Lo único que tengo que decir es que, independientemente de lo que opine Milligan, para mí ésta es su mejor miniserie de lejos: tremenda, densa, poliédrica, inagotable en sus posibles perspectivas y análisis, perfectamente dibujada, formalmente sorprendente… en una palabra IMPRESCINDIBLE. Sé que hay lectores míos, cuya opinión tengo en altísima estima, a los que no les ha satisfecho. Respeto su opinión, por supuesto… pero he de decir que independientemente de si acaba o no gustando, éste es un cómic que se debe leer. Aunque sea para acabar harto de él y odiarlo, da igual; pero conviene tenerlo en la biblioteca.
Y más, muchísimo más, si se es lector habitual de superhéroes. Porque donde otras obras tienen unas propuestas argumentales tan elevadas que restringen el círculo de posibles lectores, ésta establece una serie de escalones de análisis para cualquiera que se acerque a él. Donde otros tebeos tienden a confundir provocación son subversión, reinvención con caricaturización, éste alcanza el éxito. Así que ya sabéis: mi recomendación es que, si no lo tenéis os hagáis con él inmediatamente.

(Reseña completa en http://www.zonanegativa.com/the-extre... )

[François Vigneault · Rating 4 out of 5]

I've been rereading some of the old series I recall from back in the day (this one is from 1993/94, published by the then very new Vertigo imprint). Very interesting to revisit a book like this, with its themes of sex, violence, and race, more than a quarter century later. Not only has the culture moved and shifted, my own experience and awareness is quite altered.... For instance picking this up now the now vanished, scuzzy pre-dot-com-boom San Francisco setting jumps out at me, having lived in the city for nearly a decade, but when this came out I was still in high school (!!!), I wonder if I even recognized references to "The Western Addition" (perhaps "The Haight"). Now the book's nods to classic noir and tales of obsession like the film "Vertigo" are much clearer.

"The Extremist" is a taut story of psychosexual horror, and could I think be easily translated to the screen (much like another Milligan book of the time, Face). The story here is simple: A woman finds out that her husband was a member of a clandestine sex cult called "The Order," and soon finds herself taking on his role as "The Extremist," a leather-clad, sword-wielding enforcer. The Extremist costume itself, a tangle of leather straps and with a metal ring on its mask serving as an all-seeing Cyclopean eye, emerges as a character in its own right, impassively watching the human drama that unfolds around it. All in all great, visually iconic stuff that could translate well to a noir-inflected horror film.

The characters are almost all nasty and unpleasant people (BDSM and kink swiftly open the floodgates to overt racism and somewhat more obliquely-referenced rape), and Ted McKeever's drawings are purposefully unpleasant, rough graphic slashes and drybrush, the characters all angles and sneering lips. Almost all the superficial sexiness is (appropriately) drained out of the story to reveal something deeper, darker, and crueler.

The narrative takes an interesting turn when the focus changes to Tony, a salt-of-the-earth, working-class black man who inadvertently becomes involved in The Order's machinations. Reading this now, the race and class issues jump right off the page, even more so than at the time of publication. Tony finds himself drawn towards The Order and The Extremist, but is continually, unremittingly rejected, he literally and figuratively doesn't fit in (one of the books most enduring images encapsulates this divide in a single panel).

Reading it now, I couldn't help also seeing the resonances with the intense transformation and gentrification that San Francisco has gone through in the 25 years since "The Extremist" was published, as black and poor people have been pushed further and further out, and the City has become more and more a playground for the very rich. "The Extremist" shows some of the beginnings of this change. The seedy, working-class world of San Francisco that is shown here was already quickly disappearing when I arrived in the late 90s, and now it is pretty much completely gone, making "The Extremist" a sort of oblique time capsule of a vanished time, just like Hitchcock's "Vertigo" before it.

"The Extremist" doesn't have too much that is new to say, but I also don't think it needs to. It's a tight little tale of sexual obsession, violence, and horror. It's stuck with me over the years, and that's enough.

