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Preacher
Preacher, Volume 1: Gone to Texas
In this now-legendary graphic novel series that serves as the inspiration for the hit AMC television series, Jesse Custer was just a small-town preacher in Texas... until his congregation was flattened by powers beyond his control and the Preacher became imbued with abilities beyond anyone's understanding.
Now possessed by Genesis—the unholy coupling of an angel and demon—Jesse holds Word of God, an ability to command anyone or anything with a mere utterance. And he’ll use this power to hold the Lord accountable for the people He has forsaken.
From the ashes of a small-town church to the bright lights of New York City to the backwoods of Louisiana, Jesse Custer cuts a righteous path across the soul of America in his quest for the divine—an effort that will be met by every evil that Heaven and Earth can assemble. Joined by his gun-toting girlfriend, Tulip, and the hard-drinking Irish vampire, Cassidy, Jesse will stop at nothing to fulfill his quest to find God.
The creative powerhouse team of Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon bring readers on a violent and riotous journey across the country in this award-winning Vertigo series, beginning with Preacher Book One. Collects issues #1-12.
Now possessed by Genesis—the unholy coupling of an angel and demon—Jesse holds Word of God, an ability to command anyone or anything with a mere utterance. And he’ll use this power to hold the Lord accountable for the people He has forsaken.
From the ashes of a small-town church to the bright lights of New York City to the backwoods of Louisiana, Jesse Custer cuts a righteous path across the soul of America in his quest for the divine—an effort that will be met by every evil that Heaven and Earth can assemble. Joined by his gun-toting girlfriend, Tulip, and the hard-drinking Irish vampire, Cassidy, Jesse will stop at nothing to fulfill his quest to find God.
The creative powerhouse team of Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon bring readers on a violent and riotous journey across the country in this award-winning Vertigo series, beginning with Preacher Book One. Collects issues #1-12.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1995
490 people are currently reading
47526 people want to read
About the author
Garth Ennis
2,622 books3,174 followersEnnis began his comic-writing career in 1989 with the series Troubled Souls. Appearing in the short-lived but critically-acclaimed British anthology Crisis and illustrated by McCrea, it told the story of a young, apolitical Protestant man caught up by fate in the violence of the Irish 'Troubles'. It spawned a sequel, For a Few Troubles More, a broad Belfast-based comedy featuring two supporting characters from Troubled Souls, Dougie and Ivor, who would later get their own American comics series, Dicks, from Caliber in 1997, and several follow-ups from Avatar.
Another series for Crisis was True Faith, a religious satire inspired by his schooldays, this time drawn by Warren Pleece. Ennis shortly after began to write for Crisis' parent publication, 2000 AD. He quickly graduated on to the title's flagship character, Judge Dredd, taking over from original creator John Wagner for a period of several years.
Ennis' first work on an American comic came in 1991 when he took over DC Comics's horror title Hellblazer, which he wrote until 1994, and for which he currently holds the title for most issues written. Steve Dillon became the regular artist during the second half of Ennis's run.
Ennis' landmark work to date is the 66-issue epic Preacher, which he co-created with artist Steve Dillon. Running from 1995 to 2000, it was a tale of a preacher with supernatural powers, searching (literally) for God who has abandoned his creation.
While Preacher was running, Ennis began a series set in the DC universe called Hitman. Despite being lower profile than Preacher, Hitman ran for 60 issues (plus specials) from 1996 to 2001, veering wildly from violent action to humour to an examination of male friendship under fire.
Other comic projects Ennis wrote during this time period include Goddess, Bloody Mary, Unknown Soldier, and Pride & Joy, all for DC/Vertigo, as well as origin stories for The Darkness for Image Comics and Shadowman for Valiant Comics.
After the end of Hitman, Ennis was lured to Marvel Comics with the promise from Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada that he could write The Punisher as long as he cared to. Instead of largely comical tone of these issues, he decided to make a much more serious series, re-launched under Marvel's MAX imprint.
In 2001 he briefly returned to UK comics to write the epic Helter Skelter for Judge Dredd.
Other comics Ennis has written include War Story (with various artists) for DC; The Pro for Image Comics; The Authority for Wildstorm; Just a Pilgrim for Black Bull Press, and 303, Chronicles of Wormwood (a six issue mini-series about the Antichrist), and a western comic book, Streets of Glory for Avatar Press.
In 2008 Ennis ended his five-year run on Punisher MAX to debut a new Marvel title, War Is Hell: The First Flight of the Phantom Eagle.
In June 2008, at Wizard World, Philadelphia, Ennis announced several new projects, including a metaseries of war comics called Battlefields from Dynamite made up of mini-series including Night Witches, Dear Billy and Tankies, another Chronicles of Wormwood mini-series and Crossed both at Avatar, a six-issue miniseries about Butcher (from The Boys) and a Punisher project reuniting him with artist Steve Dillon (subsequently specified to be a weekly mini-series entitled Punisher: War Zone, to be released concurrently with the film of the same name).
Taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garth_Ennis
Another series for Crisis was True Faith, a religious satire inspired by his schooldays, this time drawn by Warren Pleece. Ennis shortly after began to write for Crisis' parent publication, 2000 AD. He quickly graduated on to the title's flagship character, Judge Dredd, taking over from original creator John Wagner for a period of several years.
Ennis' first work on an American comic came in 1991 when he took over DC Comics's horror title Hellblazer, which he wrote until 1994, and for which he currently holds the title for most issues written. Steve Dillon became the regular artist during the second half of Ennis's run.
Ennis' landmark work to date is the 66-issue epic Preacher, which he co-created with artist Steve Dillon. Running from 1995 to 2000, it was a tale of a preacher with supernatural powers, searching (literally) for God who has abandoned his creation.
While Preacher was running, Ennis began a series set in the DC universe called Hitman. Despite being lower profile than Preacher, Hitman ran for 60 issues (plus specials) from 1996 to 2001, veering wildly from violent action to humour to an examination of male friendship under fire.
Other comic projects Ennis wrote during this time period include Goddess, Bloody Mary, Unknown Soldier, and Pride & Joy, all for DC/Vertigo, as well as origin stories for The Darkness for Image Comics and Shadowman for Valiant Comics.
After the end of Hitman, Ennis was lured to Marvel Comics with the promise from Editor-in-Chief Joe Quesada that he could write The Punisher as long as he cared to. Instead of largely comical tone of these issues, he decided to make a much more serious series, re-launched under Marvel's MAX imprint.
In 2001 he briefly returned to UK comics to write the epic Helter Skelter for Judge Dredd.
Other comics Ennis has written include War Story (with various artists) for DC; The Pro for Image Comics; The Authority for Wildstorm; Just a Pilgrim for Black Bull Press, and 303, Chronicles of Wormwood (a six issue mini-series about the Antichrist), and a western comic book, Streets of Glory for Avatar Press.
In 2008 Ennis ended his five-year run on Punisher MAX to debut a new Marvel title, War Is Hell: The First Flight of the Phantom Eagle.
In June 2008, at Wizard World, Philadelphia, Ennis announced several new projects, including a metaseries of war comics called Battlefields from Dynamite made up of mini-series including Night Witches, Dear Billy and Tankies, another Chronicles of Wormwood mini-series and Crossed both at Avatar, a six-issue miniseries about Butcher (from The Boys) and a Punisher project reuniting him with artist Steve Dillon (subsequently specified to be a weekly mini-series entitled Punisher: War Zone, to be released concurrently with the film of the same name).
Taken from: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Garth_Ennis
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 1,943 reviews
April 29, 2025
The young woman with the nose stud who took my payment for this in Forbidden Planet (Bristol) said: "You're starting a weird and wonderful journey, enjoy."
She was not wrong. And I did.
The story thrives on a combination of graphic violence, humour, and weirdness. The main character, Jessie, the eponymous preacher has acquired a rather fine super-power, he has the voice of God, and when he uses it everyone has to obey him. He is ably supported by his girlfriend (currently a freelance assassin) and a drunken Irish vampire. The opposition is provided by Jessie's less than lovely family, a Vatican hit squad, and also heaven and hell.
Jessie proves to be a rather unusual preacher, a hard-drinking and dangerous man with a violent past. He has questions for God and is unsure what to do with his newfound power.
The whole thing is off-beat and addictive.
The art is well done and supports the story. When I finished I immediately wanted the next one. It's a series with gallons of potential. My experience reading on is that it goes gradually downhill but even by book 6 it's still a fun read.
I've now watched all seasons of the TV series based on the graphic novels. It's not a close match but retains the key elements and is really pretty good. Having now finished the story with the TV series I'm not sure if I will pursue the graphic novels to the end, though I would like to see if it's different...
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...
She was not wrong. And I did.
The story thrives on a combination of graphic violence, humour, and weirdness. The main character, Jessie, the eponymous preacher has acquired a rather fine super-power, he has the voice of God, and when he uses it everyone has to obey him. He is ably supported by his girlfriend (currently a freelance assassin) and a drunken Irish vampire. The opposition is provided by Jessie's less than lovely family, a Vatican hit squad, and also heaven and hell.
Jessie proves to be a rather unusual preacher, a hard-drinking and dangerous man with a violent past. He has questions for God and is unsure what to do with his newfound power.
