Miracleman By Gaiman & Buckingham: The Golden Age

Miracleman #4

by Neil Gaiman, Neil Gaiman (Writer)

Atop Olympus, Miracleman presides over a brave new world forged from London's destruction. It is a world free of war, of famine, of poverty. A world of countless wonders. A world where pilgrims scale Olympus' peak to petition their living god, while miles below the dead return in fantastic android bodies. It is an Age of Miracles — but is humankind ready for it? Do we even want it? Is there a place for humanity in a world of gods? Gaiman and Buckingham delve into the lives of lonely idealists, rebellious schoolchildren and fracturing families, exploring the human constant in a changing world of gods and miracles!

COLLECTING: Miracleman by Gaiman & Buckingham (2015) 1-6 

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fantasy, Fiction, Superheroes, Comic Book, Marvel

192 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1991

Reviews

[Dan Schwent · Rating 3 out of 5]

People struggle to live in the utopia Miracleman and Miraclewoman have created.

The Golden Age is a collection of single issue stories, slice of life tales set in the world Miracleman and Miraclewoman have created. While well-written, not a hell of a lot actually happens.

It pains me to rate something Neil Gaiman wrote less than a four but The Golden Age is pretty boring. Parts of it read like a trial run for things he later made magical with The Sandman. Buckingham's art also feels like a prelude to greater things. I will say that The Golden Age feels a lot more polished and less dated than in places than Alan Moore's take on things earlier in the series.

I respect The Golden Age's place in the Miracleman pantheon but I can't muster a whole lot of enthusiasm for ever reading it again. Three out of five stars but it really had to work for them.

[Chad · Rating 2 out of 5]

An anthology of stories about normal people affected by the Miracleman family long after Alan Moore's stories took place. It feels very much like a precursor to Sandman except the stories are, well, boring. I hate to say that about anything written by Neil Gaiman as he's long been one of my favorite authors, but there's just not much here of interest. Mark Buckingham's art in this is much more experimental than the style he's long established at this point.

[Rod Brown · Rating 4 out of 5]

A reread in anticipation of finally reading the rest of the Neil Gaiman story I've been waiting on since 1993 after reading Miracleman #24. I didn't know at the time that the finished material for issue #25 would not show up in comic book stores for decades, mired in a twisted and frustrating legal battle over IP ownership.

Time for another tour of a most melancholy utopia . . .


ORIGINAL REVIEW:

#ThrowbackThursday - Back in the '90s, I used to write comic book reviews for the website of a now-defunct comic book retailer called Rockem Sockem Comics. From the July 1997 edition with a theme of "Persistence":

INTRODUCTION

Persistence. According to the American Heritage Dictionary (Standard Edition) persistence is "to hold firmly and steadfastly to a purpose, a state, or an undertaking despite obstacles, warnings, or setbacks." In a time when it seems that half the comic books being offered in a given month are #1's, it's refreshing to see some titles, characters, and creators persist. Of course Superman and other superheroes from major publishers are perennials, but their continued existence seems more a function of momentum than persistence. To find examples of the true definition of persistence we need to look at low circulation black-and-white books which keep coming out year after year thanks to the determination and singular vision of their creators.

(A caveat: Another reason these books tend to persist is that they appeal to an adult audience instead of fickle children. All of these books contain enough sex, violence, harsh language, and/or adult themes to make them for mature readers only.)

FROM THE BACKLIST

MIRACLEMAN BOOK FOUR: THE GOLDEN AGE (Eclipse Comics)

Eclipse Comics has been defunct for years, and yet PREVIEWS continues to offer its backstock. Talk about persistence! (Didn't I hear that Todd MacFarlane bought all of Eclipse's residual property last year?) The company is dead, but the legacy lives on!

One of Eclipse's shining jewels was the MIRACLEMAN comic. Back in the eighties, writer Alan Moore revived the 1950's British comic book character Marvelman for a British magazine called WARRIOR. Marvelman was a transatlantic rip-off of our own Captain Marvel (the SHAZAM! guy, not the Kree warrior). Eclipse Comics brought Marvelman to the states and rechristened him Miracleman to avoid a lawsuit with Marvel Comics. We were thus treated to one of Alan Moore's deconstructions of the superhero mythology. Miracleman was no Superman. In MIRACLEMAN, things got a bit bloody when a couple of villains set out to achieve world domination. Then things got bloody unpredictable, when the hero actually attained world domination himself. At that point, Alan Moore left the book in the hands of a minor writer named Neil Gaiman.

