Wired‘s “Underwire” column takes a look at the new graphic novel, starring Hellblazer‘s John Constantine:
Supernatural detective John Constantine has come a long way from hell since Alan Moore invented him 25 years ago in eco-horror comic book series Swamp Thing.
In Hellblazer: Pandemonium, out this month from DC’s mature Vertigo line, the storied magus lands at last in hell on Earth, otherwise known as post-9/11 Iraq.
It’s an admittedly dicey setting for a graphic novel, according to Pandemonium writer Jamie Delano.
“There must be some sensitivity when setting out to engage with, or exploit, a real-world disaster of such devastating effect to so many human lives, for the purpose of creating a work of genre fiction,” Delano told Wired.com in an e-mail interview. “That said, the innate arrogance that allows a writer to invade foreign cultural territory and pillage it of emotion for dramatic purpose is often mitigated by a possibly deluded faith in his own good intent.”