[Anna Prejanò · Rating 5 out of 5]

Una storia bellissima e profondamente morale sull'identità, in cui il costume del supereroe diventa maschera fetish che dà corpo e ordine ai desideri repressi di chi non sa essere libero se non nascondendosi. Romanzo a tre voci di solido impianto narrativo, mette in scena il dramma di una coppia borghese incapace di comunicare (quasi ibseniana: "se Jack e Judy si fossero davvero conosciuti a fondo ... se avessero veramente scoperto quello che l'altro provava ... le cose che volevano davvero ... forse nessuno di loro avrebbe avuto bisogno dell'estremista") e quello del povero Tony, troppo umano, troppo grasso, troppo negro per entrare nell'agognata tuta di latex. Quasi fuori campo, la voce del corruttore, che con i suoi ragionamenti capziosi e affascinanti ("la nostra percezione dell'estremo è basata su una moralità attuale e quindi transitoria") ha facile gioco nel plagiare i due coniugi dallo spirito gregario, pronti a rinunciare alla propria identità forse perché essa non è mai esistita.

[Henry · Rating 3 out of 5]

I enjoyed this graphic novel by British writer Milligan and American artist McKeevor, who has a great impressionist style.

The Extremist is some sort of costumed enforcer, killing members of an extreme sex network, either to satisfy the kinkiness of the victim, or to punish their wrongdoings within the "morals" of the club. I know, it either appeals or does not I guess!

But it was enjoyable, mostly due to the mystery, narrative drive that kept me hooked, and some interesting ruminations on relationships and morality. Enough to both engage the mind, and enjoy the ride - what I look for in my literature.

[Javier Jiménez · Rating 2 out of 5]

Esta pequeña novela gráfica es acerca de un personaje enmascarado llamado el extremista, el cual pertenece a una orden secreta llena de libertinaje y perversiones.

La historia es interesante ya que se presta a la reflexión de temas como la libertad individual, los deseos, la sexualidad y la moral. Sin embargo el dibujo queda a deber muchísimo, tanto así que la mala calidad del dibujo me llegaba a distraer de la historia. Esta es la razón de que haya calificado el libro con solo 2 estrellas. Quizás con un mejor arte podría haber llegado incluso a 4 estrellas.

[Alodia H. · Rating 3 out of 5]

Well sex and violence in one title, who won't love them? Okay, many, but still though I like this. I like how it takes the BDSM issue *cough* and also there are many profound parts that show you sex is not merely sex and life is not merely life. But however with only 4 series The Extremist is actually too short and there are a lot more to be dig out if they make it longer. Some things are not clear enough in the whole 4 numbers and it does need another numbers to make us fully understand the full story. So yeah, 3.5.

[Soso · Rating 5 out of 5]

I can't think of a graphic novel more up my alley. It's dark, Violent, Unforgiving and filled with sex fuelled masochists. Peter Milligan is a genius in my eyes, He manages to write a dark tale with elegance and the art style captures this perfectly. Highly recommend this to anyone who wants something disturbing and exciting to read. Definitely a graphic novel I’ll be revisiting every now and again.

[Neven · Rating 4 out of 5]

The premise of an all-powerful, shadowy S&M organization is a wee bit silly, but Milligan treats it seriously and packs a surprising amount of real, honest human feeling into just four issues. Good stuff.

[flesher goreman · Rating 1 out of 5]

I'm not sure if this is a "read between the lines" critique of the sexuality of white supremacy or if it's just supposed to be some sort of ~*~shocking extreme~*~ bullshit. There are a lot of strange tropes in this comic and I really don't quite know what to make of it.

[Fugo Feedback]

Mi reino para aquel que logre tirarme una pista sobre dónde conseguir este inconseguible tomo...

[Ahimaaz R · Rating 4 out of 5]

A solid, quirky take on masked vigilantism - a point of departure from which Milligan exploits its roominess to great effect.

[Abi Sangarab · Rating 2 out of 5]

To be honest, I didn't like it. There are three main characters. I can not find any strong reasons behind the actions and relationships.

[Dony Grayman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Recopilación de The Extremist en la barata línea Vertigo Resurrected.

[Nikola Š · Rating 2 out of 5]

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Gimp Suit.