Category: Writing

The essence of control rings out

Posted on December 9, 2024 by Marc

In some ways, the Control Ring (level Two) of the city is the most obvious of settings and, in turn, the most aptly named. Government of any kind is essentially about control: controlling who is considered a citizen, what the borders are, and how the rule of law (if any) is implemented. There are certainly differences among the various types of government and those that are nominally about “the people” are often the most insidious in the form of control which is exerted. Our own United States, once again about to be the plaything of Bronzo the Clown and his cohort of fascists, has long trended toward the type of control which is far more subtle than simply that of a monarch dictating what is good or isn’t according to their personal whims. In the US, the concept of the nation-state as religion (the flag not being allowed to touch the ground, being required to recite a pledge of allegiance in school, etc.) is the most obvious form of that control. Treating inanimate objects and vague concepts like “democracy” and “patriotism” as untouchable foundations of this society played heavily into the conceptualization of the Tribunal, which is the dominant element of level Two.

Likewise, organized religion has been an element of control in human society for as long as the latter has existed. Being able to refer to otherworldly and largely unknowable beings as the enforcers of societal law that was, of course, usually dictated by a priesthood in close alliance with the rulers of that society, has been an essential facet of almost every major religion created throughout human history. “Don’t do that because God said so” is a direct form of that control. Writing those religious laws down and then reinterpreting them to serve whatever present interest was most advantageous to those doing the interpretation is a more oblique but just as widespread method. Religion establishes a code that must be heeded if one is to be accepted within the society where the majority of people have decided that said code is the best way for society to function. Again, American democracy was largely created as a replacement for that kind of religion. When it’s combined with that outlook is when it becomes the most pernicious as, again, we are about to see with Project 2025 and so forth. This, too, was a major aspect to my imagining of the Tribunal.

Brave New World | Occult & Obscure Clothing | Night Channels White / 5X-Large

But then when it is simply all of the worst aspects of humanity that those two things- government and religion -allow to be used as weapons is where it all comes together. That, in truth, is fascism and it usually centers around promoting the interests of a small group against the interests of all other groups and is almost always rooted in fear: fear of The Other; fear of change; fear of differing perspectives. All of those things must be repelled or abolished in order to preserve the sanctity (and control) of the society that functions on that fear. The Tribunal, as masters of the second level of the City (and, really, the first, since it’s the one that doesn’t have regular, direct contact with the outside world, like the Rim) is a structure of government that is expressly about control. It wants to control who or what enters its territory (and, thus, enters or leaves the city.) It wants control over the genetic makeup of its citizenry (the Midwife project.) It wants control over what its citizens do, think, and feel as it arcs toward its collective vision of “the perfect society”; E pluribus unum, indeed. That kind of exacting control over mass bodies of people is nearly impossible if history is any indication, but many attempts have come close, usually in fiction but not always. The Tribunal is Orwell’s 1984. It is Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. It is George Lucas’ THX-1138. But it is also Joseph Stalin’s Soviet Union. And along with those, it’s also markedly interested in eugenics, cybernetics, and psionics as methods to implement that perfect society and extend it as far as it can.

I usually refer to the Tribunal as an “it” because, while it is controlled at the top by a council known as The Trust, the whole entity is something of a unitary existence. The control within that society is so absolute that almost everything tends to function like a centralized machine; from the Tribunal Protectors (aka Thought Police) to the Midwives to the Counselors, all of which are meant to curb the potential excesses of humanity (like, say, free will) and instead shape it into a tool to be used to, again, create that perfect society. That’s why the eugenicist program of the Midwives is so important to it. Finding the right genetic makeup to not only create “super-beings” but expressly obedient, dedicated super-beings is important to the whole mission of the Tribunal. This, of course, all rings true to the basic ideas behind the Nazi regime of Germany and, likewise, rings true to the aspirations of any number of Americans, both now and in the past. Genetic purity has been a hallmark of American society since its founding on the backs of those considered a “lesser race.” Racism has been an essential part of American politics ever since. The Tribunal takes a different tack on it, in that no ethnicity is considered superior to any other, but the object of the Tribunal is to create such a race that will be superior and, therefore, in turn create the superior (or perfect) society.

