The Living Tribunal can be frightening

 The cosmic abstracts/entities in Marvel typically tend to be aloof and somewhat unconcerned about mortal reactions to them.  Sometimes they can be quite benevolent and key mortals in to why they are around, even helping them make sense of their lives, something most of us would want from a god.  Many times, however, they go beyond the usual treating us like ants and go as far as expressing hostility, just because their day got interrupted by something supposedly beneath their notice.  

The Living Tribunal is basically the Justice of God (in DC, the equivalent being would likely be the Spectre).  As we can see above from his brief time showing up during the events of the Infinity Gauntlet, he considers himself a part of the natural balance and above even the likes of Eternity.  Despite Thanos having iced a half of the universe, LT judges the event based on a notion of created beings doing what created beings do, and nopes out of the whole affair in what could easily be interpreted as a dick move.  All that said, he usually looks rather statuesque when being judgy.

Here he is in Storm vol. 5 no. 5 (this year back in February, a rather epic in scale issue that I will review later), being serenely statuesque and mildly annoyed that Eternity and Oblivion are bringing him a universal conflict to judge over.  You would think that a conflict brewing over millions, nay, billions of years over where to house Death would earn more than just a passing "sigh" from the LT.  I suppose he always has a lot on his/whatever mind, being directly responsible for the multiverse, or at least a multiversal cluster, under the One Above All, but my point here is not to defend LT but rather to point out that he usually looks very chill.  

Not so much in his first full appearance, Strange Tales no. 158, as drawn by the Mother of Cosmic Marvel, Marie Severin (also more on her later).

Glowing things tend to take on a new level of ferocity or aggression when they turn red, if only from looking just a bit more menacing, especially under that little purple hood thing he has on which shrouds his lovely golden face in DARKNESS.  Darkness equals bad in Cosmic Marvel, being the home of things like Oblivion, Knull... you get the picture.  Marie's art there is simple, but rather brilliant in how it can draw in the viewer with a bit of contemplative terror, much like being uncomfortably high while in a room full of Rothko red paintings.  

It gets a bit worse when you see him in motion, complete with those geometric edges rather than smooth hands.  Keep in mind that LT here was ready to throw down and pretty much end the planet because Strange felt compelled to tap into the power of Zom, one of those nasty extra-dimensional demons that makes even our Judgy McOscar statue take notice.  Long story short, that is NOT a face you want to see on the grand cosmic judge.  

Doctor Strange of Asgard: a review

In case you didn't know, as of July of 2024, Doctor Doom is Sorcerer Supreme.  While he did it to deal with all the vampires, we all know it was really just to be an ass.  Anyway, he never gave up the role after using his newfound magical can of vampire-be-gone, booting poor Stephen to the street.  Looking for a new gig and place to crash, Doctor Strange decides to try filling out a job application in Asgard.  

Thor, jovial and eager to hug, accepts our magic man and some laughs are had.  I have to say, it was nice seeing Thor Odinson being in a healthy place between very comedic movie Thor and artless, grimly serious traditional comic Thor.  As far as the rest of the issue goes, I would say it is definitely worth the cover price.  Stephen decides to forgo the comforts offered by Thor and the ruling class and heads out into the streets to make a name for himself.  I confess that my knowledge of things average Asgardian is not really refined, but I dare say this is the first time we get to see "street level" people in Asgard and the gritty underbelly of the whole thing.  Strange gets into a street fight, gets his tail kicked around a bit, but then goes magic on everyone and makes it to the end of the issue intact, at which point Loki gets involved, a mundane walk down a gritty street sandwiched between brushes with greatness.  This is pretty significant in my book, as Doctor Strange has always been a very upper level character.

He was, after all, our introduction to the prime cosmic beings like Eternity and the Living Tribunal.  This is because when you are a potent magic user, you often come into contact with other magical beings, demons, etc.  Many of those are also quite cosmic in scale and importance.  I had never really been that involved in his books before, despite my penchant for cosmic fixations, which I've lately been rectifying.  Even his earliest books are grand in scale and full of what made the House of Ideas get the name in the first place, often pondering philosophical questions of meaning while also looking like the artists of the time were on a psychedelic drug trip.  Here, however, despite being off world in Asgard, the former Sorcerer Supreme is just starting over.  I find myself eager to go along for the trip.