Gaiman, with artist Mark Buckingham, took MIRACLEMAN off in a new and miraculous direction. Rather than focusing on the character of Miracleman, in THE GOLDEN AGE Gaiman created an anthology of tales about common folks dealing with a planet ruled by a godlike superhero. This approach gave Gaiman the same kind of freedom he found in SANDMAN: he could use a variety of techniques to let the tale be told in the best manner possible. Some stories are poetic. Some are gritty and mean. One makes use of a child picturebook sequence. Another incorporates the image and artwork of Andy Warhol. None feature more than a panel or two of Miracleman. Mark Buckingham varies his artwork wildly in each chapter, masterfully keeping up with Gaiman's changes of pace.

While I heartily recommend you seek out the Alan Moore issues or trade paperbacks, don't miss the chance to pick up the treasure currently under your nose.

Grade: A-

[Lukas Sumper · Rating 4 out of 5]

Overall it was okay considering this consisted more of short stories than an overarching story line. I liked some of them and I couldn't stand the child traveling through space one. I got the impression that Gaiman tried his best to emulate Moore at times, but that kind of felt off and didn't mesh with his writing style.

Very interested in the next installments that are at this moment still being drawn by buckingham.
This on its own is not on par what Moore wrote, but it doesn't have to be.
4.0 out of 5.0 stars

[Alexander Peterhans · Rating 3 out of 5]

I started reading this without any prior knowledge of the Miracleman world or storylines, and I thiiiink that may have had an effect.

Some stories were mystifying, some I could still follow, because Gaiman is a good enough author. Also liked a lot of the art, felt late '80s Vertigo-y.

[Sesana · Rating 3 out of 5]

How to continue a story that doesn't need to be continued? Moore left this book at a definite ending point. Miracleman was settled, his world was entirely changed, and there didn't seem to be anything left to say about the character. So Gaiman doesn't really try to say anything about the character, except by reflection. Instead, he concentrates on the lives affected by Miracleman's new world order. Which makes this essentially a book of short stories, and like almost every collection of short stories I've ever read, the quality varies. Overall, I can definitely say that this is not some of Gaiman's best work. But it is also rather early work, so I never expected it to be. Better than not, sometimes quite imaginative, and absolutely in keeping with the framework that Moore left behind for him to work with. No, there didn't really need to be any more Miracleman stories, because what Moore wrote was a complete beginning, middle, and end. But since there was, this was probably the best possible outcome.

Re-read 2024: Picking this up before reading The Silver Age. My thoughts remain basically unchanged from 8 years ago: though this isn't Gaiman's best work, all of the stories are at least good, and some approach great. This time, I was struck by how very lonely this world feels, at least in this collection.

[Artemy · Rating 4 out of 5]

So I've yet to read Alan Moore's legendary run of Miracleman, and I am really not in the loop on the whole mythology of this book. But that said, it is a pretty enjoyable collection of short stories about random people whose life was affected by Miracleman (I would guess), with a rather optimistic feel. The stories are sort of reminiscent of what Gaiman was doing in Sandman, especially in earlier volumes. They are stand-alone, and can be read easily without knowing much about what happened before.

The artwork by Mark Buckingham is gorgeous. The colour remastering is also welcome, the book looks really good.

So, I would definitely recommend this volume to Miracleman fans (duh), but people who are into Gaiman's writing, especially Sandman and his short stories, should really give this one a go, too. There is a lot of good stuff here.

[Juho Pohjalainen · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's hard to carry on a story that ended in a more or less unambiguously happy ending for everyone. You'd either have to ruin that ending, or else there'd be no conflict, no tension... or would there?

If anyone can pull it off, Neil Gaiman can. The fourth book of Miracleman picks up from the new golden age that the last one left off with, and, hell, it actually does manage to make the whole thing a genuinely good read. We get to explore this new strange world, see what people ponder on about it, find the few tiny blemishes it still has, and contemplate human nature. It's a natural continuation to an already good story.

