Lucifer: Vol 11: Evensong (2007)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston / John J. Muth / Zander Cannon / Aaron Alexovich | Page Count: 216

“If mercy’s your aim, be relentless in your mercy.  Be absolute. 

Be yourself, until you bleed.”

The final volume.  It’s time for Lucifer to put his affairs in order before taking what he feels is the best course of action.  Carey wraps up the series with some single issue stories that pick up the pieces and suggest potential futures of many of the main characters and a few of the more memorable secondary ones.

The women of the series made the toughest choices and underwent the greatest change.  Their growth is explored beautifully.  In a perfect world that story would never end.  It’s a bitter-sweet experience; particularly for my favourite character.
It surprised me to find that I will miss the Lucifer cast just as much (and in some cases even more) than I miss the Sandman cast.

More than any other volume, Evensong feels like it’s firmly in the Sandman universe.  The structure of certain events and the interactions of the players are on a par with it.  Carey states in his afterword that Lucifer was never his character, he was just lucky enough to be able to journey with him, to guide him through adventures and growth.  While that is certainly true, in my mind Lucifer was an underdeveloped catalyst until Carey wrote him firmly into Sandman lore.  He deserves credit for taking a piece of clay and crafting an exquisite piece of art.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 70 - 75, and Lucifer: Nirvana one-shot.

5 farewell gifts out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 10: Morningstar (2006)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Colleen Doran / Michael Kaluta | Page Count: 192

“Fight.  Win, or be defeated.  Die.  Make your own arrangements.

I'm not your keeper.”

Book 10 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  After a deeply emotional opening, picking up a thread that you may have thought done and dusted from one of the earlier books, the apocalyptic conclusion to the shit-storm that has built around the Lightbringer for the past few books gets quickly underway.  What follows is conflict on a grand scale.  It’s chaos unleashed in a place unprepared for it.  Again.

While some fight for victory, some for honour, and some for the joy of fighting, Lucifer knows that to craft the New he must first destroy the Old, and not just in the physical sense.  The victor may win the battle but it’s not just Above and Below any longer; the whole of Creation itself is at stake.  So what if the collateral damage is a few billion souls?  His rules are the only rules that matter.

It could’ve turned into preachy theologizing but Carey avoids that, cleverly balancing the personal with the practical, the individual aspect with the mob mentality.  It makes sense that it ends this way.  Lucifer was never God’s opposite; he was the thing that God could never be, grounded as he was by his own stagnant rules.  Lucifer fights against predestination.  He fights for freedom; not the human militant concept of freedom, but the freedom of the individual will.

This penultimate volume is the focal end of the series.  Vol 11 is the coda.  That gives Carey the opportunity to concentrate on the story at hand and leave the loose end gathering for another time.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 62 – 69.

4½ family feuds out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 9: Crux (2006)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Marc Hempel / Ronald Wimberly | Page Count: 168

“I walked on into chaos, and the earth beat like a heart beneath my feet.”

Book 9 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  The dictionary defines a CRUX as “…a vital or decisive stage, point, etc. / a baffling problem or difficulty.”  The book embodies both of those things.

The first story kicks off with the politics of Hell once again in disarray.  The current Duke of Gly plays a pivotal role in what direction it’ll take.  I didn't think Marc Hempel’s art on this piece a good match for Mike Carey’s words.  His cartoon styling lessens the severity of the situation.  I liked his version of Gaudium but I’d like Gaudium even if he was drawn by a 5 year old in a blindfold.

After that single issue the regular team of Gross and Kelly take over for the titular tale.  Carey’s ability to drop little things into the plot, things that through causality will escalate into giant things if left unchecked, makes this volume more than exciting.  While it’s true that characters should be left to grow at their own pace, sometimes they need a little push.

A short interlude follows, full of contrasts and hard choices for a series regular.  It runs concurrent with the Crux storyline.  Guest artist Ronald Wimberly takes pen duties.  His style is perfect for depicting what unfolds.  I loved every purposeful line of it.  From that point on, Crux kicks ass all the way to the very end.  Lucifer is back to being essential reading again.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 55 – 61.