I say this because he's a really interesting combination of hubris and humility, a man who is very much a mortal but often deals with very immortal situations.  While Jean might fully ascend into a godlike state, and while Norrin will live forever and has long since left behind his days of the 9-5, Stephen still finds himself there, taking odd jobs, becoming a veterinarian, and engaging the mysteries of the universe from a much more ordinary vantage point than the girl next door who became the incarnation of life itself.  

How buff are heralds of Galactus?

Just how powerful are heralds of Galactus?  As seen in a prior post, Nova, an inexperienced and fresh herald, was able to pretty much destroy the vast majority of the Skrull planetary defense fleet without so much as breaking a sweat, which makes sense because space is cold and heralds... don't sweat.  Ha, almost got me there.  

In the Silver Age of Marvel, we encountered our first herald in the form of the Silver Surfer, who did a pretty good job inspiring at least a little awe and terror in the hearts of us Earth folk, who I suppose had only really experienced powerhouses the level of Thor, and in conscious memory, only recently.  Speaking of Goldilocks, as Thing names him, Thor is an excellent way to test a situation.  This brings us to another herald, Firelord:

As you can see, he has no problem whacking Mjolnir away, and even less of a problem standing toe to toe with the Thunder God:

This is not to say that they can't be humbled with a little effort.  Thor has certainly given Firelord some shots back, and then some.  

To put them out usually takes a bit more than a college try, however, and someone with some juice on the level of the Big G, the guy who gave them their power in the first place.  While heralds have been humbled before, a good point of reference for what sort of being can do such a thing would be Jeanix, from Uncanny X-men vol. 1, no. 105:

Jeanix has always been a hard one to understand in terms of just what exactly constitutes her/its being.  During this era of the story, Jean was seemingly transformed into the Phoenix, something later retold as being replaced by her, with the unfolding of the story later being that there was indeed a shared consciousness between them.  In any event, when she was telling Firelord to fuck off and stop wrecking Misty Knight's apartment, my interpretation of her level of being at said juncture would be something of an incarnation of the two together, or the Phoenix made flesh.  Just a few issues later, she is able to be taken out by some strong knock out gas, perhaps something of a self-limitation of the Phoenix Force trying to understand the corporeal body it was now managing.  In any event, I am sure I am going to be coming back to that particular topic throughout the blog, as Jeanix is perhaps the most interesting object of questions regarding incarnations, avatars, and being.  My point here is that heralds are powerful, but not nearly on the level as their master or the other comic entities, abstract or otherwise.  

Now, as much fun as it is nerding out over power levels as if we were having a debate that descends into name calling faster than most arguments on the superheroes subreddit, a.k.a "the answer is always Darkseid is stronger than anything else ever",  I maintain that there is a far more important question.  Just how "mortal" are heralds?  

By the point this bit of dialogue happens during Fantastic Four vol. 1 issue 49, Norrin Radd had been the Silver Surfer for at least a century, if not for several.  At first he retained his conscious experience of being a mere mortal, but as he started having difficulty finding uninhabited worlds for Big G, the Devourer decided to do a little psychic alteration on Norrin to get rid of his compassion.  Now, Galactus is not a complete douchebag, arguably a force of nature beyond being either a stand up guy or a douchebag, and knowing that Norrin would one day leave his service behind, well, he didn't exactly perform an irreversible lobotomy.  Alicia Masters there was able to awaken his inner decency and mortal experience and go back to being a bit of Norrin again.  Our friend Firelord, otherwise known as Pyreus Kril, is no different in this regard.  They are very much mortals in terms of soul, albeit with powers and transformed physical being that amounts to something of a minor deity/cosmic being.  Even centuries into it and recovering from his psychic alteration, Norrin sees the universe with expanded, but still very mortal eyes.  Like mortals in general, this does not mean that all heralds are heroes.  Terrax, for one, is a bit rough around the edges if not downright evil.  Terrax the terrible, Terrax the dickhead, Terrax the turd.  As Team America: World Police elegantly puts it, however, sometimes you need a dick to fuck an asshole:

Heralds are definitely their own entity, and can be best described as man becoming cosmic/divine, and where they end up with that newfound aspect is up to them.  They are definitely in a unique position where they can redefine themselves into something of a new state of being and transcend their mortal souls, but often do not chase that ambition.  Norrin admits that he has very lofty goals, but still... wants to be himself.

Before we part ways, as an additional note, not all heralds come from places of mortal origin, but they often are.  

What's with the name of the blog?

 "Because I don't want to lose Jean Grey"

This is a piece of dialogue taken from Phoenix (our current 2024 run) issue no. 5.  

As of this writing (issue no. 9), the series has been writer Stephanie Phillips' exploration of Jean accepting her cosmic role while carefully wading in the cosmic waters so as to not drown in them.  She/they (noted because both Jean and the Phoenix are at the wheel with equal consciousness this time around) have already encountered the cosmic beings such as Eternity, Infinity, the Living Tribunal, and other friends:

Those would all be the new designs for the cosmic beings, as introduced in the recent G.O.D.S. run by Jonathon Hickman and Valerio Schiti.  As we can see, everyone is appearing to be having a dance, and Eternity is inviting Jeanix (as I call the combined entity) in to join them all in the cosmic ballet.  Jean is hesitant to dive in all the way, maybe because she is worried about getting into a dance off with Eternity, or...  She accepts that she and the cosmic bird of life are meant to be as one, but she is more than just a little hesitant to lose herself in the process.  This blog is all about the contact between mortals and the cosmic, and I chose to name it as such because of the two-way street that is such an interaction.  While it would seem likely that most mortals given a chance at godhood would embrace jumping all in, this is not always the case, and likewise, there are definitely cosmic beings who mourn the passing of relative innocence that came with any possible prior existence.  

In Jean's case, the reasons are somewhat obvious; the last time the pair gave in to power without limits, a planet and race were wiped out.  Likewise, as much as Jean and Phoenix both found new exciting possibilities in their shared union, Jean finds herself getting tired, despite no longer being affected by fatigue.  

Two powerful instances of a faint remembering of simpler times come to mind in this regard.  In Excalibur vol. 1 issue 61, the Phoenix Force has been healing host Rachel and comes across Galactus going to town on a planet.  Feeling a bit of empathy for what remains of life there, Rachelix gets into a fight with him, knocks him around a bit, at which point Galactus gives up, but not without a parting shot about one of the ways in which Phoenix draws energy:

In what almost looks like a mixture of guilt and shame, a little bit of Galen of Taa emerges from the otherwise usually stone faced Galactus the world devourer.  Granted, he might have also had a little bit of gas from partially consuming the depleted planet, but I would like to think that Big G has a little bit of his old self still inside there.  More on that for another time.  

In Silver Surfer vol. 2 issue 31, we find Norrin Radd and the Living Tribunal agreeing that they wish for simpler times.

Cosmic pimpin' ain't easy Cosmic living is heavy!  These are but two examples of how even cosmic gods in Marvel are not without reflective souls and a kind of mortal personhood themselves, except the Stranger, who is a bit of an asshole and has more ambition than even Thanos.  Seriously, the guy is a walking scowl, which issue 31 is pretty much an amazing gallery of.  Debby Downer that Scowler is, he does not exactly nod in agreement with LT, but I digress.  It begs the question about Living Tribunal, at least this incarnation of him, about what his ultimate origins are and just how much of said past he might hold onto.  I love this panel because it asks such questions, and I love it even more for still somewhat retaining the mystery of his innermost being.    

Gods and mortals in a dance locking eyes with one another trying to look inside... that's what is with the name of the blog.