[Calista · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is interesting in that the book is really about people and their reactions to a person with powers. The actual superbeing is rarely interacted with. Gaiman always creates a mood. His stories are told through moods many times. This mood seems to be questioning and contemplating. A good book. The art is also incredible. I need to read more and learn more of the story. This seems like a piece.

[Ignacio · Rating 4 out of 5]

¿Qué contar cuando tu antecesor exprimió a tope las convenciones de los superhéroes hasta convertir al protagonista en Dios? Gaiman parece tenerlo claro: historias de cómo el mundo se convierte en una utopía y la gente aprende a convivir con la deidad mientras sus recuerdos pugnan por salir a través de la melancolía, la insatisfacción ante las aspiraciones que no se han hecho realidad o la fascinación por el mal. Quizás falla un poco en la tensión narrativa y el impacto emocional, intensos en la mayoría, deficientes en un par. Sin embargo globalmente el guión me parece a la altura del reto lanzado por Moore y se integra genial con un Buckingham que adapta su estilo a cada capítulo, experimentando con la narración (genial el número del ascenso de los peregrinos, con abundantes viñetas verticales rotas cuando es necesario por otras horizontales), el estilo o las técnicas. Ganas de que aparezca La edad de plata.

[Nick Jones · Rating 1 out of 5]

For years - years - I had been told that Miracleman was some sort of modern masterpiece. Then when Marvel started reprinting these stories I found the first few bits by Alan Moore to be fairly interesting, though tailing off in quality a bit toward the end of his run. Now this volume gets into Neil Gaiman's work on the series, and it is without a doubt the worst thing he's ever written. The stories feel completely superfluous, adding a ground-level view of the utopian world that Miracleman created that is utterly unnecessary and uninteresting. The art is uniformly pedestrian, and frequently outright ugly, the best (or honestly, the only attractive) image in this collection being a cover by Frank Cho printed in 1/6 scale at the back of the book.

Maybe this was the hump. Maybe Gaiman thought that he needed to do a bit of world-building before he got into areas that were not cripplingly boring. Maybe Miracleman's best stretch is yet to come and it will prove itself to be the surpassing work of genius I was promised.

Actually, no. That will not happen. This series is just overrated. It's not Moore's best work. It's not Gaiman's best work. There are some big ideas in here, but they're never put to effective use. I think it's just time for me to cut bait and stop waiting for this to get good.

[Issa · Rating 4 out of 5]

The beginning of Neil Gaiman's run on Miracleman. This may have been just before his legendary Sandman run. Personally handpicked by Alan Moore to take over the character and continue the adventures of Miracleman. This isn't quite his best work but the themes it does touch upon such as ushering in a new age of human/superhuman hybrids is quite interesting for the implications it has on humanity and technology. Recommended for a different take on the man superman genre.

[Rick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I remember back when Eclipse Comics was publishing these stories as Miracleman #17-22 after enormously frustrating long delays as the late 1980s transitioned into the 1990s. After the worst delay between issues #15 & #16, which were the closing issues of Alan Moore's run (sorry that should read The Original Author) that lasted a year or nearly a year, the momentum of the series had effectively evaporated. Gaiman and Buckingham's tenure on the series was further diluted with the collapse of Eclipse Comics and the series was left unfinished. The stories collected here comprise the last completed arc, and the first arc by Gaiman and Buckingham. After Gaiman spectacular run on DC's re-imagined Sandman I was expecting a lot, but the delays and inconsistent release schedule really impacted my enjoyment of the last two complete arcs of Miracleman, except that's not the entire truth. Moore (sorry that should read The Original Author) really did say about all that could be said on the matter and had effectively used up the character and the concept, much as he did with his unforgettable Watchmen. But then I'm not much of a believer in the notion that there's nothing more that can be told and Gaiman and Buckingham have delivered a wonderful story that opens up the concept in new ways and leaves fertile ground for planting a whole plethora of new crops. The biggest problem now is that this is only the beginning of a whole new conceptualization and not merely a continuation or culmination of Moore's (sorry that should read The Original Author) take on the mythos of Miracleman. I eagerly await the conclusion of the decades long wait for the completion of Gaiman's Miracleman: the Silver Age (even though there's almost no way it can actually live up to expectations).

As a side note: this collection also includes one of my favorite shorts set in the Miracleman reality. That would be Screaming which originally appeared in Total Eclipse #4.