4½ happenings in Vegas out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 8: The Wolf Beneath the Tree (2005)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / P. Craig Russell / Ted Naifeh | Page Count: 160

“To read aloud from the book makes the book an element in the story it tells.”

Book 8 of 11 in the Lucifer series. This one opens with the 50th issue, pencilled by P. Craig Russell. He did The Sandman 50th issue so it makes sense he’d also do this one. Russell’s art is of his usual high standard, full of open splendour or intimate moments when needed. It’s titled Lilith. If you've been following the series from the beginning you’ll be able to guess how that ties in with events thus far, and what it means for one or more of the supporting characters. What you may not know is how large a part it played in other events. It’s an eye-opener.

A gathering puts the Lightbringer face to face with the embodiment of the thing he despises the most; if you've been paying attention to what you've been reading up to now you’ll notice it’s the thing that he’s spent the previous seven books trying to escape. Carey lets the character’s arrogance come to the fore as a defence mechanism. Strength gained from vulnerability is a theme we've seen before but is handled differently this time. I enjoyed that part.

The consequence of Lucifer's actions has caused all sorts of vile things to surface from their lairs. Similarly, Fenris, the Asgardian wolf of Norse mythology, feels the time is right for him to bring on Ragnarok, as was foretold. If that happens it could put a giant Yggdrasil sized splinter in Lucifer’s plans.

Make sure you have book 9 because there is another cliff-hanger ending.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 45, and 50 – 54.

3 guests at the table out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 7: Exodus (2005)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly | Page Count: 168

“I served our Father faithfully,

and my reward was to be chastised for not being you.”

Book 7 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  The Morningstar is forced to take preventative measures to ensure the safety of his property.  After the effort expelled to create and then to keep it, to leave it open to God’s whim now would be folly.  This forces him into a position with the Heavenly Host that’d he’d rather avoid but sometimes circumstance forces even the hand of the angels.

Elsewhere, the secondary characters are given more to do, in a more thought-out and interesting storyline than last time.  And while this leaves Lucifer absent a lot of the time it really didn't matter because the parallel storylines kept my attention diverted.

There's a lot of humour in Exodus.  It was unexpected but not unwelcome after the drawn-out nature of the previous book.  The fugly little fallen Cherub Gaudium gets a chance to shine.  He and his sister could sustain an off-shoot of their own, about the domestic problems of two incompetent siblings.  I’d buy it.

There's a beautifully penned dark fairytale about a troubled boy and an eager, pensive demon.  It works both in the context of the Lucifer universe and would work equally well if it were removed from it.  It reminded me why I fell in love with comics.  Their ability to be both heart-warming visually and filled with deeper metaphor textually is a great strength.

The final few pages are a cliff-hanger that had me grasping for the next volume off the shelf immediately.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 42 - 44, and 46 – 49

4 great needs to blaspheme out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 6: Mansions of the Silence (2004)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston / David Hahn | Page Count: 144

"You are the King of contrivance and manipulation, my Samael.  But in that, as in all things, you learned from your Father."

Book 6 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  Seeing as how it’s on the cover, I can say without crossing into spoiler territory that Lucifer has got himself a medium sized ship.  Why or where he intends it to sail will be revealed if you read the book.

Sadly, the story is formulaic.  After an intro that leaves you wondering what happened between the last book and this one, something that Carey has been careful to address up until now, the premise gets underway.  In the tradition of Jason and the Argonauts, all manner of mythical creatures that exist merely to interfere and harm are encountered during the long and arduous voyage.  The crew bicker and fight amongst themselves and against the nasties.  That’s really all there is to it.  I wanted them to succeed but wished they’d hurry the hell up and get to their destination.   It felt like someone other than Carey was at the helm and was afraid to mess too much with the relationships, so instead they made everyone boring and ineffectual.

