The league of extraordinary gentlemen. Century: 1910

The first installment of a three-part extension of Allan and Mina's adventures through the 20th Century. A little confusing since the references and new characters (primarily from Brecht's "Threepenny Opera" and "The Moonchild" by Aleister Crowley) are a lot more obscure than in earlier stories.

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But it doesn't matter all that much, as it's a very good story that moves along well, and the art is as great as ever.

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I just ground through a goddam pile of league of extraordinary gentlemens and the basic criticisms I have to make about them all are mostly the same (weirdly crypto–"things were better in my day," at least literarily; too much rape for no reason; too much glee taken in the killing and killing;

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queasy racial stuff that you get the feeling the authors'd try to pass off as pastiche; easter egg obscurities that get obscurer and obscurer in the same proportion as they get thicker and thicker on the ground). This one has more than some to counterbalance those cons: a "Mack the Knife" storyline; a singing social conscience à la Les Misérables; a relatively complex rendering of the Nemo filial dynamic and a strong female lead trying to come out of her father's shadow. Just too bad her heroic origin story involves her getting gang-raped (not only a prime case of the monsters in Moore's and O'Neill's brains showing their claws, but also a fucking cliché) and then unleashing mass death on the Thames waterfront (you're not impressing anybody, boys).

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The first part of Century takes place between Volume 2 and The Black Dossier. This is the start of a story that will run throughout the twentieth century. Here we find Mina and Allan (pretending to be his own son) working with a new iteration of the League with Carnacki, A.J. Raffles, and the

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immortal Orlando as members. This League is not as strong as the 1898 team, and it shows in their actions.

Carnacki has a vision of Oliver Haddo (character from The Magician) and his cult beginning an apocalyptic plot, the League tries to learn what their plan is and stop it. Meanwhile, Captain Nemo passes away and his daughter tries her best to run from her fate as his successor.

Moore does such an amazing job of incorporating even more references than previous League stories, putting Jess Nevins' hair on end (Nevins has annotated every volume of the League, and Moore has even stated that he attempted to stump Nevins in the Almanac tales at the end of Volume II). A good majority of the story behind this chapter of Century comes from Bertolt Brecht's Threepenny Opera, Moore even has the characters sing the lyrics within the story. It's put together brilliantly.

As always, Moore includes additional tales at the end of the book, here a series of short stories that tell what is happening with the members of the League in 1236 BC (Bio, aka Orlando), 1910 (Allan and Mina shortly after the end events of this chapter of Century, and 1964 (after the Black Dossier affair, before the next chapter of Century: 1969). The tale of Bio and Allan and Orlando (both involving Orlando in his/her female form) are extraordinarily steamy.

Good bridging story between Volume II and The Black Dossier, need to read the other two chapters to really get an idea of how this Volume works as a whole.

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Just read this for the second time as preparation for the next installment: like most of Alan Moore's work it pays re-reading. Second time around it seemed more substantial and nuanced. It is still very much a prologue to rehabilitate Nemo's Nautilus and I do sometimes wish Moore would slow down

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and let the characters and story develop more slowly, but it is still a great read. The time traveller is a great addition - I hope we see more of him.

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To be honest, I was not nearly as impressed with this volume of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen as I was with the first two volumes. This is only the first part of a larger story, so hopefully it will improve as the story progresses.

I think part of the problem is that Alan Moore was a little

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too literarily vague. I mean, I don't mind researching a character to find out more about them and to understand their place in the story, but when well more than half of the cast of the story needs to be researched, that becomes too much of a chore for me. Maybe I'm just not as well-read as I think I am, but it rather struck me that Moore is trying to show us how much smarter he is than the rest of us by using such vague characters.

The current version of the League (Mina Murray, Quartermain 'Jr', Orlando, Raffles & Carnacki - if you don't know who they all are, look them up like I had to do) are trying to stop an apocalyptic premonition that Carnacki has. By the end of the volume, I'm still not sure if they know what the premonition is all about or not. Again, it all seems rather vague. Hopefully the story will improve, but if the next volume isn't any better, I can honestly say that I'm not sure that I will care to read the final volume.

Overall, a real 'meh' feeling with this one.