The whole thing is off-beat and addictive.
The art is well done and supports the story. When I finished I immediately wanted the next one. It's a series with gallons of potential. My experience reading on is that it goes gradually downhill but even by book 6 it's still a fun read.
I've now watched all seasons of the TV series based on the graphic novels. It's not a close match but retains the key elements and is really pretty good. Having now finished the story with the TV series I'm not sure if I will pursue the graphic novels to the end, though I would like to see if it's different...
Join my Patreon
Join my 3-emails-a-year newsletter #prizes
...
August 6, 2016
Preacher has so much graphic violence that the makers of the Saw movies can’t read it without projectile vomiting.
Preacher has such profane language that Chris Rock would cover his ears if he heard it.
Preacher has acts of sexual perversions so disgusting that Larry Flynt once said he would have never taken his case to the Supreme Court if he knew that this was the kind of stuff that would get published.
But damn, is it a great story.
Jesse Custer, a reluctant redneck minister in a tiny Texas town gets endowed with the Word of God after bonding to an entity that escaped Heaven. Then he hooks up with Tulip, his gun-toting ex-girlfriend, and Cassidy, a 90-something year old Irish vampire who likes whiskey as much as he likes blood. The three join forces on a quest to find God and kick his ass for his neglect of humanity as they fight an international religious conspiracy and the toughest supernatural killer ever seen in all of creation.
It’s not Richie Rich, that’s for sure.
It’s really easy to get caught up in the shocking stuff that happens in Preacher. This is a comic series where a character casually states, “ Curiosity won’t just kill the cat. It’ll bite it’s head off and stump fuck the remains ‘til the sun comes up.” And that’s mild compared to some of the other stuff that gets said and done. Frankly, there are images in the panels of Preacher that I’ve sometimes wished I could get out of my head.
But look past the shock value, and you’ll find a comic classic with almost limitless ambition and wildly original story to tell. At times, Preacher reads like Irish-born Garth Ennis’s love letter to America. It’s also his exploration of the legends of the American West, the nature of religion, the depravity of people, and the limits of friendship and love.
Despite the gore, the sex, the language, and the violence, this is a series with a strong sense of morality. Jesse and his friends are outraged and disgusted by the depths people will sink too, and the quest to find God is a carry over from that. Jesse is angry with what he learns about the nature of God, and sees him as a vain hypocrite who created people and then just lets them suffer while expecting them to praise his name and not lifting a finger to help. And to Jesse’s cowboy nature, that’s an insult that deserves a reckoning.
Joe R. Lansdale says it best in his introduction in this volume: “I’m not sure it’s a learning experience, but it’s a thinking experience, but most important…it’s unique, and I hope it’s uniqueness does not encourage a hundred writers to go out and try to repeat it. What they will come up with is just meanness for meanness’ sake. It won’t have the edge, the special feel of PREACHER. They’ll just be imitations. Because there is only one Garth Ennis, and only one Steve Dillon, and only one PREACHER, a tale out of Ireland, dragged through Texas with a bloody hard-on, wrapped in barbed wire and rose thorns. And it’s out to get you.”
Preacher has such profane language that Chris Rock would cover his ears if he heard it.
Preacher has acts of sexual perversions so disgusting that Larry Flynt once said he would have never taken his case to the Supreme Court if he knew that this was the kind of stuff that would get published.
But damn, is it a great story.
Jesse Custer, a reluctant redneck minister in a tiny Texas town gets endowed with the Word of God after bonding to an entity that escaped Heaven. Then he hooks up with Tulip, his gun-toting ex-girlfriend, and Cassidy, a 90-something year old Irish vampire who likes whiskey as much as he likes blood. The three join forces on a quest to find God and kick his ass for his neglect of humanity as they fight an international religious conspiracy and the toughest supernatural killer ever seen in all of creation.
It’s not Richie Rich, that’s for sure.
It’s really easy to get caught up in the shocking stuff that happens in Preacher. This is a comic series where a character casually states, “ Curiosity won’t just kill the cat. It’ll bite it’s head off and stump fuck the remains ‘til the sun comes up.” And that’s mild compared to some of the other stuff that gets said and done. Frankly, there are images in the panels of Preacher that I’ve sometimes wished I could get out of my head.
But look past the shock value, and you’ll find a comic classic with almost limitless ambition and wildly original story to tell. At times, Preacher reads like Irish-born Garth Ennis’s love letter to America. It’s also his exploration of the legends of the American West, the nature of religion, the depravity of people, and the limits of friendship and love.
Despite the gore, the sex, the language, and the violence, this is a series with a strong sense of morality. Jesse and his friends are outraged and disgusted by the depths people will sink too, and the quest to find God is a carry over from that. Jesse is angry with what he learns about the nature of God, and sees him as a vain hypocrite who created people and then just lets them suffer while expecting them to praise his name and not lifting a finger to help. And to Jesse’s cowboy nature, that’s an insult that deserves a reckoning.
Joe R. Lansdale says it best in his introduction in this volume: “I’m not sure it’s a learning experience, but it’s a thinking experience, but most important…it’s unique, and I hope it’s uniqueness does not encourage a hundred writers to go out and try to repeat it. What they will come up with is just meanness for meanness’ sake. It won’t have the edge, the special feel of PREACHER. They’ll just be imitations. Because there is only one Garth Ennis, and only one Steve Dillon, and only one PREACHER, a tale out of Ireland, dragged through Texas with a bloody hard-on, wrapped in barbed wire and rose thorns. And it’s out to get you.”
August 31, 2022
If you think you'd be interested in a boozing, hardcore fighting, young preacher; his petulant, piss-taking, gun swinging Ex; an Irish man with a love of boozing, bonking, fighting, biting and very foul language; the meanest Sheriff, with the meanest mouth, with the meanest face; an FBI agent struggling to find any decent coffee in the South; the sharpest shooter in history, who is also kind of mega fast, oh, and unkillable!!; and the unluckiest cop in New York, maybe in the world, with the surname, I kid you not of 'Tool'; and not to mention a few serial killers, angels and demons... then you need to read this series!
Yes Goddamn it! Really. And if you think the TV show is bad-ass, well this series is then some! I probably should mention that it's full of filthy language, imagery and concepts, and it's pretty great! Garth Ennis does all this debauchery, and yet tells an intriguing story that will resonate with everyone, touching on friendship, relationships, oh, and the concepts of morality, and what really is good and evil! 8 out of 12 for this scene and style setting first volume.
2019 read; 2017 read
Yes Goddamn it! Really. And if you think the TV show is bad-ass, well this series is then some! I probably should mention that it's full of filthy language, imagery and concepts, and it's pretty great! Garth Ennis does all this debauchery, and yet tells an intriguing story that will resonate with everyone, touching on friendship, relationships, oh, and the concepts of morality, and what really is good and evil! 8 out of 12 for this scene and style setting first volume.
2019 read; 2017 read
December 25, 2014
This book is something else! Violence, sex, booze and craziness. Sign me up!
I read that Seth Rogan is trying to make either a show or movie from this. Lawd Help.
Reverend Jesse Custer is just a Texas preacher-then at a service he bonds with a spirit force named Genesis that makes him be able to get people to do as he asks..just by saying it. He teams up with his gun toting ex-lover Tulip and Booze hound Vampire named Cassidy. And dudes..these are the good guys.
I need the rest of these books..Right now.
I read that Seth Rogan is trying to make either a show or movie from this. Lawd Help.
Reverend Jesse Custer is just a Texas preacher-then at a service he bonds with a spirit force named Genesis that makes him be able to get people to do as he asks..just by saying it. He teams up with his gun toting ex-lover Tulip and Booze hound Vampire named Cassidy. And dudes..these are the good guys.
I need the rest of these books..Right now.
November 29, 2012
In my opinion, one of the best things about this series is its beginning.
If you've never read Garth Ennis before, this is a good place to start. Because odds are, you're going to love this series, or hate it. And, by no small twist of fate, odds are that you're also going to either love or hate Garth Ennis.
Why would you hate Ennis? Well, because his work contains graphic ultraviolence, vulgarity, and blasphemy on pretty much every conceivable level.
Why would you love Ennis? For pretty much the same reasons.
So my thought is you might as well just in and learn what side of the fence you're going to be on right off the bat.
If you've never read Garth Ennis before, this is a good place to start. Because odds are, you're going to love this series, or hate it. And, by no small twist of fate, odds are that you're also going to either love or hate Garth Ennis.
Why would you hate Ennis? Well, because his work contains graphic ultraviolence, vulgarity, and blasphemy on pretty much every conceivable level.
Why would you love Ennis? For pretty much the same reasons.
So my thought is you might as well just in and learn what side of the fence you're going to be on right off the bat.
January 6, 2013
This did not go the way I expected at all. I haven’t heard a dissenting voice from anyone about Preacher. Not one, although I’ve not looked at any of the reviews here on goodreads. In fact, I’ve had numerous friends say, “You have to read this book,” and, “Dude, you will love this book,” and since it was all from people I trusted, loving Preacher was my expectation.
Nope. I hated this book.
