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Michael Moorcock's Multiverse
Michael Moorcock's Multiverse, is a twelve-issue comic book limited series published in 1997 as a part of the short-lived DC Comics imprint, Helix. It was later collected as a single edition graphic novel. Written by Michael Moorcock, each monthly issue contained a chapter from three separate storylines featuring distinct groups of characters lifted from Moorcock's sprawling Eternal Champion novels.
A different artist was used to illustrate each story; Walter Simonson for 'Moonbeams and Roses', Mark Reeve for 'The Metatemporal Detective' and John Ridgway for 'Duke Elric'.
Whilst each story depicted an independent series of events set across different locations and time-lines, by the conclusion of the title the three plot threads had converged in a logical manner centred around their mutual search for the Silverskin, an enigmatic underworld crime figure and recurring protagonist from Moorcock's novels
A different artist was used to illustrate each story; Walter Simonson for 'Moonbeams and Roses', Mark Reeve for 'The Metatemporal Detective' and John Ridgway for 'Duke Elric'.
Whilst each story depicted an independent series of events set across different locations and time-lines, by the conclusion of the title the three plot threads had converged in a logical manner centred around their mutual search for the Silverskin, an enigmatic underworld crime figure and recurring protagonist from Moorcock's novels
288 pages, Paperback
First published November 1, 1999
About the author
Michael Moorcock
1,222 books3,788 followersMichael John Moorcock is an English writer primarily of science fiction and fantasy who has also published a number of literary novels.
Moorcock has mentioned The Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Apple Cart by George Bernard Shaw and The Constable of St. Nicholas by Edward Lester Arnold as the first three books which captured his imagination. He became editor of Tarzan Adventures in 1956, at the age of sixteen, and later moved on to edit Sexton Blake Library. As editor of the controversial British science fiction magazine New Worlds, from May 1964 until March 1971 and then again from 1976 to 1996, Moorcock fostered the development of the science fiction "New Wave" in the UK and indirectly in the United States. His serialization of Norman Spinrad's Bug Jack Barron was notorious for causing British MPs to condemn in Parliament the Arts Council's funding of the magazine.
During this time, he occasionally wrote under the pseudonym of "James Colvin," a "house pseudonym" used by other critics on New Worlds. A spoof obituary of Colvin appeared in New Worlds #197 (January 1970), written by "William Barclay" (another Moorcock pseudonym). Moorcock, indeed, makes much use of the initials "JC", and not entirely coincidentally these are also the initials of Jesus Christ, the subject of his 1967 Nebula award-winning novella Behold the Man, which tells the story of Karl Glogauer, a time-traveller who takes on the role of Christ. They are also the initials of various "Eternal Champion" Moorcock characters such as Jerry Cornelius, Jerry Cornell and Jherek Carnelian. In more recent years, Moorcock has taken to using "Warwick Colvin, Jr." as yet another pseudonym, particularly in his Second Ether fiction.
Moorcock has mentioned The Gods of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Apple Cart by George Bernard Shaw and The Constable of St. Nicholas by Edward Lester Arnold as the first three books which captured his imagination. He became editor of Tarzan Adventures in 1956, at the age of sixteen, and later moved on to edit Sexton Blake Library. As editor of the controversial British science fiction magazine New Worlds, from May 1964 until March 1971 and then again from 1976 to 1996, Moorcock fostered the development of the science fiction "New Wave" in the UK and indirectly in the United States. His serialization of Norman Spinrad's Bug Jack Barron was notorious for causing British MPs to condemn in Parliament the Arts Council's funding of the magazine.
During this time, he occasionally wrote under the pseudonym of "James Colvin," a "house pseudonym" used by other critics on New Worlds. A spoof obituary of Colvin appeared in New Worlds #197 (January 1970), written by "William Barclay" (another Moorcock pseudonym). Moorcock, indeed, makes much use of the initials "JC", and not entirely coincidentally these are also the initials of Jesus Christ, the subject of his 1967 Nebula award-winning novella Behold the Man, which tells the story of Karl Glogauer, a time-traveller who takes on the role of Christ. They are also the initials of various "Eternal Champion" Moorcock characters such as Jerry Cornelius, Jerry Cornell and Jherek Carnelian. In more recent years, Moorcock has taken to using "Warwick Colvin, Jr." as yet another pseudonym, particularly in his Second Ether fiction.
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Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews
August 8, 2011
We have: A rose. The Rose. Half plant, half woman. A player. A pilot between the planes of the multiverse.