Update: After rereading this so many years later, I’m left feeling just how dated this story has become. It’s going to be interesting to see how Miracleman: The Silver Age will “feel” once I eventually get to it.

[Julian Darius · Rating 5 out of 5]

Brilliant. Gaiman at his most poetic and lyrical, teasing implications of Moore's earlier work into often touching and philosophically meaningful tales of this "perfect" world. Buckingham is at his most varied and experimental too. Moore's work on MIRACLEMAN is more fondly remembered, but this too is classic material, a height of comics narrative -- and honestly, maybe even of narrative itself.

[Shannon Appelcline · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow, this is Neil Gaiman at his comic-writing height! Beautiful short stories about individuals who have been affected by Miracleman changing the world.

[Sud666 · Rating 3 out of 5]

I tend to enjoy most of Neil Gaiman's offerings. It was this in mind that I picked up this volume. I have no experience with Alan Moore's Miracleman and assumed this was Gaiman's take on the subject. Well..sort of.

This is a collection of short stories set in the world of Miracleman. Thus, without a background in the original Alan Moore series, it can be a rather strange and nebulous volume. That certainly was the case for me. Even being relatively clueless, relatively only due to the summary of prior events at the start of the volume- these short stories show how people are coping with the new Miracleman world order. I didn't truly get any of the nuances or backgrounds of these characters due to my ignorance of the original source material. But, in a way, Gaiman did his job- he has interested me enough that I will now track down and read the original Miracleman series by Alan Moore.

So interesting enough stories, the artwork is ok, but the world that is presented is interesting enough to draw me in and get me motivated to read the original work. I am sure someone who is familiar with the original will draw far more pleasure and appreciate the meaning behind some of these characters, far more than I could.

[Jerry · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a very strange book. The creators of The Matrix should have read it to see what to do after godhood is achieved. Alan Moore had, at the end of his run of Miracleman, made a tightly-packed and beautifully-open-ended statement about human saviors, as most of his best work back then did: V for Vendetta, Watchmen, and Twilight of the Superheroes. His best work involved totalitarian takeovers, a feeling of or an actual loss of responsibility.

In V for Vendetta we have a nearly perfect superhuman who can arguably be trusted to do whatever is right. That he has great power is alright, because he's a good guy—his successors, however, are a different story. In Watchmen, the same character reappears as Adrian Veidt. This time, he is clearly in the wrong, but why? Why is Veidt wrong compared to V? Their methods are actually quite similar. And in Twilight, we've got Constantine running around trying to do the same thing; engineer a lot of deaths in order to save the world from superhumans.

Miracleman, contemporary with V for Vendetta, has the nearly-perfect superhuman who can arguably be trusted to do what is right, but it’s a much more nuanced tale, partly because there is more than one superhuman. In Moore’s final issue, Miracleman and Miraclewoman discuss his qualms about taking over human destiny, and Avril says:

Michael, I don’t know why you persist in seeing the state of being human as something special. Did humans ask such agonized questions about the free will of cows, or the destiny of fish? Besides, we’re taking nothing from them. We’ll give them more free will than they ever dreamed of or wanted. We’re going to love them, Michael. We’re going to make them perfect.

This echoes C.S. Lewis’s famous statement about tyrants who have our moral interests at heart. The parallel is almost certainly deliberate. Gaiman quoted Lewis toward the end of Sandman when the angels take over Hell. Here it’s even worse. Miracleman sees men as human; Miraclewoman sees the Miracle family’s relationship with us as a shepherd might their herd of animals.

The ending itself, which you have to read in situ, emphasizes that ambiguity.

When Neil Gaiman took over the writing, he started in paradise, and he presented it as paradise. But there were hints of something deeper. At first it is only voiced by a villain, but the abolition of money has made it harder to know if what a person is doing is worthwhile. It’s something I’m primed to pay attention to, because I only recently wrote about how money is civilization and its lack is a return to the rule of the strong. Which is, clearly, what’s going on here.

There’s a line in one of Elliott S! Maggin’s Superman books in which someone is worried that the only real advancement since Superman appeared is among the villains. And dead Emil Gargunza appears to be the only innovative non-superhero in paradise as well. Everybody else is into new designs for t-shirts or trying to avoid the further loss of family life.

At the very end of this collection, the Miracle Family gifts to the world the gift of flight. But it’s a gift without control or destination.

This collection collects issues 17 to 22 of the original series, Neil Gaiman’s first six issues. In issue 23, Gaiman brings Young Miracleman back, fresh from the fifties and the fight for Democracy, and starts what looks like a look at the dystopian aspect of the Kingdom of Marvelman. It looks a lot like the territory the Singer reboot of Superman was going to head into. Unfortunately, issue 25 (which itself probably wasn’t the end of the story: an ad in Apocrypha 1 and 2 but oddly not 3 has Silver Age going at least to 28) was never published. (Marvel may finally be republishing it now, having announced that they have the rights to Marvelman sorted out for 2019.)

This is beautifully drawn and well-written. It’s difficult to say if Gaiman’s story would/will live up to Moore’s, but it certainly was a game try.

[Tom Schutt · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was my first experience with Miracleman, and this Golden Age is a clear metaphor for the Heaven on Earth established after the Apocalypse. The concept that people still experience everyday problems after the Second Coming is fascinating, and the vignettes collected here explore it excellently. This is an outstanding graphic novel, check your library for it.

[Daniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some of the stories are quite good, but overall they are not nearly as good as the ones written by Alan Moore.

[Dakota · Rating 5 out of 5]

Even in a short story format, Neil Gaiman will convince you that each character is interesting and every panel is important. I had no prior knowledge of Miracleman before reading but I can't wait to read more about him. A telltale sign of effective storytelling.

[Petergiaquinta · Rating 4 out of 5]

For the last couple of years I avoided this book on the graphic novels shelf of my public library incorrectly believing it to be a Mister Miracle storyline and, no offense to the memory of Jack Kirby, I really don't need any more of Scott Free's geewhiz gimcrackery.

But on closer inspection today, I discovered this volume is about as far away on the spectrum as you can possibly get from the New Gods and the Forever People. This is the collected work published a few years ago of Neil Gaiman's return to Alan Moore's '80s storyline of what life might be like if there really were superheroes on earth with unlimited abilities created by the power of the atom and alien technology. It's grim, but it's brilliant stuff, worthy of both Moore's The Watchmen and Gaiman's Sandman, although not quite as good as either. However, I kid you not; this is must-read epic mythic shit, and it will blow you away.

So why only four stars? I dunno; like any of Gaiman's story telling some of these tales from Miracleman's Golden Age are stronger than others, and a couple of these just don't work as well as the rest. And the fact that these tales are really just a tease of a much bigger even more epic story waiting to be told kind of leaves me a tad dissatisfied. The Qys, the eighteen Andy Warhols, Mist and many more of the characters and storylines need fleshing out. There's a world here that Gaiman introduces us to and then slams the door on...but read it because Gaiman is a master story teller.

Here's Neil Gaiman talking about the evolution of his Miracleman from Billy Batson's Captain Marvel to Marvelman to Alan Moore's Miracleman...and his hope that the storyline will continue. And I hope it will, as well, because Gaiman's take on this utopian age of miracles created by an omnipotent super figure is darkly compelling and quite fascinating to read:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=isLW0...

[D.M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ask anyone who's read this series, and they'll tell you: Gaiman had an unenviable task ahead of him. A virtual unknown, he was essentially handpicked by Moore -- who'd just reinvented the superhero -- to follow his lead on a well-known & well-received landmark of a series. The trick to his success is this: in spite of what some may believe (including me & himself), Gaiman is every bit as talented a writer as Moore, but there is a key difference between them. While Moore is more a Writer, Gaiman is unmistakeably a Storyteller.
Gaiman's talent as a storyteller is what saves what could have been a disastrous passing of the torch. Instead of just jumping in with a new story of the Big Blue Cheese, he decides to effectively ignore the man and instead study the changes his presence, etc., has wrought upon the populace.
Golden Age looks at seven very different people leading very different lives in a new age of miracles. Each one is a small wonder in its own right, only enhanced by Mark Buckingham (who had, as yet, not pinned himself down to his now well-known 'cutesy' style), who adeptly illustrates each tale in a markedly unique style.
My own favourites are Notes From the Underground and (still Top of the Pops for me after all these years) Spy Story...though I do get a kick out of the Jaime Hernandez homage/ripoff of Trends...oh, and the end of the book still brings a tear to my eye. Gaiman's still-present ability to easily shift voice and personality from story to story, however, means everyone will find their own fave.
It's a continuing shame Gaiman has (as yet) been unable to finish what sounded like an amazing series of arcs on this series. From this, and the couple published issues following this book, it could've been a milestone series to put his brainchild Sandman in the shadows. Time will tell.