First, this book is populated by the most idiotic array of stereotypes and caricatures (certainly these characters can’t be called archetypes) outside of a Circus Sideshow:
Second, Garth Ennis is an Irishman writing about a Texan douchebag wandering the U.S., and there are times when it is distractingly obvious that Ennis is not American. His Texan characters speak in ways Texans would never speak. It might not happen often, but it happens enough that I noticed, and oddly enough, when they slip, they speak precisely like someone from Ireland. Go figure. Couldn’t this story have been told just as effectively in Dublin or Belfast as the starting point? Couldn’t the Preacher have been a priest? Perhaps the Vampire could have been a Yank, then? I think it could have been all of these things, and had it been I wouldn’t have found myself constantly being yanked out of the comic by inappropriate vocabulary and regional cadences.
Third. the humor was awful. Had one character been a smarmy dipshit, quick with the cutting, insulting banter, I probably would have loved him/her? But the fact that EVERY-SINGLE-CHARACTER (with the exception of Saint of Killers and a cop named Tool) was capable of smarmy dipshittery drove me mad. The dialogue was painfully one note -- and there was a ton of it. The dialogue just goes on and on, like a Quentin Tarantino table talk, but without the entertainment value. If this is any indication of Ennis’ usual writing, my expectations have fallen into a muddy trench; one I’d be happy to leave for the danger of No Man’s Land.
Sure there were some interesting moments and wannabe twists (all of which Ennis telegraphed too obviously), but they were not enough to save this comic for me. I worry that I expected too much, though. I truly expected greatness. I thought I was opening something on par with Alan Moore’s best, and with expectations like that there was no way Preacher Gone To Texas could succeed. For that reason alone, I will take a crack at the second volume, but Ennis better hook me with that book or I am all out.
Nope. I hated this book.
First, this book is populated by the most idiotic array of stereotypes and caricatures (certainly these characters can’t be called archetypes) outside of a Circus Sideshow:
Foul-mouthed, sexed-up, lost his faith Preacher? ✓I find nothing compelling about this cast of assholes, and I am usually a fan of assholes. I can care about assholes if they are unique and I can believe their behaviour. Not this bunch, though.
Foul-mouthed, sexy, Preacher-loving-hating Moll? ✓
Foul-mouthed, ultra-violent Vampire (but he’s Irish. Isn’t that original? No. Not terribly.) ✓
Foul-mouthed, racist, Texas sheriff? Cormac McCarthy-style, unstoppable, amoral Saint of Killers? ✓
Cocky, arrogant, bureaucratic, disbelieving FBI Agent? ✓
Too butch, sado-masochistic, homophobic homosexual? ✓
Big city, throw-the-book-out-the-window, abusive super-cop and his bumbling partner? ✓
Overbearing warrior Angels, sexy Demons, idiotic heavenly functionary Angels? ✓
An absentee God? ✓
Dog-faced boy?✓
Second, Garth Ennis is an Irishman writing about a Texan douchebag wandering the U.S., and there are times when it is distractingly obvious that Ennis is not American. His Texan characters speak in ways Texans would never speak. It might not happen often, but it happens enough that I noticed, and oddly enough, when they slip, they speak precisely like someone from Ireland. Go figure. Couldn’t this story have been told just as effectively in Dublin or Belfast as the starting point? Couldn’t the Preacher have been a priest? Perhaps the Vampire could have been a Yank, then? I think it could have been all of these things, and had it been I wouldn’t have found myself constantly being yanked out of the comic by inappropriate vocabulary and regional cadences.
Third. the humor was awful. Had one character been a smarmy dipshit, quick with the cutting, insulting banter, I probably would have loved him/her? But the fact that EVERY-SINGLE-CHARACTER (with the exception of Saint of Killers and a cop named Tool) was capable of smarmy dipshittery drove me mad. The dialogue was painfully one note -- and there was a ton of it. The dialogue just goes on and on, like a Quentin Tarantino table talk, but without the entertainment value. If this is any indication of Ennis’ usual writing, my expectations have fallen into a muddy trench; one I’d be happy to leave for the danger of No Man’s Land.
Sure there were some interesting moments and wannabe twists (all of which Ennis telegraphed too obviously), but they were not enough to save this comic for me. I worry that I expected too much, though. I truly expected greatness. I thought I was opening something on par with Alan Moore’s best, and with expectations like that there was no way Preacher Gone To Texas could succeed. For that reason alone, I will take a crack at the second volume, but Ennis better hook me with that book or I am all out.
February 9, 2017
So great! I mean, if it hadn't been for just watching the first season of the TV series, I probably never would have picked this up to read, but then I would have been missing out on more irreverent goodness!
Believe it or not, this picks up right at the end of the first season's action, although, all the character building has already been done on the show, so I'm rearing to go and ready to see what comes next. Thankfully, there's plenty to enjoy!
The Saint of Murderers is great and the bits about the angels is too sweet and delicious not to chortle over, but the best parts have got to be the interactions between Jessie, Cass, and Tulip. Irreverent barely describes it, and it's a breath of fresh air.
New York was a great hoot, too. :) I hope the road trip continues on!
Believe it or not, this picks up right at the end of the first season's action, although, all the character building has already been done on the show, so I'm rearing to go and ready to see what comes next. Thankfully, there's plenty to enjoy!
The Saint of Murderers is great and the bits about the angels is too sweet and delicious not to chortle over, but the best parts have got to be the interactions between Jessie, Cass, and Tulip. Irreverent barely describes it, and it's a breath of fresh air.
New York was a great hoot, too. :) I hope the road trip continues on!
Read
January 10, 2024So far so Good i will do quick character introduction of every well made character we have seen so far
1-Jesse Custer (The Preacher)
Jesse is a preacher who have lost his faith we know that when he spills out all the secrets of the little town he lived in that was supposedly told to him in the confines of the church
Jesse is possessed with a heavenly spirit called genesis without consciousness which is a product of an angel and a devil fucking each others brains out
After being possessed by Genesis he acquires a power that is very powerful but in my opinion its not as powerful as the power of god , so this power forces anyone to do whatever Jesse tells them to do when he uses it on them.
2.Cassidy (The Vampire)
Cassidy is a vampire we are not sure how many years old he is but he is ancient even though he left at the end of this volume but i believe he will be back he is a very loyal friend and Sy being the asshole he turned out to be was a bit much for him so he is taking a break.
3.Tulip(The contract killer)
So far we don't know much about Tulip she is the ex-girlfriend of Jesse we see her at the first issue trying to kill a guy with a pistol but misses him and fucks up the mouth of the person beside him
She seems to be a contract killer but we don't know for sure yet whats her deal.
4. Hugo root (The Racist Sheriff)
Every comic book needs one of these guys
i will never forget what he said about the massacre of anneville
I'm telling you this is the doing of martian niggers lol
He is fucked up in the head and he deserved his death the guy didn't even say any word to his son till he needed to use him to kill himself
5. The Saint of killers (name and nickname lol)
This guy is an unstoppable killing machine assassins and super soldiers are boy toys next to him
It looks like he is the killing machine of the heavens but he seems to have some kind of power against them as well they send him to kill someone but they cant call him back unless he kills that someone we see this evidently when he warns them that if they didn't answer he will kill half the population of earth.
6.The adephi (The scientist angels)
Pilo , Fiore , DeBlanc
It seems that Deblanc is they boss somehow the adephi are angel scientists they are lower then the seraphi which are the warrior angels
so the adephi answer to them
Pilo dies after waking The Saint of killers
and Fiore And Deblanc are cast into a big black hole by the seraphi after they learn that they lost Genesis
7.The seraphi (The warrior angels)
They run the kingdom of heavens now since god has abandoned his duties.
What about the haircut and tattoo Genius artist really.
8. ArseFace
That is a name worthy of some fucked up super hero
this kid was deformed due to shooting a gun at himself if i remember correctly he is the son of Sheriff roots his father who hasn't spoken a word to him since the accident doesn't even look at him
It is so weird to see this kid living like that with no issues talking away to his father and not a care in the world it doesn't seem right but anyway this is how it is and when his father dies he promises to take revenge on whoever did this to him how far did he go we don't know we don't see him again
but there is a limited series about him and a limited series about the saint of killers as well
Now Enters the first event Naked City and its all about the serial killer really its running in the back and we learn about all of it near the end when they reveal all the cards.
9. John Tool (The unluckiest cop on planet earth)
Tool is a shy person he keeps to himself he is very clumsy and that would get you killed his luck turns around for a bit after the revelation about his partner cop but it catches up to him again and he loses both his hands in an accident
10 . Paul Bridges (The Tormented gay cop)
i bet everyone thought that Tool is the gay one but no we learn out that the mucho cop is actually a gay and he is tormented because he hates gays only to turn out one himself
He is the no 1 cop everyone tells stories about how brave and smart he is but we see him a bit off there is something wrong about him only to learn later that he is tormented about what he does behind clothed doors and its fucking his life and mind up
11. Si coltrane (The reporter/The serial killer)
It was a total surprise for me that this guy turned out to be the serial killer
they even made bridges disappear for a while so that we don't suspect Si
plus for me there was always the probability that the serial killer is someone we haven't seen his face yet
anyway Si conjures the best plan he could come up with to get rid of everyone and not get caught for his crimes but his plan was too flawed really Cassidy got out way too easy he should have guessed that this would happen since he knows that he is a vampire and all.
anyway amazing start sorry for the long review
i enjoyed the first volume looking forward to reading the rest of the series <3.