Elric. I mean: ELRIC. In a very sane phase (for him). With the sword and without. Playing his own game. A king as in chess - not the strongest, but yet of infinite value. And there is a beautiful variant of the final confrontation. Not Elric against chaos. Not Elric against order. But Elric against all that he was and might be and will be - or Elric against the Eternal Champion, fighting to be himself. Fighting for the right to blow the horn - the right to reshape the multiverse.
There are the Phoorn, settled somewhere in Egypt, but still the Phoorn of "The Skrayling Tree".
There is the big fight of Chaos against the Law, as it is always fought. This time with music:
There are three storylines: today, 1000 a.d. and sometimes in the 1930ies, in an alternate past at the end (or not?) of the Weimar Republic. All three stay apart and then fluidly, wonderfully come together. There are three Roses - and not all of them seem to be on the 'right' side. There are the daughter, the tigress, the silver cat and Colinda Dovero, which are all interconnected in a way which left me stunned. There is a bowl of fish, which plays a crucial role and is twice not what it seems.
The eternal champion assembles himself: not an engineer, a God or a Lord, not a player in the eternal game, but neither a chessman. And, when the things come together, this brings us Elric, with the black sword, in the whole middle-age warrior's costume - and giant 90ies sunglasses, wide grinning. This picture alone is worth the whole read.
There are, in spite of all the cheesiness, a lot of little wonderful moments: there is the word "weltschmerz", of which I did not know that it existed in English. There is the parking sign with the chaos emblem on it: the eight arrows, showing in different directions. What a wonderful sign! There is the road "B666: Moonbeam Road", there is the Ketchup Cove. And there are, very typically Moorcock-y, sentences, like:
Of course it is also a story of old friends and lovers meeting, of the Black Sword, the Grail and the Balance. Of Elric's ruthlessness and of Rose's cold-heartedness (weren't they lovers at some point? I need to re-read some of the books! But it is not about "them" actually, it is only about Elric and about Rose). Of the end of the world and of a new beginning. Hey, did you expect anything else of this author?
You'll probably not going to enjoy the book as much if the pure reference of a place called T'aan-Al-Oorn does not make your inned child squee with delight or the moment the world "Phoorn" falls something inside you does not start dancing like crazy because... Dragons! Dragons who can fly between universes! And dragons whoes bloodbrother is the last Emperor of Melnibone. But it just made me so happy
"Sorry Sam, did I scratch you?"she asks. And you don't wanna know how scratched the poor guy looks. A rose has thorns.
Elric. I mean: ELRIC. In a very sane phase (for him). With the sword and without. Playing his own game. A king as in chess - not the strongest, but yet of infinite value. And there is a beautiful variant of the final confrontation. Not Elric against chaos. Not Elric against order. But Elric against all that he was and might be and will be - or Elric against the Eternal Champion, fighting to be himself. Fighting for the right to blow the horn - the right to reshape the multiverse.
There are the Phoorn, settled somewhere in Egypt, but still the Phoorn of "The Skrayling Tree".
"Adieu, little brother,"says Flamefang to Elric, a dragon to a - no, not a human.
There is the big fight of Chaos against the Law, as it is always fought. This time with music:
"Worse than I'd guessed! They're fueling up Andrew Lloyd Weber's Greatest Hits - banned forever under the Nashville convention!"How mean of the Lords of Law! One does not have to agree with Moorcock's Music taste, but it is incredibly funny to read.
There are three storylines: today, 1000 a.d. and sometimes in the 1930ies, in an alternate past at the end (or not?) of the Weimar Republic. All three stay apart and then fluidly, wonderfully come together. There are three Roses - and not all of them seem to be on the 'right' side. There are the daughter, the tigress, the silver cat and Colinda Dovero, which are all interconnected in a way which left me stunned. There is a bowl of fish, which plays a crucial role and is twice not what it seems.
The eternal champion assembles himself: not an engineer, a God or a Lord, not a player in the eternal game, but neither a chessman. And, when the things come together, this brings us Elric, with the black sword, in the whole middle-age warrior's costume - and giant 90ies sunglasses, wide grinning. This picture alone is worth the whole read.
There are, in spite of all the cheesiness, a lot of little wonderful moments: there is the word "weltschmerz", of which I did not know that it existed in English. There is the parking sign with the chaos emblem on it: the eight arrows, showing in different directions. What a wonderful sign! There is the road "B666: Moonbeam Road", there is the Ketchup Cove. And there are, very typically Moorcock-y, sentences, like:
"Enabling the mathematics of heart to reduce the ultimate equation to a single elegiac note,"or, to stay in tone with the previos:
"sometimes I wish music and math weren't so thoroughly related".