Religion and Control | Catholic Answers Podcasts

That endeavor is, like many things throughout history, a direct response to the circumstances around them. The Collapse was enough of a shock to create the idea in the most outlying portion of the city (but still inside the city, unlike the “lawless” Rim where those “others” live…) that a government/religion like the Tribunal is the only proper response to this disaster. And there are a couple elements external to the state that contribute to that idea. Back in the early 90s, it was common knowledge that the older portion of the population were more likely to be conservative voters, which made the idea of the Dawn Patrol- a group of pharmacologically-enhanced, elderly men, longing for “the good old days” -an easy one to countenance as one of the few manifestations of the “gang” phenomenon on the second level. Another one of those groups is the Anarchrists, who take the religion example to an extreme; each one of them believing that they could be the promised messiah if they can only sacrifice themself in the fury of conflict against the control enforced by the Tribunal. We’ll run into a few of them in one of our upcoming stories.

But I also don’t want to neglect the religious angle in all of this talk about government control. That’s a deep-rooted aspect of the Tribunal’s makeup. As a Marxist and classical Stoic, I’ve always been fascinated by those who are devoted to this or that religion and the extremes that they’ve been driven to throughout history in the name of “God.” Much of the technology involved in the makeup of the Midwives, as well as the very network that the Tribunal maintains independent of the ShadowNet- TrinityNet -is rooted in that religious perspective. Entities on TrinityNet and within the very structure of the society carry names from religious texts like ophan and nefeshim. The iron fist of that society is inherently portrayed as something extending from the heavens and rooted in imagery of much greater significance than one gated neighborhood on the edge of a former metropolis. Also, one of the interesting things about the Tribunal that sits in the deep background is how similar much of its approach and essential makeup mirrors the society of the Walkers, much deeper in the city and much farther in our future than any tales about the second level…

Anyway, again, that’s for the future. For the next couple months, we’re still on the Rim and perfection is a distant vision. But we can still see the Tribunal Protectors lining the wall. They’re right there, hiding in plain sight. 

The tribal mentality

Posted on November 18, 2024 by Marc

Gang - Wikipedia

As I mentioned in the historical publication piece, the gangs have almost always been a fascinating topic for whomever has read the bible. When I started listing them off on that day that I dumped the majority of this whole concept onto a keyboard, a lot of them had come from the fabled notebook but in various stages of creation. Some of them were almost fully realized, like the Knightshift, and some of them were just names, like the Gorekings. Some of them had an identity firmly established, like Jerry’s Kids, and some of them had one that was only a wisp of an idea, like the Catclaws. And, certainly, some of them have been updated down through the years, as I’ve thought about stories that involved them and realized that there was a better concept that I hadn’t even considered when first naming and imagining them. I’m still doing that as I continue to write about the place. The Anarchrists of my current mindset aren’t the Anarchrists of the moment I first set them to paper, electronic or actual, in 1991. But I think the lure that their overall presence creates is that tribal mentality that most humans have to one degree or another. People want to belong to something and the gangs of Dystopia are like their own little nation-states unto themselves. Indeed, many of them are formed around actual genetic or other identities, like Bloodpulse and the Posh Street Flaming Screamers.

Mafia of the Poor: Gang Violence and Extortion in Central America | Crisis Group

Tribalism is hardwired into the human condition and manifests itself in any number of ways. The idea of Us vs Them is very much a part of the human condition, even if it wasn’t already encouraged by public institutions, like governments with their national borders, or cultural training, like racism. It also manifests itself in different ways, even when one discards one type of tribalism for another. I detest nationalism, as I think it divides people that would otherwise be working together (aka “They got you distracted with the national war so you don’t think about the only war that matters: the class war.”) It’s that disdain for nationalism that largely makes me indifferent to international football. Of course, I’m also a lifelong Liverpool fan, so my football tribalism expresses itself in another fashion. But it also depends on how you let it shape your thinking. I have good friends who are Manchester United, Manchester City, Real Madrid, and Chelsea fans and it doesn’t affect our friendship, even during matches. (Can’t say I know any Everton fans, though. I have limits.) The difference being that I am me first and Liverpool fan/club member, second. But a lot of people wrap themselves up in an identity that often defines how they interact with others. They’ll frame interactions in the context of being this or that identity, rather than simply a unique human with unique reactions to and interpretations of everything and everyone around them.

