Zeb Larson reviews The Autumnlands #10…
Things have gotten very bad, up the mountain. Very bad.
Everybody knows the Arthur C. Clarke quote, his so-called third law, that any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic. Maybe it’s just me, but in this issue, the lines between magic and technology are starting to blur in this series, especially as we get closer to the mystery of what’s happening at this mountain. What we learn here is that what’s happening is not going to be pretty, and the sickness that the sheep men described is far worse than we were led to believe. Warning: I will be discussing spoilers from here on out.
Learoyd and Dusty are continuing their journey toward the mountain and starting to see evidence of how tainted the land has become, including mutated “primitive” animals. On the mountain, a humanoid woman with a stone body begins to radiate an intense amount of energy. Suddenly, Dusty is able to manipulate magic with ease, which he uses to cure an infected goatman they come across. Suddenly, the mountain is practically consumed by the energy the woman emanates, creating a mushroom cloud and causing all of the infected animals to stampede, and bringing out a truly massive beat that appears to be several beasts melded together.
I love the general tension that exists between Learoyd and Dusty. It’s not personal, exactly, because the two of them basically like each other. Rather, there’s a tremendous cultural and societal gulf that’s probably more akin to first contact between two alien species. The awkward silence that follows Dusty asking Learoyd what human beings used to eat is hilarious. Likewise, Learoyd’s confusion about how there can be unintelligent frogs as well as sentient frogmen is pretty priceless. Perhaps the thing they can relate to most easily is how terrible politics are: after Sandhorst made a case for himself as the Ted Cruz of this world, they at least have that much in common.
Given that the central crisis of The Autumnlands was the gradual disappearance of magic, its sudden surge should be a good thing. And yet, as we can pretty clearly see, it’s not. It’s not a natural force, at least how it’s being used here, and the fact that that woman can somehow channel raises so many questions about what exactly is controlling and directing this force. She’s not human, clearly, but she looks like a human, and we haven’t seen anybody else like that apart from Learoyd. The magic we’re seeing is more akin to radiation, from the mutations to the mushroom cloud that’s meant to evoke a nuclear weapon.
This issue strengthens the connective links between Learoyd’s time and the present in the Autumnlands. Sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic: can science create magic? If magic is nothing more than energy to be wielded, then some kind of technology can allow one to direct it. Initially, I had thought that whatever weapon was deployed in Learoyd’s time was the cataclysm that destroyed the old world, and allowed a new one to come in. This is the usual interplay between science-fiction and fantasy (I’m thinking of Shannara, but Adventure Time does this too), but I’m not sure it’s that simple here. The humanoid woman unleashing magic is sort of a bridge point, which also suggests an interesting bridge between the two genres beyond mere cataclysm. Rather, they sustain each other.
In general, this was a really good issue. I got a kick out of the fact that the goatmen appear to be in Irish, in contrast to the English sheepmen. Ben Dewey’s art is always a pleasure to look at, but the sheer number of creepy-crawlies and grotesqueries in this issue gives him a lot of fun things to draw. I’m going to be curious to see how they tie this all back together with the beasts in the cities, especially now that magic is coming back. Of course, Learoyd and Dusty have more pressing problems: the fight should be a fun one.
Rating: 9/10
Zeb Larson
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https://youtu.be/b7Ozs5mj5ao?list=PL18yMRIfoszEaHYNDTy5C-cH9Oa2gN5ng
Originally published April 14, 2016. Updated April 15, 2018.