Of course it is also a story of old friends and lovers meeting, of the Black Sword, the Grail and the Balance. Of Elric's ruthlessness and of Rose's cold-heartedness (weren't they lovers at some point? I need to re-read some of the books! But it is not about "them" actually, it is only about Elric and about Rose). Of the end of the world and of a new beginning. Hey, did you expect anything else of this author?
You'll probably not going to enjoy the book as much if the pure reference of a place called T'aan-Al-Oorn does not make your inned child squee with delight or the moment the world "Phoorn" falls something inside you does not start dancing like crazy because... Dragons! Dragons who can fly between universes! And dragons whoes bloodbrother is the last Emperor of Melnibone. But it just made me so happy
November 22, 2019
I've read every elric book. Every eternal champion book. I even re read a lot of them. They are the best of old fantasy stories. This book, not so much. Thats all I'll say. I mean if you're like me and you feel obligated because you have some kind of ocd to read everything about the eternal champions then go for it. Otherwise you could stare at the floor for a couple hours and get just as much out of it.
August 6, 2021
Um mergulho no surreal universo partilhado que Moorcock criou para unir as suas criações, do espada e feitiçaria Elrik à aventura de Jerry Cornelius. Três histórias que se entretecem entre si, aparentemente díspares mas todas a convergir para o mesmo objetivo. Num futuro possível, jogadores com realidades e navegadores entre realidades enfrentam-se em bizantinas jogadas. No passado recente, o maior detetive inglês (não esse, o que Moorcock criou) investiga estranhos casos de assassinato onde o elusivo e albino Von Bek (um dos alter-egos de Cornelius, na tortuosa mitografia moorcockiana). No passado, Elrik atravessa desertos, auxiliado na sua demanda por um académico mouro e a sua filha. Todos convergem para um ponto, todos buscam Silverskin, o ser que está no nexo das buscas e em cuja mão poderá estar o destino dos universos. Surrealismo algo alimentado a ácido é o que Moorcock melhor fazia, e o estilo visual acompanha muito bem estas três histórias díspares, mas paralelas entre si.
April 8, 2020
This was really long, clocking in at just over 285 pages. It had a couple different stories going on all intertwining. Most of them were pretty straight forward, but the others were really surreal/trippy. I've read some of Moorcock's trippy novels (and didn't really care for them) so I guess it was to be expected. I did really like the art from Walter Simonson, he's been around for a while so I think it reminded me of old comics that I read as a kid.
One of the coolest/strangest thing about this book was that both the Moorcock and Simonson are characters. They don't have a huge affect on the story, but they're there and they look like themselves in real life.
Overall I would say, skip this unless you're a hardcore Moorcock fan, not just a fan of the swords and sorcery stuff (Elric, Corum etc...)
One of the coolest/strangest thing about this book was that both the Moorcock and Simonson are characters. They don't have a huge affect on the story, but they're there and they look like themselves in real life.
Overall I would say, skip this unless you're a hardcore Moorcock fan, not just a fan of the swords and sorcery stuff (Elric, Corum etc...)
July 15, 2017
The trouble with the Elric saga is the same as the trouble with mainstream comics- if you read one series, you're gonna miss a lot of plots and allusions to events and characters that only make sense if you read all the sister publications. As an Elric story, "Multiverse" shows promise, planting another incarnation of Elric in a variation on medieval Europe and the Middle East. But as the scope expands, bringing in players from the rest of Moorcock's canon, the thread gets lost amidst an attempt to make an "all-in" event story, a Secret Wars of the Multiverse. It doesn't always work, though more dedicated Moorcock followers may enjoy and appreciate it more than I did.
July 24, 2020
This omnibus of 12 comics, each divided into 3 story lines, targets the philosopher more than the fanboy. They are essentially graphic novels for the late Elric stories, the Second Ether series, and the Metatemporal Detective short story collection. It’s easy enough to get lost in the novels, steeped in Chaos Theory, ethics and pop culture. Cramming this concept into a graphic novel is nearly impossible to follow, unless you’ve read the novels. This is for Moorcock fans, and even then only best enjoyed late in that journey.
June 24, 2023
Completely unhinged; three stories that layer over each other, reflect and refract, you've never seen such metatextuality in your life. Incredible psychedelic eye-popping art from all three artists. Maybe if you're a Moorcock die-hard this is comprehensible, I've read a few and I was mostly lost, but there's nothing wrong with being lost, that's when you find what you didn't know you were looking for--which is exactly what I was saying to myself as I roamed around the library, no goal in mind, and stumbled on this.