[Dr. T Loves Books · Rating 3 out of 5]

Gaiman takes Moore's work and builds it out a bit from where it left off. This series is a collection of stories that unite at the end. My guess, based on the "extras" material at the end of this book, is that Gaiman plans to follow the characters of these stories into future pieces, showing how the world continues to develop around Miracleman and his compatriots.

I like that Gaiman is continuing to push forward the boundaries of this world a bit. Moore's original (and frequently revisited) thesis is about how superheros might actually impact the world outside of the comic book fantasies that are offered by ongoing titles; he realizes that there is probably a finite amount of grand storytelling that can be done, as super-powered people would either fix or destroy the world fairly quickly. Moore's focus is generally on those heroes and the people in their immediate circle. Gaiman pulls the lens further back, focusing on the stories of people who have only encountered the mythic figures of Moore's stories in glancing ways, and looking at how their lives are affected by living among god-like characters. It's not a type of story that is often presented in comic books, so it provides an interesting window into this world.

Seeing how Gaiman has established this world around the heroes, I'm curious to see how he will develop it from here.

[Kris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had heard of Miracleman, and of Gaiman's turn on the series, for quite a while, but had never actually read any Miracleman (neither Gaiman's work nor Alan Moore's earlier stuff). Not knowing much about it, I thought this would be a good starting-out point. It was not. This book has very little to do with Miracleman himself; it's a series of short stories, really, about how various people are affected by the Miracle "family". As with so much of Gaiman's short fiction, it's really kind of hit-and-miss. Some parts are pretty good, others not as good. But my overall feeling was that I didn't have a clue what was going on.

[Jamie · Rating 2 out of 5]

It just didn't work. There were a couple of good stories in there, and some inconsistent but interesting art, but as far as being a necessary or even good continuation of the Miracleman saga? Yeah... it just didn't work. Sorry Mr Gaiman. You're one of my favourites, and I appreciate what you were trying to do here, but I personally could have done without it.

[JCUZZ · Rating 4 out of 5]

Neil gaiman has one hell of and imagination that's for sure..... genius.

[Tony Laplume · Rating 5 out of 5]

By the time the Watchmen movie was released, The Boys already existed. Never mind that The Dark Knight was in theaters the year prior, that Iron Man had presaged the MCU. The Boys was the next step in the evolution of cynical superheroes. And that’s basically what Watchmen was, a superhero comic where there really weren’t any good guys, all of them either ineffectual, indifferent, or corrupt, and they existed in a world where the Vietnam War was won by them, and all it really gave the world was the continued threat of nuclear annihilation. In The Boys, the concept was merely streamlined, so that you didn’t have to believe in the superheroes at all.

Now, I’m talking about this because I just read the first volume of Astro City, and try as I might (and I really have tried, many times, over the years), I’ve just never been able to be a fan of it. I just never got it. Kurt Busiek likes to think it’s a response to Watchmen, but it really isn’t. It’s basically exactly the same thing. Kurt Busiek believes the same comic book logic as Alan Moore did, as Garth Ennis did. That in order to understand superheroes, you can’t see the real world with them in it. Not really. Astro City isn’t the real world. Busiek says so himself. The comic book looks and acts as if it is, but it isn’t. It’s just comic book logic with real elements overlaid. Same as Watchmen. Same as The Boys and Ennis being fundamentally disinterested in understanding superheroes.

I’m talking about all this because Miracleman: The Golden Age exists. It’s a direct sequel to Moore’s own Miracleman. And it’s a direct repudiation of all these comics.

Miracleman: The Golden Age is the first time I’ve read Neil Gaiman and saw the writer of Sandman outside the pages of Sandman itself. Miracleman himself, by the way, is hardly within these pages. It’s a series of short stories that look at the world that resulted from Moore’s Miracleman. Filled with comic book logic. But steeped in regular lives. It starts out by suggesting it will depict the first time humanity experiences a golden age and knows that it is. Usually (the Greeks imagined, for instance, their golden age in a mythical past), you don’t really appreciate the good times while they’re happening. You take them for granted. You look back and say, Those were the good times! And even as Gaiman tells his Golden Age (the follow-up, The Silver Age, is being concluded now, and it’s somehow not being seen as the big deal it is), and the characters within don’t seem to be basking in the glow, you realize, that’s life. That’s the real world. That’s what’s so often missing from superhero comics. Even the ones that go well out of their way to prove they have what’s so often missing.

(Veggie trays. And Darkseid eating a carrot stick from them. In case you were wondering.)

So I’m glad I got caught up in all of this. I’m glad I kept trying. And I’m certainly glad I finally became a fan of Neil Gaiman. (I came very late to Sandman.) This might be Gaiman’s masterpiece. Will he get to finish his story? Will he get to write Miracleman: The Dark Age? And what will that even look like? Does it matter?

And I will look down, and I will whisper, “No.”

[Quentin Wallace · Rating 4 out of 5]

I remember reading this volume years ago and didn't care for it, but for whatever reason now that I've re-read it I really enjoyed it. It's not really a direct continuation of the Miracleman saga, but more like snapshots taken from the world created when Alan Moore ended his run. Some of the stories are better than others of course, but overall this was very entertaining. It's interesting because Miracleman and the other heroes don't appear so much directly in this volume, as we just see how regular people interact with the new "utopia". Gaiman was smart enough to know there wasn't much left to build on from Moore's story so instead he just took side branches for lack of a better term.

I will say this about the Marvel Editions. This volume wasn't as guilty as the first 3, but Marvel packed on a lot of "extra material" that really wasn't necessary as you'd have to be an extreme Miracleman addict to really want to see all of the raw art they put into the books. Volume 3 was especially bad as it seemed like half the book was ancillary material the average reader wouldn't have wanted, and this of course raise the price of the book considerably. I could see them maybe doing more expensive "deluxe" versions for the hardcore collectors, but for most readers we ended up paying for material in which we had little interest. Just an observation, but I suppose since this series was considered such a milestone Marvel wanted to do something a little different.

Overall I really enjoyed the Miracleman series and I think any superhero fan should at least check it out to see what they think. Or maybe this would work just as well for non super hero fans as it tackled the subject in a different way. Either way it was very entertaining for the most part.

[Artur Coelho · Rating 4 out of 5]

Se Alan Moore reinventou um personagem clássico, algo patético, da primitiva BD britânica de super-heróis, fê-lo seguindo temas e uma estrutura que se viria a tornar um padrão na sua obra. Do desconhecimento de si ao arquétipo, projetando no super-herói a necessidade mítica de um deus moderno. Quer siga a super-ciência como em Miracleman, o ambientalismo místico em Swamp Thing ou a magia mítica de Promethea. Neil Gaiman soube construir sobre essa base definida pelo seu predecessor na série, mudando o ponto de vista ao leitor. Moore centrou-se no herói e suas lutas, que culminam na apocalíptica destruição de Londres, momento fundamental para se forjar uma nova era dourada onde o todo-poderoso herói usa os seus poderes para instaurar um reinado benevolente, ditando assim os destinos da humanidade. É para a humanidade que Gaiman olha, perguntando-se como seria viver nessa utopia onde seres mais poderosos do que os mitos religiosos determinam, com benevolência, o devir humano. Um ponto de vista ingénuo, é certo, nada garante que este tipo de seres se sintam inclinados à bondade. É uma curiosa continuação da inacabada história do clássico Miracleman, agora trazida ao público português pela G.Floy, após editar num volume único toda a série de Alan Moore.

[Jacca · Rating 3 out of 5]

Beautiful art. Moody stories that show the reality of a utopian world maintained by the almighty power of god-like superheroes. When these stories work they act well as emotional and sometimes humorous glimpses into this new society. The differing art direction of each chapter plays beautifully into the mood of each persons story. They interconnect at the end in a bit of a jumble. Not perfection, but still a great melding of Gaiman’s endless imagination for fantastical but wholly human tales and a brilliant artist.