The Warriors movie review & film summary (1979) | Roger Ebert

Many of the gangs are of the former perspective, where their gang membership and the identity that allows or encourages them to be part of that gang, is like their armor against those not like them. In the city, of course, being part of a group that is closely-bonded is often a matter of literal survival, as opposed to social advancement or comfort that often defines gang membership in the current era (which can also be about survival in some cities, I am fully aware.) If you aren’t part of something like the Phalanx or the Shadow Dragons on Six, you may not live to see the next day. In contrast, your membership in something like Jerry’s Kids may not only be a matter of your physical makeup, but also might risk your life more than simply living on Three would ever do, which is a pretty high bar to clear in most parts of Dystopia. But in some cases, it’s not even a question of identity. The only thing that keeps the Phalanx tied together is the presence of the Warlord. It’s a cult of personality just like the modern Republican party, which is centered solely around Bronzo the Clown. Again, the fact that political parties throughout history were often just better organized and better funded street gangs (occasionally oriented around sports teams, like the Blues and Greens of Constantinople) makes those kinds of associations and personality cults that much easier. Again, many nations are essentially “gangs” of people who share an identity and often point that identity at other nations to announce: “They not like us.” That erroneous outlook of our modern era is often a side note in the identities of Dystopia’s gangs and that’s part of what science fiction is for: an extrapolation of what we see today into what we could see tomorrow.

Juggalos vs. the FBI: The fight for identity beyond the gang label - Sqauk

Canis Majoris, for example, is made up of lycanthropes on Four, both human and Morlock. Similarly, the Cyberrats on Seven are only made up of the cybernetically-enhanced and genetically-mutated servants of Hakker, which is still a cult of personality, to some degree. Both of their identities are also shaped by the level they inhabit, which was also part of the overall concept. I wanted to be able to do multi-genre stories in the same location, so the fact that werewolves exist on Four is entirely in keeping with the “horror” theme of that level. But I also wanted to do a different kind of SF/horror on Seven (about which I can’t really say that much until we get there…), which is why the Cyberrats (and Hakker) are what they are. But, again, sometimes it’s just a matter of self-interest. One could easily see any of the Rogue Corps on Three as “gangs.” For that matter, it’s easy to look at Macabre’s mob on Four, the Iron Wizards on Three, and The Morgue Lords and The Deathless across the city as different forms of “gangs”, even if they’re not identified as such in the bible. Human tribalism infects most aspects of modern society. Few people want to be alone all the time, so you find other people that are like you or think like you do or are fans of the same thing you are and you join them. That social animal characteristic, while not unique to humans, is far more refined and often esoteric than it is among other mammals. Elephants don’t band together because they like the same singer, but humans do and it means that even the most exotic motivations of any of the gangs in Dystopia still make sense at some level. That instinct to band together becomes even more prominent when you’re in the midst of a metropolis that just collapsed in on itself and it’s hang together or get hanged together. (The Hanged Man, however, remains one of the distinct loners in the city…)

So that’s some of the background thinking on the gangs and their presence in the setting. We’ll be running into one of them in the second story and the fourth story in the serial novel basically revolves around the activities of both the Knighshift and Control/Alt/Delete, so there will be plenty of gang action to come. One of these days, I might get back to that Bloodpulse story from the original digest-sized comic, too. Meanwhile, next time I might get back to the survey and explore the Control Ring, but no guarantees.

Plans for the moment

Posted on July 21, 2024 by Marc

When Jeff suggested that we try to get back into comics (him drawing and me writing), he immediately suggested the Dystopia material that I’ve been regaling you with in these first few posts. When he did that, he asked me to send him everything: the “bible”, the scripts, future story notes, and so on, as he hadn’t read any of it in years. What I also sent were a few short stories that I’d been writing in more recent years on the suggestion of my friend, Margot, that Jeff had never seen. Years ago, Margot had read the bible and a bit of the other material and reasoned that, if I couldn’t find an artist to do it in comic format, I should just write (or rewrite) the stories that I had and do everything in prose. That way, I wouldn’t have to rely on anyone to enable their seeing the light of day other than me. I’d become so fixated on the material in a visual sense that I’d never considered trying to change format and approach them from another angle. Some of that fixation remains, since we used to do everything in black-and-white at Fifth Panel because color printing was yet another expense that we (meaning: Jeff) couldn’t really afford. Consequently, I imagined almost every concept and character for Dystopia in black-and-white and that perspective remains to this day. Jeff has talked about adding color to the finished panels for the first story, which is based on one of those short stories that Margot suggested- written over a decade after the studio had ceased operation -and I find myself still imagining everything in black-and-white, such that adding color to anything feels foreign. I think Into Darkness could probably remain black-and-white, although I understand that adding color to it will attract more eyes and allow us to reveal some more details about things like the Netwights and so forth. The next story, though, will definitely benefit from a little chromatic accessorizing…