August 5, 2019
A crazy, wide-sweeping, interconnecting set of worlds, stories and characters. The links almost didn't grab me but by the middle I was so impressed with how it all comes together. It's nuts, brilliant, kooky and fun. I suspect you either hate it or love it. The art by Simonson is some of his best ever. It doesn't hurt that he's drawing completely insane ideas and worlds. His metaphysical layouts are incredible.
April 17, 2022
Excellent, crazy artwork. An acid trippy thing seldom seen nowadays.
Comic is however also somewhat too long and meandering and confusing.
I've read a bunch of Moorcock, but if I hadn't, I'd have been completely lost in the concepts and ideas that remain unexplained.
Comic is however also somewhat too long and meandering and confusing.
I've read a bunch of Moorcock, but if I hadn't, I'd have been completely lost in the concepts and ideas that remain unexplained.
August 18, 2020
A rip-roaring adventure through the multiverse, not for the faint of heart!
August 20, 2025
un caramelito para ultra-fans de moorcock que a su vez podría matar a cualquier persona que no se haya leído su wiki completa al menos dos veces
siendo tres historias hay alguna que me gusta más que otra, pero tiene un dibujo de 10 y las cosas que más me flipan de moorcock: caos vs. orden, cultura pop (albert camus sale en este comic. don't ask), albinos con poca estabilidad mental y un (meta)humor muy caracteristico...
es jerry cornelius el chiste del chocobollo personal de michael moorcock?
siendo tres historias hay alguna que me gusta más que otra, pero tiene un dibujo de 10 y las cosas que más me flipan de moorcock: caos vs. orden, cultura pop (albert camus sale en este comic. don't ask), albinos con poca estabilidad mental y un (meta)humor muy caracteristico...
es jerry cornelius el chiste del chocobollo personal de michael moorcock?
August 8, 2012
Beautiful art, but this comic is for the hardest of hardcore Moorcock fans only. I've read about two dozen Moorcock books and have a decent grounding in his Eternal Champion mythos, and this series was still largely incomprehensible.
The idea of three parallel plot lines linking at the end of the story is an interesting one, but things never quite mesh, and the various threads don't seem to share equal relevance to the overall story. In the end the reader is left with a host of mostly cipher-like characters shouting about how "destruction of the multiverse is imminent" without gaining any real sense of the how and the why behind the threat.
Moorcock has written many of my favorite books, but this is him at his most impenetrable.
The idea of three parallel plot lines linking at the end of the story is an interesting one, but things never quite mesh, and the various threads don't seem to share equal relevance to the overall story. In the end the reader is left with a host of mostly cipher-like characters shouting about how "destruction of the multiverse is imminent" without gaining any real sense of the how and the why behind the threat.
Moorcock has written many of my favorite books, but this is him at his most impenetrable.
May 21, 2008
Starts out as just a cool fantasy anthology with three very different types of stories. Then, slowly the stories start to overlap and eventually combine at the grand finale.
You have to be a big Moorcock fan as a lot of characters from various stories show up with only the bare minimum of information about them given and a lot of story threads combine.
Moorcock makes you work for it, but it is an amazing story with two very funny guest stars showing up at the finale.
You have to be a big Moorcock fan as a lot of characters from various stories show up with only the bare minimum of information about them given and a lot of story threads combine.
Moorcock makes you work for it, but it is an amazing story with two very funny guest stars showing up at the finale.
June 30, 2014
A peculiar comic that's not exactly an adaptation of the Second Ether nor a preview of Elric: The Moonbeam Roads. Instead it's a weird testing ground for ideas that's in part fascinating and in part incoherent. It's beautifully illustrated and it's great to see the origin of some of Moorcock's later ideas, but I think it's not as good as either the Second Ether series of the '90s or the Moonbeam Road stories of the '00s.
February 27, 2014
Ich glaube, als Paperback kommt dieses Zusammenstellung dreier unterschiedlicher Erzählstränge zu linear herüber. Als Miniserie, jeden Monat mit einer neuerlichen Wendung, war sie wahrscheinlich noch anregender. Simonson und Moorcock passen hervorragend zusammen, kein Wunder, dass beide als reale (?) Personen auftauchen. dennoch: Ihre andere Zusammenarbeit ist unschlagbar.
July 14, 2007
A twisting tale told from several different viewpoints in both time and space. Very confusing, even for a fan of Michael Moorcock.
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May 20, 2015Science-Fiction
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews