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Written by Byron Kerman Thursday, 06 September 2007 17:00

This adaptation of stories from the master sci-fi storyteller was a decade in the making. But is even a decade long enough to translate the stories of the legendary Harlan Ellison?

 

168 pgs. FC; $19.95 Softcover

(W / A: Various)

Once upon a time, about ten years ago, when the Sci Fi channel was young, Harlan Ellison used to appear on a short-lived show on the network called "Sci Fi Buzz." He would get all fired up about something or other he found offensive, and his face would darken, and spit would fly at the camera as his tirade heated up and burst forth into the world. It was quite a segment. I remember at one point he was railing that most people pronounce the word "Neanderthal" without its properly silent "h." We mispronouncers, by implication, were just a bunch of Neanderthals.

 

After 60 years of eloquent SF short stories and teleplays, Ellison's well-documented anger -- and the occasional physical confrontation -- has overwhelmed his eloquence. His legendary hubris, thin skin, viciousness, and litigiousness are documented at his Wikipedia page. The job of the fan, then, is to ignore Ellison's public froth and dive into his classics: stories like "'Repent, Harlequin!' Said the Ticktockman" and "A Boy and His Dog" are poetic and prophetic. The many, many awards the man has won from SF, horror, and TV-writers' groups are deserved; it's redundant to say so.

 

But adapting his work into comics has proven problematic. In this long-awaited latest installment of his Dream Corridor series, an all-star cast of comics writers and artists transform Ellison stories old and new into sequential tales. Writers such as Mark Waid, Steve Niles, and John Ostrander are joined by a superb group of artists: Richard Corben (!), Curt Swan (!!), Neal Adams (!!!), Gene Ha, Rags Morales, Paul Chadwick, Steve Rude, and others. Green Lantern creator Martin Nodell does one of the stories, fergodsake!

 

It is positively inexplicable that this feast of talent yields virtually nothing edible. In "Opposites Attract," an elderly "mad bomber" meets his match in an elderly female throat-slasher. In "Djinn, No Chaser," a genie is freed from a lamp with the aid of a can opener. These play like extended graphic jokes with limp punchlines.

 

"The Discarded," a tale of society's mutants sent to a space gulag, was recently adapted into a "Masters of Science Fiction" special by ABC. Its thoroughly predictable ending (as both a TV show and a comic) disappoints. In "Moonlighting" and "Rock God," the action isn't tight; the meandering mood loses the reader.

 

One gets the feeling that most if not all of these stories work as stories. It's the process of adaptation that has fallen short. And hey, that's not a knock on anybody - it's a flaw in the very idea of the task. I wouldn't want to read comics adaptations of lotsa SF classics, for fear they wouldn't hold up. How could the graphic version of The Demolished Man or Childhood's End enhance the original? And for that matter, would the comics version of a poem by T.S. Eliot or Robert Frost be a worthy endeavor? Only under very, very special circumstances, where the adaptation was handled by an alt-comics stud, I imagine. Maybe. But 99% of the time, no. You want so badly for Ellison's magic to be here, to make us forget his angry attempts to bankrupt Fantagraphics, his horrifying attempt to make an onstage joke by touching fellow SF writer Connie Willis' breast at an awards dinner (again, see that Wikipedia page for more), but you never stop waiting.

 

I guess the greatest comics are arguably created for the comics page from the get-go. The fault does not lie with the artists in Dream Corridor, surely. Neal Adams' black-and-white work is breathtaking. Richard Corben's evocative style is always a breath of fresh air. Brian Bolland's cover is predictably awesome.

 

Ellison introduces each of these stories (some reprinted, some new), with an obnoxious, self-conscious intro presented in illustrated, panel form. He shows off his famous vocab, busting out words like "rodomontade" while riffing on this and that. You want to dislike these asides, the way you dislike Dennis Miller's ego-as-charm swipes at wit, but it's difficult -- Ellison's intros are actually more satisfying than the stories that follow. That's because they're straight from the madman himself, unadulterated by adaptations that don't quite measure up. | Byron Kerman

Click here for a 4-pg. Preview of Harlan Ellison's Dream Corridor Vol. 2, courtesy of Dark Horse!