Spoilers for Mike Carey’s Lucifer (2000), Paul Jenkin’s Inhumans (1998), Swamp Thing Vol 2. (1984) and Hellblazer: Constantine.

Lucifer #43 (Vertigo, 2000)

There’s something fascinating in watching intricate and complex plans get executed to perfection. Something captivating about watching all the pieces come together to end in a masterstroke.

Chessmasters always have an objective and a plan to achieve it. They will make any gamble and sacrifice anyone necessary to complete that objective. In a pursuit of glory, money and power, the chessmaster villain has such control that the metaphorical pieces don’t even know they’re in the game. That’s what makes the chessmaster so dangerous. And terrifying.

But what about when the chessmaster is the hero of the story?

When we read a story where the chessmaster is a protagonist, our perspective has to shift. These characters make appalling sacrifices and take terrible risks throughout their stories. A likable and well-developed side character will, often unwillingly, become collateral damage as the hero makes their play to finish the game. How can we, the audience, appreciate and encourage such a ruthlessness? With a strong thematic character hook, that’s how.

In Mike Carey’s Lucifer series, the fallen angel Lucifer is obsessed with escaping predestination. He isn’t interested in people, souls, morality, or anything at all. Nothing except resenting an existence that anticipates every action he could possibly take.

So Lucifer finally devises a plan that he thinks will achieve his goal. Goading a bloody war with heaven and rescuing God’s demiurge, Micheal, Lucifer manages to create his own universe, a universe without destiny. When Micheal asks him what this new universe is for, Lucifer responds, “The culmination of all my efforts. The end of predestination. The end of tyranny. I have escaped providence.”

Then in Paul Jenkins’ Inhuman miniseries, the xenophobic Inhuman city of Attilan is under attack and their society roils from internal dissent stirred by the madman Maximus. The thematic line through the story is Black Bolt, the Inhuman leader, and his struggles as a ruler. Black Bolt is forced to constantly make decisions that cost lives and endanger his people. Silent and stoic, his inner monologue occasionally interjects the story to confront us with questions of how we might deal with the events of the story.

Inhumans Cover #5 (Marvel, 1998)

Vengeance #6 Cover (Marvel, 2012)

On the eve of defeat, Black Bolt’s plan is revealed- to bait the interlopers into a massive attack and stage a natural disaster that both forces back the invading army and falsifies the destruction of Attilan. The Inhumans are now hidden from the world and safe from interference.

Black Bolt has been holding all the cards the whole time but has sacrificed many lives to his end. The story closes with Black Bolt’s final question for the audience: “Imagine that you could save a family by sacrificing a child, but that you had to explain it to the child… What would you say?”

From the other side, Hellblazer explores what being a callous chessmaster can do to a person. In the pages of Swamp Thing (Alan Moore, 1984), John Constantine organizes a group of magical superhumans and entities in a bid to prevent the end of the world. While eventually successful, Constantine orders and then watches as many of his friends and comrades are killed in this battle.

In Hellblazer, Constantine struggles with the guilt of his decisions. Perhaps he had the best of intentions. Perhaps he didn’t really believe they would die. Or perhaps he just thought he could take it if they did.

Alcoholism, depression, and self-destructive tendencies plague Constantine wherever he goes and whatever he does. More battles rise and more friends fall into the pyre. As Constantine notes, “Getting too close to me can be bad for your health. I’m radioctive.”

A trope is what a writer makes of it. Strong motivations and character explorations can elevate stories and the tropes they use. Used well, tropes help us explore facets of story and human nature in dynamic and interesting ways. The Chessmaster is no different. Lucifer, Black Bolt, and Constantine might be chessmasters, but that’s just the lense by which we can examine their struggles with destiny, leadership, and guilt.

hellblazer: all his engines (Vertigo, 2005)

This is Andrew’s final blog post for Genre Savvy Grab Bag. You can read Andrew’s other blogposts here, here, and here!

---

Andrew Gilvary

Andrew is a former graduate of the University of Ottawa where he got his B.A. with a Major in English Literature. He enjoys doing nerdy things and cuddling his cat.

Believe Everything. The Earth may have been birthed from primordial Chaos, as the Greek myths say. That doesn’t mean that Odin didn’t fashion the Earth from bones and blood of Ymir the Frost Giant. It also doesn’t mean that Izanagi didn’t create the Earth using his jeweled spear. It all happened. Well, most of it. Maybe.

In a story that explains how the myth of Orpheus is true, death proclaims that other myths do not necessarily apply (Sandman- The Song of Orpheus, DC comics)

This trope has been a mainstay of contemporary fantasy for years, across almost every medium imaginable. Supernatural and metaphysical events from multiple world mythologies can share the same space in stories that engage this trope. Any and all legends and folklore are up for grabs. Even God with a capital G is a frequent resource to mine in these stories. Examples of this trope include- television series like Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, Charmed, and Supernatural- video games such as God of War and Assassin’s Creed- comic books like Hellboy, Fables, and Sandman- and in books such as Harry Potter, The Dresden Files and American Gods.

Mining the rich mythological traditions of different world religions is a really effective tool in story writing. Using world mythologies that the reader might be familiar with engages them. And a good writer can take advantage of that intrigue.

In Neil Gaiman’s stupendously excellent Sandman series, for example, gods are created from the power of human worship (not necessarily belief). Gods who remain popular, like Odin or Thor, also remain powerful; less popular gods, like the Egyption goddess Bast, are withering away. When Gaiman begins to introduce aliens in this universe then the audience has to wonder, “do these people’s gods exist?” What do the gods of aliens even look like? (Whoops, wrong comic book universe)

Believe Everything is also effective because, ironically, it means the audience doesn’t know what to expect. Contrary to the trope name, not everything is true when it comes to the mythology being adapted. Another example from Sandman is the Orpheus myth, a central piece of mythology to the through-narrative of the comic. In this version, Orpheus visits Death to learn how to enter the underworld, understanding that the Greek hero Herakles had done so. Death disillusions Orpheus, and the audience, on the reliability of those Herakles exploits (see image above). This subversion sets up an important rule and theme for the entire narrative; avoiding death might actually be worse than dying.

Winged Horses are “technology” you see (Thor- Ragnarok, Marvel Studios)

Often it is prudent to create rules for why, or at least how, the creatures and characters of mythology exist within the world. Hellboy comics play it straight where mythical beings are simply a part of the world just like humans; not all folklore is true, but folklore is inspired by beings’ existence. On the other hand is Marvel comics, where the godly heroes of Asgard are actually aliens with technology so advanced it seems like magic.

This isn’t an issue in stories like Harry Potter, where the magical world is kept secret, including the magical creatures. The mythical creatures, like Fluffy and Buckbeak, are simply an extension of the zoology of that narrative. However, the rules need to made clear in worlds like Marvel’s so that readers understand how these characters might be allowed to interact with a non-myth narrative. If Loki is an alien, we can expect that myths where he transformed into a mare and gave birth to an eight-legged horse are not applicable, for better or for worse.

---

Andrew Gilvary

Andrew is a former graduate of the University of Ottawa where he got his B.A. with a Major in English Literature. He enjoys doing nerdy things and cuddling his cat.