It's the mid-way point of the series and it functions as such.  It closes the first half and opens the second.  It’s essential you read it for a number of reasons that will eventually become clear but don’t expect it to peak your excitement meter like previous volumes have.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 36 - 41

2½ pools of thought out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 5: Inferno (2004)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston / Craig Hamilton | Page Count: 166

“It was an irony very much to his taste, that he could no longer live without her.”

Book 5 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  The four-part storyline that opens this volume closes a deal made in Vol 2: Children and Monsters (2001); Lucifer and Amanadiel meet at the arranged place and time to resolve their differences.  Some secondary characters find the event fortuitous, believing it the perfect opportunity to gain favour with one side or the other.  It gives writer Mike Carey a chance to further develop threads from previous books and once more stress that Lucifer can rely just as well on his wits as on his powers; for power is useless without the knowledge of when to best use it.

A large part of Inferno feels like an interlude—a  time of rest and recuperation before Lucifer can fulfil the promise he made himself in the previous book.  Before he can set that in motion he must seek out something specific, but to secure it he has to offer yet another promise that'll likely bring him trouble further down the line.  It’s business as usual for the fallen angel.

Carey’s multifaceted narratives work best when they have a large cast to entwine themselves in; this volume is lessened by those deep interrelations being removed as everyone is separated by duty.  The closings, the side-events and the setting up of a new arc are all dependent on your enjoyment of the previous books, and as such this feels disjointed and stitched together haphazardly.  The stories are strong in characterisation but structurally messy when collected together in a trade; the format highlights its own artificial nature.  In single issues they’d have worked much better.

One of the stand-alone works is a story of joy, dependent upon someone going to someplace dark within himself.  It was quite beautiful.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 29 – 35

3½ rules bent out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 4: The Divine Comedy (2003)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston |

Page Count: 190

“Grace and perfection and eternity were her heritage.  […]

And a soul so bright it could be seen from Hell.”

Book 4 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  The consequences of things unseen would be a simple way to describe this volume.  To elaborate will be hard to do without giving anything away because almost everyone of any significance in the previous books is gathered in Carey’s playground within a fractured part of Gaiman’s universe.  It’s a five pointed star with all the points pointing inwards.  No one is safe when everyone wants the same thing and most of them are prepared to do anything to obtain it.  It’s as powerful as a series finale, and yet it’s not even close to the end.  Nevertheless, not everyone makes it out alive.

When giants walk through the forest, the bugs that get trampled underfoot also have a story to tell.  The book breaks from the power play to focus upon the consequences the big players have upon some of those small inhabitants.  In doing so it attaches more drama to the main play and reminds us that our actions impact upon the innocent.

The Lightbringer’s pride, his most defining attribute, is once again the thing that gets him into trouble.  It makes him think he can stop any opposition and it puts him in the debt of a gift given willingly.  He won’t let that pass without due recompense.  The Devil keeps his promises, even the unspoken ones.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 21 – 28

5 exploding fap hands out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 3: A Dalliance With The Damned (2002)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston |
Page Count: 160

“I think you should stop talking to the snake.  These things he tells you
are making you unhappy.”

Book 3 of 11 in the Eisner award winning Lucifer series.  Things unfold at a more leisurely pace in this volume as writer Mike Carey shifts the focus away from the titular anti-hero.  Instead, he explores the virtues and vices of some of the other inhabitants of the realm.  In the first half of the book we get three shorter episodes that have a self-contained beginning / middle / end but are themselves interconnected and still manage to tie in with the series arc.

In story number one, you’ll sympathise with Mazikeen as she embarks on a very personal mission that’ll have consequences for everyone.

The second tale sees the little girl with the special talent take a walk in a dark place where little girls with special talents shouldn't be.  Look out for a cameo from some Sandman escapees.

And finally, the concept of free will is given more attention in some place new that resembles some place very, very old.  It’s a well crafted, beautifully presented tale filled with some dark humour and some scathing observations.