Into Darkness was intended as the opening segment of a serial novel. Even doing prose, I couldn’t escape the comic roots of the concept. What I wanted to do was a series of connected short stories- nine of them, in fact -that could stand on their own but still be a part of a continuing presentation; kind of a serial novel, with each segment taking place on one of the city’s nine levels. I realized in thinking about the whole concept that the later stories would more clearly be really long chapters in an actual novel, since the characters would be reflecting on previous events and interacting in a manner that involved that continuing story. But the first three or four or five could easily just be “days in the life of Dystopia” that spoke to one corner of the differing nature of each level. The central plot of the novel was an eruption by the Netwights/Jackwraiths in both the Real and the Now, respectively. You’ll see me regularly using that little catchphrase that is commonly wielded by the inhabitants of the city to talk about the outer world (the “real”) and the inner world (the ShadowNet or the “now.”) It was something I thought about when developing the concept of the city as I noticed how quickly news traveled on the then-nascent Internet, compared to the everyday world which still depended on newspapers, TV networks, and word-of-mouth. That phenomenon expanded beyond anything I was considering 30 years ago, such that, on today’s date that I’m writing this, the current president of the United States announced that he was not running for reelection not via press conference or delivering a letter to the New York Times, but on the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. That was inconceivable 30 years ago. There was the real and today there is the now. The entities that are the wights and the wraiths exist in those domains, respectively, but they’re just one of the most outward examples of how intertwined those domains are, which is why the catchphrase exists.

All of that said, Into Darkness is about just one aspect of The Rim, which is Force Command. The previous post talked about a few others, so there are still many directions that we could go if we decided to venture back to the top level. It is, of course, also only the first half of that story and we will finish it, but we’re going to sail down to the second level for the second one: Midwife, aborted which is, again, one of those short stories of the serial novel but involves a concept that’s been with me from the very first imaginings of the setting, which is The Tribunal, the dominant presence on the second level, and the Midwife program, which is a key element of the Tribunal’s genetic purity efforts. I’ll do a post about level Two as I mentioned at the end of my post about The Rim, so I won’t go into too much detail here. But there’s no hiding the fact that one of my favorite concepts within the setting is that of the fanatical, fascist, ultra-religious, Kafkaesque Tribunal and its various manifestations, including its own network, known as TrinityNet. So we decided to switch off from completing the full story of Bradson and Frazier up on Point and figured we’d engage at least the first part of how that surge of wights and wraiths is impacting at least one of the other levels of the city. I’m not sure if we’ll follow through the entire plot of the novel just yet; mostly because I never finished it. I completed the first three stories (although there’s room for them to be expanded) and got about halfway through the fourth (Stake and the Knightshift on Four, key characters in that story, are among my favorites of the gangs that are everywhere in the city) before losing the flame for it. Now that Jeff and I are back at it, this may turn out to be the compelling factor in its completion; not least because it’s a solid look at every level of the city all the way down to the Well. (Just as an editorial aside, I’m still debating about constantly capitalizing the articles before proper names that are major elements, rather than personal names. In other words, I’m questioning whether I should keep writing things as “The Tribunal” or “the Tribunal.” It may just be a question of me saving one keystroke (e.g. not pressing Shift more than once when writing those names.))

I kind of detest doing survey work, which is what I feel like “introducing” people to the concept is. I don’t want to be writing a guidebook. I want to be writing stories. But the serial novel was intended to be both an introduction to the overall concept AND a solid story, so beginning where we do is a convenient opening, but I’m not really concerned about holding people’s hands on the way down, either. One of my all-time favorite comic writers is Howard Chaykin, who basically never stops to give people any kind of introduction to plot or setting or characters. He just dives right into whatever story he’s writing and assumes that you’ll catch up as he moves along. There are pros and cons to that approach (Howard has never really been a “hit” comic writer) but it’s always felt more “honest” to me and I want (need, really) this project to be compelling, rather than seem like a chore, since it will end up producing better material from my end if I’m enthusiastic about what I’m doing, rather than feeling like I’m writing yet another guidebook to all of the amusement parks in my head. I’m not trying to imply that Into Darkness isn’t compelling. On the contrary, I hope people find it to be a great springboard into everything else that we’re doing. But I just don’t want to feel, again, like I’m letting people in easy. There’s nothing easy here, in the real or the now. So, next time, level Two. Maybe.