1-Jesse Custer (The Preacher)
Jesse is a preacher who have lost his faith we know that when he spills out all the secrets of the little town he lived in that was supposedly told to him in the confines of the church
Jesse is possessed with a heavenly spirit called genesis without consciousness which is a product of an angel and a devil fucking each others brains out
After being possessed by Genesis he acquires a power that is very powerful but in my opinion its not as powerful as the power of god , so this power forces anyone to do whatever Jesse tells them to do when he uses it on them.
2.Cassidy (The Vampire)
Cassidy is a vampire we are not sure how many years old he is but he is ancient even though he left at the end of this volume but i believe he will be back he is a very loyal friend and Sy being the asshole he turned out to be was a bit much for him so he is taking a break.
3.Tulip(The contract killer)
So far we don't know much about Tulip she is the ex-girlfriend of Jesse we see her at the first issue trying to kill a guy with a pistol but misses him and fucks up the mouth of the person beside him
She seems to be a contract killer but we don't know for sure yet whats her deal.
4. Hugo root (The Racist Sheriff)
Every comic book needs one of these guys
i will never forget what he said about the massacre of anneville
I'm telling you this is the doing of martian niggers lol
He is fucked up in the head and he deserved his death the guy didn't even say any word to his son till he needed to use him to kill himself
5. The Saint of killers (name and nickname lol)
This guy is an unstoppable killing machine assassins and super soldiers are boy toys next to him
It looks like he is the killing machine of the heavens but he seems to have some kind of power against them as well they send him to kill someone but they cant call him back unless he kills that someone we see this evidently when he warns them that if they didn't answer he will kill half the population of earth.
6.The adephi (The scientist angels)
Pilo , Fiore , DeBlanc
It seems that Deblanc is they boss somehow the adephi are angel scientists they are lower then the seraphi which are the warrior angels
so the adephi answer to them
Pilo dies after waking The Saint of killers
and Fiore And Deblanc are cast into a big black hole by the seraphi after they learn that they lost Genesis
7.The seraphi (The warrior angels)
They run the kingdom of heavens now since god has abandoned his duties.
What about the haircut and tattoo Genius artist really.
8. ArseFace
That is a name worthy of some fucked up super hero
this kid was deformed due to shooting a gun at himself if i remember correctly he is the son of Sheriff roots his father who hasn't spoken a word to him since the accident doesn't even look at him
It is so weird to see this kid living like that with no issues talking away to his father and not a care in the world it doesn't seem right but anyway this is how it is and when his father dies he promises to take revenge on whoever did this to him how far did he go we don't know we don't see him again
but there is a limited series about him and a limited series about the saint of killers as well
Now Enters the first event Naked City and its all about the serial killer really its running in the back and we learn about all of it near the end when they reveal all the cards.
9. John Tool (The unluckiest cop on planet earth)
Tool is a shy person he keeps to himself he is very clumsy and that would get you killed his luck turns around for a bit after the revelation about his partner cop but it catches up to him again and he loses both his hands in an accident
10 . Paul Bridges (The Tormented gay cop)
i bet everyone thought that Tool is the gay one but no we learn out that the mucho cop is actually a gay and he is tormented because he hates gays only to turn out one himself
He is the no 1 cop everyone tells stories about how brave and smart he is but we see him a bit off there is something wrong about him only to learn later that he is tormented about what he does behind clothed doors and its fucking his life and mind up
11. Si coltrane (The reporter/The serial killer)
It was a total surprise for me that this guy turned out to be the serial killer
they even made bridges disappear for a while so that we don't suspect Si
plus for me there was always the probability that the serial killer is someone we haven't seen his face yet
anyway Si conjures the best plan he could come up with to get rid of everyone and not get caught for his crimes but his plan was too flawed really Cassidy got out way too easy he should have guessed that this would happen since he knows that he is a vampire and all.
anyway amazing start sorry for the long review
i enjoyed the first volume looking forward to reading the rest of the series <3.
February 18, 2019
Παπάδες έγραψε εδώ ο Garth Ennis, παπάδες!
Μέσα από ένα ποταμό από αίμα, χυμενα μυαλά, βρισιές και ούρα , μπορεί κανείς τελικά να συναντήσει το Θεό.
Ίσως όμως διαπιστώσει ότι ο Μεγαλοδύναμος δεν είναι ακριβώς αυτό που θα περίμενε.
Το "Gone to Texas" είναι το άξιο ξεκίνημα σε μια από τις καλύτερες σειρές comic που έχουν γραφτεί.
Μέσα από ένα ποταμό από αίμα, χυμενα μυαλά, βρισιές και ούρα , μπορεί κανείς τελικά να συναντήσει το Θεό.
Ίσως όμως διαπιστώσει ότι ο Μεγαλοδύναμος δεν είναι ακριβώς αυτό που θα περίμενε.
Το "Gone to Texas" είναι το άξιο ξεκίνημα σε μια από τις καλύτερες σειρές comic που έχουν γραφτεί.
July 16, 2014
After reading Kemper's awesome review I knew I'd be getting to Preacher eventually -- now after having read the first volume I'm left wondering why the hell did I wait so long?!
It's bloody, gory grit and gasoline pulp Texas style, with demons and angels and a possessed preacher, an Irish vampire and a supernatural gunslinger known as the Saint of Killers -- who reminded me instantly of Roland Deschain crossed with Randall Flagg.
Something has gone very wrong in heaven: a terrifyingly powerful entity (the offspring of an angel and a demon known as Genesis) has escaped to earth and binds itself to a mortal man -- Jesse Custer (redneck preacher of a small Texas parish). Jesse needs answers fast as the dead bodies start to pile up around him and the po-po are hot on his tail. Joining him on his quest (and evasion of the law) will be his ex-girlfriend Tulip, and a ninety-something year old Irish vampire called Cassidy.
There's a vicious serial killer on the loose too just to keep things from, you know, getting boring.
The word from up on high is that God has left the building. Literally. Fucked off and left humans to fend for themselves. That's not going to stand for Jesse, and he's decided it's time to smoke God out of his hiding hole and get some answers. Maybe even a little payback, who knows? I surely don't, but I can't wait to find out.
Yeah so make no mistake: this thing is profane. It's violent. But there's an energy and an aliveness running through the story that's absolutely addictive. I can see why this series has stood the test of time (and will continue to do so I'm sure).
But don't take my word for it: in his introduction to the series Joe R. Lansdale calls Preacher "scary as a psychopathic greased gerbil with a miner's hat and a flashlight and your bare asshole in sight." Heh heh. An effective metaphor to make any butt clench up I'm sure. But this is what really got me:
Because there is only one PREACHER, a tale out of Ireland, dragged through Texas with a bloody hard-on, wrapped in barbed wire and rose thorns.If that doesn't make you want to pick this series up then check your pulse, because you just might be dead.
April 7, 2018
5 stars
Wow.
I don't even know what to say...
This is not the kind of tale that won't sound a bit nuts if I try to explain or describe it. No matter how hard I try to convey the many reasons it captured my attention and intrigued me or all the times I laughed, cringed, grimaced, exclaimed out loud, and even teared up a time or two along the way.
You've just got to read it and decide for yourself if it's your kind o' cuppa.
As I'm sure you've so astutely gathered, Preacher, Volume 1: Gone to Texas totally worked for me. (Yeah, okay, my rating kinda, sorta gave that away, but whatever...) This was some fabulous, disturbing, fascinating crazysauce -- 100 proof.
So I accept that I've fallen down this bizarre rabbit hole. Okay, all right, I jumped in of my own volition. And I'm not even going to try and claw my way out. Still falling, after all. And I've gotta say, though it's pretty damn dark down here, there are glimpses of light from time to time...
Since I've only just begun this journey, I'm really not sure when I'm gonna land or just how hard.
But what a trip...
***
If you want more actual deets (that don't sound like someone's been hittin' the bong for a little too long), check out this wonderful review:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I'm still too frazzled from this first dose of crazysauce to do any better...
Wow.
I don't even know what to say...
This is not the kind of tale that won't sound a bit nuts if I try to explain or describe it. No matter how hard I try to convey the many reasons it captured my attention and intrigued me or all the times I laughed, cringed, grimaced, exclaimed out loud, and even teared up a time or two along the way.
You've just got to read it and decide for yourself if it's your kind o' cuppa.
As I'm sure you've so astutely gathered, Preacher, Volume 1: Gone to Texas totally worked for me. (Yeah, okay, my rating kinda, sorta gave that away, but whatever...) This was some fabulous, disturbing, fascinating crazysauce -- 100 proof.
So I accept that I've fallen down this bizarre rabbit hole. Okay, all right, I jumped in of my own volition. And I'm not even going to try and claw my way out. Still falling, after all. And I've gotta say, though it's pretty damn dark down here, there are glimpses of light from time to time...
Since I've only just begun this journey, I'm really not sure when I'm gonna land or just how hard.
But what a trip...
***
If you want more actual deets (that don't sound like someone's been hittin' the bong for a little too long), check out this wonderful review:
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...
I'm still too frazzled from this first dose of crazysauce to do any better...
October 10, 2017
WTF?!
Oh man, I was really expecting to be blown away here, but this was just a colossal disappointment. 😭 So much so, that I'm not sure if I even care to continue—it was a struggle to even make it through this one.
Let's see here . . . two dimension characters, cringe worthy dialog, terrible jokes that mostly fell flat, and a rather dull, juvenile storyline lacking that vital spark. In particular, all the scenes with the Adelphi (some sort of administrative angels) were extremely lame. I didn't care much for the artwork either. Even the font was annoying and made it difficult to read.
Yada, yada, yada . . . no need to get all ranty. I will say that it picked up a bit towards the end, so maybe it does improve in the following volumes—God, I hope so! I just don't understand all the overwhelming love for this series.
To borrow a line from my friend Ed - Final Judgment: Lower your expectations.
Oh man, I was really expecting to be blown away here, but this was just a colossal disappointment. 😭 So much so, that I'm not sure if I even care to continue—it was a struggle to even make it through this one.
Let's see here . . . two dimension characters, cringe worthy dialog, terrible jokes that mostly fell flat, and a rather dull, juvenile storyline lacking that vital spark. In particular, all the scenes with the Adelphi (some sort of administrative angels) were extremely lame. I didn't care much for the artwork either. Even the font was annoying and made it difficult to read.
Yada, yada, yada . . . no need to get all ranty. I will say that it picked up a bit towards the end, so maybe it does improve in the following volumes—God, I hope so! I just don't understand all the overwhelming love for this series.
To borrow a line from my friend Ed - Final Judgment: Lower your expectations.
August 13, 2013
My problem with some of these "comics for adults" books is that they seem like just that. Its as though a child wanted to prove how adult he was so he filled his book full of sex and swearing and crude jokes so everyone would know he was really mature. And so, as I have found with a lot of these adult comic books, it ends up feeling more juvenile than many of the ones that do not attempt to be labeled as adult.
I really wanted to like this book. I had heard it was funny and thought provoking but found it was neither. It tried really hard to be funny, almost as hard as it tried to be shocking. The main purpose of this book though is to shock. But it even fails there since it starts to all feel so juvenile that I can be no more shocked than I could be from a junior high kid who is trying to sound tough.
Demons and angels having sex, rapists, congregations exploding, and a kid trying to kill himself but ending up with an "ass face" make up just some of the events in this book put in merely in order to shock.
If you want an intelligent funny story with religious, and moral commentary and compelling characters than don't read Preacher. If you want a comic for adults don't read Preacher since it clearly was not meant for adults.If you want obscenity and violence put in for the sake of obscenity and violence, as well as constant attempts to offend, then Preacher is for you.
I'm starting to think I don't like Garth Ennis. I shall now put him in the same category as Frank Miller and Mark Millar. As in popular comic book authors that I am not interested in wasting any more time and money on.
I am honestly confused by the great popularity of this particular book series.
I really wanted to like this book. I had heard it was funny and thought provoking but found it was neither. It tried really hard to be funny, almost as hard as it tried to be shocking. The main purpose of this book though is to shock. But it even fails there since it starts to all feel so juvenile that I can be no more shocked than I could be from a junior high kid who is trying to sound tough.
Demons and angels having sex, rapists, congregations exploding, and a kid trying to kill himself but ending up with an "ass face" make up just some of the events in this book put in merely in order to shock.
If you want an intelligent funny story with religious, and moral commentary and compelling characters than don't read Preacher. If you want a comic for adults don't read Preacher since it clearly was not meant for adults.If you want obscenity and violence put in for the sake of obscenity and violence, as well as constant attempts to offend, then Preacher is for you.
I'm starting to think I don't like Garth Ennis. I shall now put him in the same category as Frank Miller and Mark Millar. As in popular comic book authors that I am not interested in wasting any more time and money on.
I am honestly confused by the great popularity of this particular book series.
September 23, 2012
This was probably the easiest five stars I've handed out to a comic collection. From the insane violence combined with the wildly original story, the first volume of Preacher did exactly what it was supposed to do: hook me and leave me begging for more.
Following it's unexpected escape, the dangerous offspring of an Angel and a Demon bonds with Jesse Custer, a lone Texan minister. Now with the word of God embedded within him, Jesse forms an alliance with his ex-girlfriend Tulip and a drunken Irish vampire named Cassidy as they embark on a journey to find God - and not in the "I'm saved/born again" sense but the "I'm going to kick your ass for deserting mankind" sense.
I'm going to try and give you my thoughts on the first volume but it would be hard for me to live up to the excellent review written by Kemper.
- I honestly have no idea where this is headed, which is awesome.
- The excessive violence and the profanity could be distracting IF the writing had been terrible (i.e. Die Hard 2 ). Thankfully, it's not. It never feels like Ennis is throwing all of this offensive material at you to get your attention, it fits right in with the setting and characters he's presenting.
- I will admit to being shocked on more than a few occasions. I'm not saying that I have this wealth of experience in "torture porn" films or explicit writing but I've seen my fair share of gore. That being said, some of the stuff contained in this book can be anything from downright frightening to gross.
I finished this late last night around 2 a.m. I have a few of the following volumes on deck so I'm hoping this is going to be something I'll breeze through.
Following it's unexpected escape, the dangerous offspring of an Angel and a Demon bonds with Jesse Custer, a lone Texan minister. Now with the word of God embedded within him, Jesse forms an alliance with his ex-girlfriend Tulip and a drunken Irish vampire named Cassidy as they embark on a journey to find God - and not in the "I'm saved/born again" sense but the "I'm going to kick your ass for deserting mankind" sense.
I'm going to try and give you my thoughts on the first volume but it would be hard for me to live up to the excellent review written by Kemper.
- I honestly have no idea where this is headed, which is awesome.
- The excessive violence and the profanity could be distracting IF the writing had been terrible (i.e. Die Hard 2 ). Thankfully, it's not. It never feels like Ennis is throwing all of this offensive material at you to get your attention, it fits right in with the setting and characters he's presenting.
- I will admit to being shocked on more than a few occasions. I'm not saying that I have this wealth of experience in "torture porn" films or explicit writing but I've seen my fair share of gore. That being said, some of the stuff contained in this book can be anything from downright frightening to gross.
I finished this late last night around 2 a.m. I have a few of the following volumes on deck so I'm hoping this is going to be something I'll breeze through.
December 31, 2022
One of the craziest, bloodiest, and most perverted highways to hell in the search of god
This will bring you to your limits or give you a honey pie horse grin
It´s not just the overkill of sex, violence, blasphemy, and horror, but the sheer level of perversion that lurks behind each corner of this absolutely disturbing masterpiece. Not just the antihero dark fantasy crew of protagonists on their road trip, but all their enemies and bosses, all kinds of social structures, cults, government, agencies
Are totally freaking bonkers
Nobody is normal here, which is maybe also necessary to survive. And it opens the potential for permanent escalation because of any issue, flashback, or provocation that caused someone to go nuts. But not just boring, stereotypical everyman spree killing rampage style, these
People have magic powers too
So one never knows what will happen. Is it a disaster caused by a crew member, FBI agents, Southern redneck hillbilly sheriffs, or family clans, or by one of the big, hidden, secret forces in the background? And I have such a feeling that this will
Expand to some social commentary in the other parts of the series if it doesn´t already
These are especially coming with a sarcastic, dark comedy undertone, because, well, just look at freaking 2022s reality! This was thought of as a dark, violent satire when it was published 27 years ago, and instead of becoming saner and less ape like, many people seem to have misunderstood and taken it as a blueprint for future societies. Humans are just so batshit crazy man.
Tropes show how literature is conceptualized and created and which mixture of elements makes works and genres unique:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph...
This will bring you to your limits or give you a honey pie horse grin
It´s not just the overkill of sex, violence, blasphemy, and horror, but the sheer level of perversion that lurks behind each corner of this absolutely disturbing masterpiece. Not just the antihero dark fantasy crew of protagonists on their road trip, but all their enemies and bosses, all kinds of social structures, cults, government, agencies
Are totally freaking bonkers
Nobody is normal here, which is maybe also necessary to survive. And it opens the potential for permanent escalation because of any issue, flashback, or provocation that caused someone to go nuts. But not just boring, stereotypical everyman spree killing rampage style, these
People have magic powers too
So one never knows what will happen. Is it a disaster caused by a crew member, FBI agents, Southern redneck hillbilly sheriffs, or family clans, or by one of the big, hidden, secret forces in the background? And I have such a feeling that this will
Expand to some social commentary in the other parts of the series if it doesn´t already
These are especially coming with a sarcastic, dark comedy undertone, because, well, just look at freaking 2022s reality! This was thought of as a dark, violent satire when it was published 27 years ago, and instead of becoming saner and less ape like, many people seem to have misunderstood and taken it as a blueprint for future societies. Humans are just so batshit crazy man.
Tropes show how literature is conceptualized and created and which mixture of elements makes works and genres unique:
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.ph...
March 24, 2014
Garth Ennis is definitely one of my all-time favourite comic book writers. I forget which series I read first - his Punisher MAX run I think followed by The Boys - but I do remember coming to Preacher very late in the game, despite being told it was his finest work to date. And I remember reading it and thinking, no, it’s not. Re-reading it recently, I’m still not convinced and I’m baffled at most readers’ overwhelmingly positive response to it.
Jesse Custer is a former bad boy turned preacher in a Texan town who one day gets superpowers from God and accidentally burns his entire flock alive. He meets his old flame/hitman, Tulip, and a random stranger called Cassidy who’s also an Irish vampire, and together they look to hunt down God - who’s on Earth somewhere - and tell him what a lousy job he’s doing with Creation. Meanwhile, the Saint of Killers, an unstoppable killing machine, is on Custer’s trail.
The book opens with Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy sitting around a cafe table nattering away, and it’s this setup that bothered me the most in the volume: they’re always sat round cafe tables reminding themselves (and the reader) who they are, what they’re doing, and why they’re doing it. I guess Ennis really liked Pulp Fiction and Tarantino’s other movies and thought it’d be riveting to have his characters mimic that style - and that’s fine, there were plenty of Tarantino copycats in the wake of Pulp Fiction - but he can’t emulate Tarantino’s dialogue successfully enough and instead his expositional summary dumps became extremely trite long before the end.
The characters didn’t grab me - I don’t really care about boring Jesse whose quest to find God or whatever isn’t interesting in the least, and the other characters like Tulip are about as two-dimensional as you can get. Cassidy plays the louche slacker (a quintessential 90s archetype that still annoyingly crops up now and then) whose jokes fall flat every single time. “I’ve got this brilliant recipe for quiche. You make the quiche, right, an’ then you cook it, an’ then you throw the stupid fuckin’ thing out the window. Then you grill yourself a t-bone an’ eat that instead.” Ugh. He comes up with drivel like that all the time and it’s so irritating.
I’ve seen lots of reviews that mention that Preacher is gory and bloody, etc., and it is but not enough to really warrant it being THE thing to know about the book. If you’ve read Ennis before, you’ll already know he writes gory comics - The Punisher, The Boys, Jennifer Blood, War Stories, hell, practically every Ennis book contains the same amount of gore as you see in Preacher, so I’m not sure why it’s worth pointing out about this comic. It’s a bloody story but no more so than any other Ennis and/or Steve Dillon book you’ll read.
The setup is just boring. Some weird thing from Heaven (which is real) called Genesis has escaped and become part of Custer who now has the Word of God, meaning he can will whoever into doing anything he wants with his voice. And because the world’s gone to pot, Custer’s going to find God and tell him to sort it out, make him care somehow, probably using the Word of God? Meh. I’m not sure why Tulip or Cassidy are along for the ride either. I guess neither have anything much going on? Which is always a compelling motivation to have…
I really like Steve Dillon’s art so seeing that here is always awesome, and Ennis’ murder mystery in New York City at the end was ok. At least that had a story rather than characters standing about telling the reader about themselves and their situation while they waited for the Saint of Killers to show up. You can also see the prototype for Detective Soap from Welcome Back, Frank in Detective John Tool - the two are comically incompetent detectives chasing after much more competent criminals.
And Arseface still makes me laugh - he’s a Kurt Cobain fan who tried committing suicide the same way as his hero with a gun in the mouth but miraculously lived and whose face now looks like an arse! The scenes where he’s trying to be upbeat and cheerful to his grim father who can’t bear to look at his son were so damn funny. But overall there’s very little to like in a 200+ page book that’s hugely rated by the majority of readers.
First volumes aren’t always indicative of the series as a whole. I wasn’t that impressed with the first volumes of Sandman, Y: The Last Man and Scalped but went on to adore the rest of the series. And Ennis has written enough brilliant books to warrant a level of trust other writers wouldn’t, so I’ll keep on with Preacher. But Gone to Texas is a surprisingly very weak first book in such an acclaimed series.
Jesse Custer is a former bad boy turned preacher in a Texan town who one day gets superpowers from God and accidentally burns his entire flock alive. He meets his old flame/hitman, Tulip, and a random stranger called Cassidy who’s also an Irish vampire, and together they look to hunt down God - who’s on Earth somewhere - and tell him what a lousy job he’s doing with Creation. Meanwhile, the Saint of Killers, an unstoppable killing machine, is on Custer’s trail.
The book opens with Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy sitting around a cafe table nattering away, and it’s this setup that bothered me the most in the volume: they’re always sat round cafe tables reminding themselves (and the reader) who they are, what they’re doing, and why they’re doing it. I guess Ennis really liked Pulp Fiction and Tarantino’s other movies and thought it’d be riveting to have his characters mimic that style - and that’s fine, there were plenty of Tarantino copycats in the wake of Pulp Fiction - but he can’t emulate Tarantino’s dialogue successfully enough and instead his expositional summary dumps became extremely trite long before the end.
The characters didn’t grab me - I don’t really care about boring Jesse whose quest to find God or whatever isn’t interesting in the least, and the other characters like Tulip are about as two-dimensional as you can get. Cassidy plays the louche slacker (a quintessential 90s archetype that still annoyingly crops up now and then) whose jokes fall flat every single time. “I’ve got this brilliant recipe for quiche. You make the quiche, right, an’ then you cook it, an’ then you throw the stupid fuckin’ thing out the window. Then you grill yourself a t-bone an’ eat that instead.” Ugh. He comes up with drivel like that all the time and it’s so irritating.
I’ve seen lots of reviews that mention that Preacher is gory and bloody, etc., and it is but not enough to really warrant it being THE thing to know about the book. If you’ve read Ennis before, you’ll already know he writes gory comics - The Punisher, The Boys, Jennifer Blood, War Stories, hell, practically every Ennis book contains the same amount of gore as you see in Preacher, so I’m not sure why it’s worth pointing out about this comic. It’s a bloody story but no more so than any other Ennis and/or Steve Dillon book you’ll read.
The setup is just boring. Some weird thing from Heaven (which is real) called Genesis has escaped and become part of Custer who now has the Word of God, meaning he can will whoever into doing anything he wants with his voice. And because the world’s gone to pot, Custer’s going to find God and tell him to sort it out, make him care somehow, probably using the Word of God? Meh. I’m not sure why Tulip or Cassidy are along for the ride either. I guess neither have anything much going on? Which is always a compelling motivation to have…
I really like Steve Dillon’s art so seeing that here is always awesome, and Ennis’ murder mystery in New York City at the end was ok. At least that had a story rather than characters standing about telling the reader about themselves and their situation while they waited for the Saint of Killers to show up. You can also see the prototype for Detective Soap from Welcome Back, Frank in Detective John Tool - the two are comically incompetent detectives chasing after much more competent criminals.
And Arseface still makes me laugh - he’s a Kurt Cobain fan who tried committing suicide the same way as his hero with a gun in the mouth but miraculously lived and whose face now looks like an arse! The scenes where he’s trying to be upbeat and cheerful to his grim father who can’t bear to look at his son were so damn funny. But overall there’s very little to like in a 200+ page book that’s hugely rated by the majority of readers.
First volumes aren’t always indicative of the series as a whole. I wasn’t that impressed with the first volumes of Sandman, Y: The Last Man and Scalped but went on to adore the rest of the series. And Ennis has written enough brilliant books to warrant a level of trust other writers wouldn’t, so I’ll keep on with Preacher. But Gone to Texas is a surprisingly very weak first book in such an acclaimed series.
September 6, 2015
I may be a little late jumping on the Preacher bandwagon but thankfully I'm on it and this is yet another one I should have read a long, long time ago.
Jesse Custer is our faithless priest who gets possessed by Genesis, the powerful offspring of a forbidden relationship between Angel and Demon. So the story takes place mainly on terra firma with interludes to heaven, where the powers that be don't really want Genesis around, too dangerous and too powerful. So they send the mean old saint of killers down to take out our hero.
Jesse is a pretty cool character and tagging along we have his ex-girlfriend Tulip who didn't really push any buttons for me and the vampire Cassiday who was a little more interesting in typically violent blood sucking fashion.
The artwork was ok, the story was the clincher for me, ending in our three heroes setting out to find the one and only, God, who has forsaken mankind and is apparently wandering about somewhere after acquiring a suitable disguise. So that's the endgame find the all-powerful, who probably doesn't want to be found, so let's get on it. And I've found God by the way, he's on Twitter and often professes words of wisdom for us mere mortals.
Next up The Boys & 100 Bullets, can’t wait.
Also posted at http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
Jesse Custer is our faithless priest who gets possessed by Genesis, the powerful offspring of a forbidden relationship between Angel and Demon. So the story takes place mainly on terra firma with interludes to heaven, where the powers that be don't really want Genesis around, too dangerous and too powerful. So they send the mean old saint of killers down to take out our hero.
Jesse is a pretty cool character and tagging along we have his ex-girlfriend Tulip who didn't really push any buttons for me and the vampire Cassiday who was a little more interesting in typically violent blood sucking fashion.
The artwork was ok, the story was the clincher for me, ending in our three heroes setting out to find the one and only, God, who has forsaken mankind and is apparently wandering about somewhere after acquiring a suitable disguise. So that's the endgame find the all-powerful, who probably doesn't want to be found, so let's get on it. And I've found God by the way, he's on Twitter and often professes words of wisdom for us mere mortals.
Next up The Boys & 100 Bullets, can’t wait.
Also posted at http://paulnelson.booklikes.com/post/...
August 10, 2016
In the collection “Preacher, Volume 1: Gone to Texas “ the Hardcover we are presented with the first twelve issues of the comic collected together along with some nice extra’s printed on some nice paper, not the cheap stuff that most comics are printed on.
The book is printed as a “Graphic Novel” and the empathies should be on the word Graphic, not that here is anything wrong with that (to quote the nice Seinfeld folks). I guess if you have young kids it would be best, if they can read, not to leave this book within their reach.
When books are compared to movies it has been my experience that for the most part, the books are better than the movies, except for perhaps “The Wizard of OZ” where the movie, in my opinion, is defiantly better. In the comparison of a graphic novel to a television show, it becomes quickly apparent that the story in the graphic novel could not presented on the in home screen. And let me be clear I don’t want to disparage the television show in the slightest, it is what it is and it's entertaining, and comparing the two is an apples and oranges kind of comparison.
For a comic that is 20 years old now (originally published in 1996) and tells the story the way it does, it holds up amazingly well. The writing is crisp, the art is well done, the colors are eye catching. And it’s a lot of fun and defiantly darkly funny.
I look forward to the next installment.
The book is printed as a “Graphic Novel” and the empathies should be on the word Graphic, not that here is anything wrong with that (to quote the nice Seinfeld folks). I guess if you have young kids it would be best, if they can read, not to leave this book within their reach.
When books are compared to movies it has been my experience that for the most part, the books are better than the movies, except for perhaps “The Wizard of OZ” where the movie, in my opinion, is defiantly better. In the comparison of a graphic novel to a television show, it becomes quickly apparent that the story in the graphic novel could not presented on the in home screen. And let me be clear I don’t want to disparage the television show in the slightest, it is what it is and it's entertaining, and comparing the two is an apples and oranges kind of comparison.
For a comic that is 20 years old now (originally published in 1996) and tells the story the way it does, it holds up amazingly well. The writing is crisp, the art is well done, the colors are eye catching. And it’s a lot of fun and defiantly darkly funny.
I look forward to the next installment.
February 6, 2017
3.5 Stars.
To be honest, I was so close to marking this as a DNF at the start of this volume. I thought it was really hard to get into it and I wasn't enjoying it at all. I'm glad I gave it a chance though because I feel like I'll really enjoy reading this comic series. The second half of the volume was definitely much better than the first half. It also made a lot more sense to me. I wasn't really enjoying the artwork much either at the start but it definitely grew on me. I feel like this is a really original idea and I'm excited to see where it goes. I would recommend this series.
To be honest, I was so close to marking this as a DNF at the start of this volume. I thought it was really hard to get into it and I wasn't enjoying it at all. I'm glad I gave it a chance though because I feel like I'll really enjoy reading this comic series. The second half of the volume was definitely much better than the first half. It also made a lot more sense to me. I wasn't really enjoying the artwork much either at the start but it definitely grew on me. I feel like this is a really original idea and I'm excited to see where it goes. I would recommend this series.
November 3, 2013
book #11 for Jugs & Capes
& my latest entry at CCLaP
First of all, I understand that it is totally unfair to read only the first two volumes in a series and purport to have a reasonable grasp of said series. My friend Keith, a crazed comics fan who has become the unofficial backseat-driver of my comics tastes, criticized Jugs & Capes for this when we read the first two volumes of Fables a few months ago. He sees this as a problematic pattern: the indie comics we're reading are all self-contained, but then we're trying to "get a taste" of mainstream comic series by reading the intros to different series, thus putting mainstream comics necessarily at a disadvantage. But what else can we do? If you're not a die-hard comics-phile with limitless time to dedicate to seventy-plus-issue series, how else can you even get started? And listen: I get that you wouldn't try to judge an entire prose novel on the strength of its opening chapters, but you would decide from that whether you wanted to keep reading or just ditch the book and find something else. No one thinks that's unfair. So while I admit that I didn't read nearly enough to judge Preacher as a series, I do think I have the right to discuss how the first books affected me, and why I have little intention of reading any more.
The other introductory comment I'd like to make is that we were all primed for Preacher by reading reviews insisting that this series was not for the faint of heart, that there was pretty much something here to offend everyone—the blood and gore were horrifying, the language exaggeratedly profane, the plot obscenely sacrilegious, and on and on. So though I am a bit squeamish when it comes to violence, I love cursing and hate organized religion (more on this later), and I was kind of pumped to see if these books really could offend me.
Turns out: not really.
So. Preacher is the story of reluctant redneck preacher Jesse Custer, his sort-of girlfriend Tulip, who is a hitwoman and general bad-ass, and Cassidy, their angry drunk vampire buddy. Oh, and it's also about how God has abandoned his post in Heaven, a demon boning an angel to spawn a scarily powerful force called Genesis, Jesus as an overbearing prick, and a dirty, angry, cruel, horribly fucked world.
As expected, the profanity didn't bother me, the blasphemy made me mostly giggle, and the violence... well, the violence did upset me, but not how I'd thought it would. The truth is, I was more upset when the violence stopped upsetting me than I was when it did. I don't mean this in the "We're all going to become criminals because of desensitization to violence in pop culture" way, but I do think that desensitizing your readers does a serious disservice to your book and your point. Preacher is supposed to be edgy and dark and devastating, but after you see a man whose flesh has been cut from his face, a hideously disfigured failed suicide, an angel with the back of his head blown off (brains visibly dripping through the hole), and dozens and dozens of shootouts and bar brawls and stabbings, it just stops being shocking. And then what's the point? I suppose I respect the fact that they kept finding new and different ways of hurting and killing people, but it was a somewhat bored admiration, a cataloguing of novelty rather than an appreciation of the intensity of the scenes. And to me, that's a failure.
And speaking of failures? Racism / homophobia. I get that this story takes place in Texas, and I get that there are all kinds of closed-minded people in the South. But there are scenes that are just too much, like one where a band of cops bat about the n-word and f-word (not fuck, the other one) willy-nilly. No. What's the point? It wasn't even as if it were targeted; if one of the characters had been black or gay and the cops'd shouted slurs at him or her, okay, maybe. But this was a different thing, this was just racism as a shortcut to characterization, which is awful. There are lots and lots of other ways to demonstrate that these men are ignorant and stupid. If this was done as an attempt to shock and push the same boundaries that the extreme violence does, that seems juvenile as well as offensive. (So maybe Preacher actually did manage to offend me?) Worse than lazy characterization, I think the racism played a part in making the overall plot more clichéd. Even though our "hero" is a gun-toting, violent semi-psychopath, our ragtag cast of "villains" are even worse—way worse. And one of the laziest ways to make a sharp distinction between the good guys and bad is to show that the bad cop is a racist homophobe.
I felt the same kind of failure—lack of nuance, lack of development—in the "good" guys. Jesse and Cassidy are dangerous motherfuckers, but they seem to view violence as an itch that needs to be scratched, not a last, or even second, reactive resort. At one point they kill a dozen men in a bar because one of them denigrated Laurel & Hardy. Sorry, but that's fucking ridiculous, especially since Jesse is meant in some ways to be a moral arbiter. He's a preacher, for goodness sake! I get that he's also a "good ol' boy," but that doesn't go far enough for me. In order to show morality, I need some gradual buildup to violence, I need to see him try to reason with people before breaking their fingers, I need to believe that he'd really rather not have to kill yet another yokel, but he will if he really really has to. Otherwise he's just a nasty thug, little better than the nasty thugs he's senselessly butchering.
And finally, let's talk about the religious stuff. I'm a pretty staunch atheist, raised Jewish, and I tend to regard modern religions in the same way I do ancient mythology: as wild stories. Often allegorical stories, sure, but I have none of the religious hangups or residual guilt that so many modern (and especially lapsed) Christians do. So the Catholic guilt aspect of this story—which is clearly another of its shortcuts to emotional intensity—didn't affect me the way it likely would have if I were, say, a Catholic. I guess that means I'm missing a significant part of the impact of this story, but it also means I could treat it like a story, without bringing any emotional baggage to it.
In any case, I'm not saying Preacher was all bad; I did find the plots engaging and the dialogue punchy and believable. The art was of a type, of course, but clearly top-notch, especially the poster-quality chapter openers (which Keith informed me are the original covers of the single issues). The cursing didn't seem nearly as overdone as the violence, and the religious themes were interesting in the same way any fantasy plot would be. But look, in such a massively overcrowded media landscape, when every book I read means at least a hundred others that I never will, this one (well, these two) just didn't do it.
Of course, let's bring it back to the idea that these two books are possibly just an intro, a bit of throat-clearing and balance-finding, and most likely if I were to read more of the series, I'd get more and more enmeshed in the story. But I just don't feel like it's a story I particularly care to get enmeshed in. As with all epic fantasy, I'm sure the good guys are going to win, and of course Jesse and Co. will kick a lot of motherfucking ass while doing it, probably up to an including the asses of God, Jesus, and all the angels. I'm sure it'll be an interesting (and very, very bloody) journey to watch them get there, and I hope lots of people enjoy following it. I just won't be one of them.