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I think I would enjoy this much more upon a second read--the easter eggs, inevitably, are getting more obscure, and there were all those mystics . . . and even when you recognize them, there's a lot less of a thrill in Haddo/Crowley or Broad Arrow Jack than fucking Hyde and Nemo and shit.


But the

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MacHeath stuff was fantastic, and the Orlando/Orlando/Tireisias connection was inspired, and I think it's really interesting how Quatermain is young and strong now but it's still become Mina's league. The fact that Moore has been abe to go through as much material as he has and keep this fresh is amazing, and next volume in the "Century" trilogy is going to be set in a post-Big Brother Swinging London (post- because of that story about 1984 actually being 1948), and that sounds rad. This was a good read.

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Extraordinary Gentlemen
A friend of brought this graphic novel to my attention. It's a new addition to "The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen Series, and is subtitled: "Century 1910" by one of my favorite authors Alan Moore.

In it the "League's personnel have evolved in the ensuing years since the

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last issue. The members of the league are once again facing a potentially world treating problem. It seems someone is trying to create a Moonchild in order to bring in a/the New Aeon!

Mentioned or involved in the story are Simon Iff, Oliver Haddo, Dr. Taverner, Prince Zaleski, Zanoni, with cameos of many others including Popeye, according to my interpretation.

To me this book was a lot of fun! The occult references are intriguing, as in where have I seen that name before?

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Yes, a definite "return to form" after the self-indulgent metafictional noodling of The Black Dossier. Now to go read the annotations...

The newest installment of The League does everything that made the previous volumes so entertaining ... although it adds little.

Unfortunately, the source material for this one isn't quite as recognizable, which is both a blessing and a curse. The blessing is that it brings a sense of the

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unexpected, but part of the fun of The League is how Moore twists what you already know into his own personal worldview.

It is perhaps unfair to comment too extensively on what is only the first of three parts to the story, but Pirate Jenny seems a bit of a let down, while I thought the big reveal about the dockside murderer was handled quite well.

Not sure about all the singing, though.


Edited to add: A few minutes research on The Threepenny Opera makes me think that Moore might deserve a little more credit than I'm giving him.

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This was a rather disappointing mess of non-intersecting plots. The Extraordinary Gentlemen now consist of a rejuvenated and apparently immortal Miss Mina Murray and Allan Quartermain, the gender shifting (and also long-lived) Orlando, as well a psychic and a burglar. They are investigating a

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occultist group with a doomsday agenda, but they bumble along and don't get far. There is also a killer on the docks and an impending coronation (George the Fifth's). The strongest thread of the comic is Captain Nemo's daughter, who runs away to London to be a serving wench rather than become the old man's successor. These story threads intersect only when the Extraordinary Gentlemen arrive too late on the scene to make any difference. The result is unsatisfying for this reader. To add insult to injury, the last section of the book is an extended collection of prose episodes which might quite easily have been made into more (albeit increasingly bizarre) comic book. I have no objection to prose in graphic novels, but not as the main content; it is a *graphic* novel, after all. The last words of the book are To Be Continued. Perhaps this book works as the opener of a sequence. It certainly does not work as a standalone.

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This sequel to the LoEG 1 and 2 is actually very good - we find again some of the heros, with the added characters of Orlando, Raffles and Carnacki. But we are far from the early adventurers, as we see the end of an era in dying Nemo; Quatermain Jr. plays his part well but Mina is less aggressive

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than in previous books. We do see the rise of a new strong woman in Nemo's daughter: she will wreak havoc on the London docks, in a twisted tale of personal humiliation and bloody revenge on the Empire. And, sadly, the League will find itself unable to manage current events and will also fail to understand the signs of future battles. This is why I am looking forward to reading Century 1969.

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the League does a musical number: the hands of the clock move forward, Pirate Jenny's Black Freighter comes to call, the League obsolesces, immortality comes with some side effects, and the Story of Orlando takes a literary turn.

After the embarrassment of riches of black dossier, with its myriad of styles and stories, comes a slim volume that begins a new 3 part story arc. As beautiful as ever, the style this time is a Sweeney Todd style musical, with much of the action relayed by two singing side characters. It shouldn't

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work given there's no music, but somehow it does. Not sure the entire 3 part could work in this style though; I suspect this will just be the introduction,

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Disappointing. After the well paced romp through Victorian literature of the first two books, this is a huge let down. I know that it is intended as the first part of a series, but there still has to be a narrative arc with a sense of conclusion. What you are presented with is a mess of characters

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with shoehorned in motives in a both poor and vague plot, not at all interesting or at least intriguing to read. And finally it must be said that the artwork isn't up to the standard of the previous two books. It is not bad, just not as good or dramatic in scope.

Hopefully the next volume will be better.

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Like its predecessors, 1910 is a dark, entertaining romp with characters from famous Victorian literature. Many of the references I got (Virginia Woolf’s ambisexual Orlando); I’m sure more sailed over my head (Mack the Knife and Pirate Jenny were two I looked up later).

Mina Murray, Allan

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Quatermain, Jr., and colleagues are in pursuit of an occult group up to no good. Meanwhile, a young Indian woman defies her father and strikes out on her own. Stories collide in a spectacular way, accompanied by a duet commentary from two other characters. It’s interesting, with many plots left dangling, which certainly makes me eager for the next installment of what is to be a trilogy.

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I didn't like the backstory material nearly as much as the ones in the first two books. (The short story in the first collection was great, and the gazetteer in the second collection got off to a slow start but had really good chapters, particularly the humorous ones.) This one though was a bit

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disappointing. Not bad, but not great.

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After the diffuse "Black Dossier", this is a terrific return to form. There were times when it was so good I gasped out loud.

The title of this first installment (of three) is "What Keeps Mankind Alive?", and if that doesn't excite you--if you don't get that he's taking on The Threepenny

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Opera--then you probably won't get this book at all. The way Moore's "Jenny Diver" is entangled with that of Brecht is by itself worth the price of admission.

The League, such as it is, now consists of three immortals: Mina Murray, Allan Quartermain, and Orlando; plus Thomas Carnacki, the Ghost Finder, and the Gentleman Burglar, A.J. Raffles.

I can't say more without spoiling things, alas, but I will mention that the "Earl of Gurney" who plays a significant (but unseen) role in the denouement is the protagonist of Peter Barnes's brilliant black comedy "The Ruling Class."

It's not an action comic, and it's not a Hollywood movie. The heroes aren't always central, and they sometimes fail. It's much more like a prose novel, where characters come and go and not everything gets spelled out. Moore's allusions here are less universal than in the first LoEG, but it's worth chasing down the footnotes. (The prose backmatter incorporates parodies of Clarke's "2001" and Reage's "Story of O", among other surprises.)

I need also to say that this is the best work I ever seen from Kevin O'Neill, which is saying something.

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The League is back, newly formed (sort of... if you've read the last three books, particularly The Black Dossier, you know about this version of the League already) and it's ready to defend London. Expect to need to sit down with a wiki after you read this (at least I did) to get all the characters

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and references. If you're a LoEG fan already, that shouldn't be new! Nemo's daughter, Janni, really makes the story, with her departure from Lincoln Island and transformation working in the Cuttlefish Hotel. I had not expected to dislike Orlando so much, particularly after his/her feature in The Black Dossier made me so much more curious about this character.

The artwork, as always, is awesome. I felt like the story was somewhat lacking, though I felt the same way about The Black Dossier. The last book was a quick chase, with frequent and lengthy interruptions of the League's history. Moore seems to resist the urge in this volume, with a rather short entry at the end called "Minions of the Moon," which explores the League's future. I'm really curious to see more of this iteration of the League, but it sounds like I'll be disappointed, based on Moore's plans for the next two volumes. I suppose, in a way, I've always been more interested in the other members of the League and less so in Allan and Mina.

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An enjoyable romp through a familiar pastiche England filled with allusions to Victorian literature but set at the end of the brief Edwardian age. O'Neill's art is masterly but Moore's story is too obvious in places: a woman is happy working as a skivvy until she responds to being raped by becoming

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visiting her vengeance on the collective inhabitants of London's East End. Not all the allusions are immediately obvious, however; the songs are neat parodies.

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