The Mystery Play

By Grant Morrison

Book Overview

Written by Grant Morrison; Art by Jon J. Muth The fully painted psychological thriller THE MYSTERY PLAY illustrates the devastating power of fear and accusations as a small-town community is ripped... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 1563891891
• ISBN13: 9781563891892
• Release Date: August 1995
• Publisher: Vertigo
• Length: 80 Pages
• Weight: 0.55 lbs.
• Dimensions: 10.2" x 0.2" x 6.7"

Customer Reviews

Not Morrison's best story, but still a worthwhile read

Comic writer extraordinairre Grant Morrison (The Filth, Doom Patrol, New X-Men, JLA; come on, you know the list by now) weaves an interesting, often thought provoking tale with The Mystery Play; in which an actor playing God in a town play is murdered, and the investigation led by a mysterious detective which follows. Without giving too much away, Morrison presents a setting and characters which are not what any of them seem to be, and the final result ends up being a twisty thriller that may not rank up there with Morrison's best work for DC/Vertigo, but is a worthwhile read nevertheless. The real star of The Mystery Play is the starkly painted artwork by Jon J. Muth, which helps make this graphic novel all the more haunting. All in all, The Mystery Play is a dark and somewhat moving excursion from the great Grant Morrison, and even though it doesn't come close to the amazing works he's crafted in the past, it is still definitely worth a look for Morrison and/or Vertigo fans.

Grant Morrison the Antichrist?

I'm a huge fan of all of Grant Morrison's work, from Zenith to the Invisibles. His work will make you think in a way that you never have before. If you're a fan of his work like I am, you should check out Brian Caldwell's novel, We All Fall Down. It's the Biblical Apocalypse done right- full of sex and violence and an angry young man who smokes and swears too much. I mention all of this here because the Antichrist in the novel has the peculiar name of Richard Grant Morrison, and when he begins talking about how humanity has to realize that they are five demensional creatures growing in the soil of space/time, you'll realize that that name isn't a coincedence. Check it out after you've read all of Grant's stuff.

A fascinating graphic novel.

THE MYSTERY PLAY, written by the pheonomenally talented Grant Morrison and painted by the equally brilliant Jon J Muth, opens with the murder of God, or, rather, the murder of an actor playing the part of God in "The Mystery Play," the titular play performed annually in a small town. An eccentric detective from the city comes to investigate the murder, only to find that the answers he seeks lie far deeper than he may be willing to dig. It's not hyperbole to say that Grant Morrison is one of the finest, most brilliant minds to ever write comics. His work on DOOM PATROL, ANIMAL MAN, and THE INVISIBLES is extraordinary and so far ahead of the majority of comics in terms of intelligence, originality, innovation, and pure storytelling genius that it's almost pathetic to read most non-Morrison-written comics. Hell, even some of his "lesser" masterpieces like FLEX MENTALLO, KILL YOUR BOYFRIEND, and, yes, THE MYSTERY PLAY blow most other comics out of the water. Simply put, Morrison is great.And THE MYSTERY PLAY just so happens to be one of his finest short works (the aforementioned DOOM PATROL, ANIMAL MAN, and THE INVISIBLES being some of his excellent longer works) and one of the best graphic novels in the medium's history. On the surface, it appears to be a fairly complicated but not terribly deep murder mystery -- a man is killed in a small town and a detective comes out to investigate. However, the brilliance of THE MYSTERY PLAY lies in what is under this somewhat mundane surface. Beneath the "simple" murder mystery veneer lay dozens of clevor allegories, symbols, allusions, and metaphors. In short, loads and loads of depth -- this comic requires considerable patience to read and it requires that the reader be willing to plumb its considerable depths again and again, because there will always be something new, something fascinating for he/she to stumble upon. Jon J Muth's haunting painted artwork provides a stunningly realistic vision of Morrison's story, but there's enough of a hint of something more unusual, something more surreal, something almost supernatural at the edges of his artwork that this artwork transcends mere photorealism. Many of the book's dreamlike images will no doubt stick with you long after you close it and set it down. THE MYSTERY PLAY is a story full of subtle details and small nuances, and it's allegories, symbolism, metaphors, and allusions wrap around and through each other in so many breathtaking ways that the end result bears more resemblance to the literary equivalent of a knotted-up ball of yarn. Yet the fun lies in unwrapping and untying this ball of yarn, trying desperately to reach the core. Chances are, you never will -- this enigma of a comic will doubtless continue to puzzle you until you die. If you're in the mood to truly see comics as art, to see a work of art more mature, more sophisticated, and more complex than virtually anything in most other mediums, y

An excellent work-- if not a complete classic.

This fine graphic novel is among the best that medium has ever seen