Most of the second half of the book is a three part story with a large cast that plays out like a subversive period drama; it's about lust, leisure, pleasure and pain.

One final story finishes the volume.  It returns to the series arc; contrasting it alongside a smaller, more personal story of a couple lost in more than one sense of the word.  The coda will have you on the edge of your seat, particularly if you have a healthy interest in the occult and religious hypocrisy; or at the very least a basic knowledge of Tarot.

The book collects together Lucifer issues 14 – 20.

4 armadillo canons out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 2: Children and Monsters (2001)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Peter Gross / Ryan Kelly / Dean Ormston |
Page Count: 208

"You know how it is.  You put things away for a rainy day ... then you look up one day and it's raining Angels."

Book 2 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  This volume contains two distinct but interconnected parts.  Lucifer owns a piano bar in Los Angeles called Lux.  The irony of that amuses him because he’s not without a Machiavellian sense of humour.  In the four part "The House of Windowless Rooms" he leaves his precious bar behind for a time to pursue the next part in his great work.  That requires him to speak with Izanami-no-Mikoto, the Japanese Goddess of creation and death.  He will be powerless in her realm so must rely on his wits and his cunning to be his weapon and his armour.  Shit hits the Japanese fan.

The second story, the five part "Children and Monsters," focuses on what happens while Lucifer is away from Lux.  Mazikeen gets a chance to prove her loyalty to the Morningstar.  I like her a lot.  If you have trouble understanding what Mazikeen is saying, try reading it aloud and listen phonetically.  It makes sense then.  Dean Ormston takes art duties on this one.  Even if you dislike his style, the story is strong enough to distract you.  I like his work so was easily sucked into the world.

The reasons for Lucifer’s actions up until now begin to become clear and it further develops the people, places and things that are keen to stop him achieving it.
The position he holds between cockiness and arrogance is what keeps him an enigma to his enemies and his followers, and only he knows the distinction between the two.  His unbending will is his greatest weapon and he uses it without fear of reticence.

Lucifer may be a spin-off series but it’s definitely not a Sandman clone.  In terms of spiralling narrative, Mike Carey is easily Gaiman’s equal (or better).

The book collects together Lucifer issues 5 – 13

5 Ghosts, Gods, Demons and the Host of Heaven out of 5

Lucifer: Vol 1: Devil in the Gateway (2001)

Author: Mike Carey | Illustrators: Scott Hampton / Chris Weston / James Hodgkins / Warren Pleece / Dean Ormston  | Page Count: 160

"Every time I try to improvise I find my moves were right there in the script all along."

Book 1 of 11 in the Lucifer series.  It’ll help your introduction into Lucifer’s world if you've read The Sandman: Vol IV: Season of Mists (1992); it’s not essential but it’s recommended.  This series follows on from events that began there.
The Dream King tried to find a balance but The Morningstar wants to upset the balance because he knows the balance is a lie.  He wants to tear it away and leave a naked truth.  As one door closes…

Vol One isn't just a casual introduction, it presents characters that’ll become important in later issues.  You may think their story has ended with the final panel but it more often than not hasn't.  Carey has the ability to leave a reader with the impression that those people exist outside of the story; when you close the book they don’t disappear, they continue to exist in new more personal stories that we aren’t privy to.

He writes for adults.  That doesn't mean he deals in Hollywood sex and violence, it means he creates characters with flaws, prone to introspection, with selfish tendencies that influence their actions, like all of us.  He places the fallen angel in their world.  Lucifer has a goal that he'll do almost anything to achieve but he needs help.  He uses his talents to influence people.  He may toss them aside afterwards but he’ll always allow them free will.  Give the Devil his dues: it's not him that makes you walk the path to hell.  It should be remembered that manipulation is just another part of the game.  If Lucifer achieves his goal, all of creation will be thrown into chaos.

The book collects together The Sandman Presents: Lucifer issues 1 – 3, and Lucifer issues 1 – 4

5 walking Miltonian anti-heroes out of 5