& my latest entry at CCLaP
First of all, I understand that it is totally unfair to read only the first two volumes in a series and purport to have a reasonable grasp of said series. My friend Keith, a crazed comics fan who has become the unofficial backseat-driver of my comics tastes, criticized Jugs & Capes for this when we read the first two volumes of Fables a few months ago. He sees this as a problematic pattern: the indie comics we're reading are all self-contained, but then we're trying to "get a taste" of mainstream comic series by reading the intros to different series, thus putting mainstream comics necessarily at a disadvantage. But what else can we do? If you're not a die-hard comics-phile with limitless time to dedicate to seventy-plus-issue series, how else can you even get started? And listen: I get that you wouldn't try to judge an entire prose novel on the strength of its opening chapters, but you would decide from that whether you wanted to keep reading or just ditch the book and find something else. No one thinks that's unfair. So while I admit that I didn't read nearly enough to judge Preacher as a series, I do think I have the right to discuss how the first books affected me, and why I have little intention of reading any more.
The other introductory comment I'd like to make is that we were all primed for Preacher by reading reviews insisting that this series was not for the faint of heart, that there was pretty much something here to offend everyone—the blood and gore were horrifying, the language exaggeratedly profane, the plot obscenely sacrilegious, and on and on. So though I am a bit squeamish when it comes to violence, I love cursing and hate organized religion (more on this later), and I was kind of pumped to see if these books really could offend me.
Turns out: not really.
So. Preacher is the story of reluctant redneck preacher Jesse Custer, his sort-of girlfriend Tulip, who is a hitwoman and general bad-ass, and Cassidy, their angry drunk vampire buddy. Oh, and it's also about how God has abandoned his post in Heaven, a demon boning an angel to spawn a scarily powerful force called Genesis, Jesus as an overbearing prick, and a dirty, angry, cruel, horribly fucked world.
As expected, the profanity didn't bother me, the blasphemy made me mostly giggle, and the violence... well, the violence did upset me, but not how I'd thought it would. The truth is, I was more upset when the violence stopped upsetting me than I was when it did. I don't mean this in the "We're all going to become criminals because of desensitization to violence in pop culture" way, but I do think that desensitizing your readers does a serious disservice to your book and your point. Preacher is supposed to be edgy and dark and devastating, but after you see a man whose flesh has been cut from his face, a hideously disfigured failed suicide, an angel with the back of his head blown off (brains visibly dripping through the hole), and dozens and dozens of shootouts and bar brawls and stabbings, it just stops being shocking. And then what's the point? I suppose I respect the fact that they kept finding new and different ways of hurting and killing people, but it was a somewhat bored admiration, a cataloguing of novelty rather than an appreciation of the intensity of the scenes. And to me, that's a failure.
And speaking of failures? Racism / homophobia. I get that this story takes place in Texas, and I get that there are all kinds of closed-minded people in the South. But there are scenes that are just too much, like one where a band of cops bat about the n-word and f-word (not fuck, the other one) willy-nilly. No. What's the point? It wasn't even as if it were targeted; if one of the characters had been black or gay and the cops'd shouted slurs at him or her, okay, maybe. But this was a different thing, this was just racism as a shortcut to characterization, which is awful. There are lots and lots of other ways to demonstrate that these men are ignorant and stupid. If this was done as an attempt to shock and push the same boundaries that the extreme violence does, that seems juvenile as well as offensive. (So maybe Preacher actually did manage to offend me?) Worse than lazy characterization, I think the racism played a part in making the overall plot more clichéd. Even though our "hero" is a gun-toting, violent semi-psychopath, our ragtag cast of "villains" are even worse—way worse. And one of the laziest ways to make a sharp distinction between the good guys and bad is to show that the bad cop is a racist homophobe.
I felt the same kind of failure—lack of nuance, lack of development—in the "good" guys. Jesse and Cassidy are dangerous motherfuckers, but they seem to view violence as an itch that needs to be scratched, not a last, or even second, reactive resort. At one point they kill a dozen men in a bar because one of them denigrated Laurel & Hardy. Sorry, but that's fucking ridiculous, especially since Jesse is meant in some ways to be a moral arbiter. He's a preacher, for goodness sake! I get that he's also a "good ol' boy," but that doesn't go far enough for me. In order to show morality, I need some gradual buildup to violence, I need to see him try to reason with people before breaking their fingers, I need to believe that he'd really rather not have to kill yet another yokel, but he will if he really really has to. Otherwise he's just a nasty thug, little better than the nasty thugs he's senselessly butchering.
And finally, let's talk about the religious stuff. I'm a pretty staunch atheist, raised Jewish, and I tend to regard modern religions in the same way I do ancient mythology: as wild stories. Often allegorical stories, sure, but I have none of the religious hangups or residual guilt that so many modern (and especially lapsed) Christians do. So the Catholic guilt aspect of this story—which is clearly another of its shortcuts to emotional intensity—didn't affect me the way it likely would have if I were, say, a Catholic. I guess that means I'm missing a significant part of the impact of this story, but it also means I could treat it like a story, without bringing any emotional baggage to it.
In any case, I'm not saying Preacher was all bad; I did find the plots engaging and the dialogue punchy and believable. The art was of a type, of course, but clearly top-notch, especially the poster-quality chapter openers (which Keith informed me are the original covers of the single issues). The cursing didn't seem nearly as overdone as the violence, and the religious themes were interesting in the same way any fantasy plot would be. But look, in such a massively overcrowded media landscape, when every book I read means at least a hundred others that I never will, this one (well, these two) just didn't do it.
Of course, let's bring it back to the idea that these two books are possibly just an intro, a bit of throat-clearing and balance-finding, and most likely if I were to read more of the series, I'd get more and more enmeshed in the story. But I just don't feel like it's a story I particularly care to get enmeshed in. As with all epic fantasy, I'm sure the good guys are going to win, and of course Jesse and Co. will kick a lot of motherfucking ass while doing it, probably up to an including the asses of God, Jesus, and all the angels. I'm sure it'll be an interesting (and very, very bloody) journey to watch them get there, and I hope lots of people enjoy following it. I just won't be one of them.
August 23, 2020
Approfittando della ristampa di questa serie da parte della Panini, ho deciso di ripartire: in passato avevo letto alcuni volumi che ero riuscito a trovare in fumetteria, della Magic Press. Pochi e non consequenziali.
Così finalmente ho potuto leggere l'inizio di questa serie (tra l'altro sono ragionevolmente sicuro che l'omonimo volume "Texas o morte" della Magic Press contenesse altre storie, quelle con la famiglia di Jesse forse... purtroppo ormai l'ho venduto da tempo e non posso controllare, ma sono sicuro di non aver mai letto le storie lette ora).
Mi piace la tecnica del flashback, per mostrare la storia come un "riassiumiamo quanto accaduto finora" nel presente.
Mi piace che sia partito subito tutto a massima velocità, senza tentennare o trascinare le cose: abbiamo subito Genesis e la sua storia, il Paradiso e la notizia su Dio, gli angeli e il Santo degli Assassini, il Verbo, Tulip e Cassidy.
Più una discreta mole di accenni a personaggi e situazioni future.
Violenza e volgarità, un ritratto impietoso del razzismo in certe zone dell'America e in certi ambienti, una visione della religione disillusa e cinica.
Che altro chiedere?
Così finalmente ho potuto leggere l'inizio di questa serie (tra l'altro sono ragionevolmente sicuro che l'omonimo volume "Texas o morte" della Magic Press contenesse altre storie, quelle con la famiglia di Jesse forse... purtroppo ormai l'ho venduto da tempo e non posso controllare, ma sono sicuro di non aver mai letto le storie lette ora).
Mi piace la tecnica del flashback, per mostrare la storia come un "riassiumiamo quanto accaduto finora" nel presente.
Mi piace che sia partito subito tutto a massima velocità, senza tentennare o trascinare le cose: abbiamo subito Genesis e la sua storia, il Paradiso e la notizia su Dio, gli angeli e il Santo degli Assassini, il Verbo, Tulip e Cassidy.
Più una discreta mole di accenni a personaggi e situazioni future.
Violenza e volgarità, un ritratto impietoso del razzismo in certe zone dell'America e in certi ambienti, una visione della religione disillusa e cinica.
Che altro chiedere?
April 12, 2018
Well I wish could go back in time and punch myself in the face, because this book is awesome. Take it from me, sometimes one read is not enough for something that's really different.
Preacher is this insane mix of western, supernatural horror, romance, and black comedy. One of those "impossible" genre combos but it seems to work, at least for me on a second read. It's dark, romantic, creepy, hilarious, exciting, crude, and horrifying. It can definitely be offensive to the religious, the animal lover, the southerner, the Texan, the police, the criminal, the teenager, pretty much everyone. But that's good, because we're all too serious and self-important anyway.
"Christ, I think I'd grow old overnight if I lost you."
Hidden under Garth Ennis' wild violence and profanity is a story of drama. Jesse Custer, our hero, suddenly has incredible power and finds himself in the company of an Irish vampire, Cassidy, and his ex-girlfriend Tulip. There's John Wayne, angels and demons, something called Genesis, and the Killer of Saints. But it's really Jesse's story of coming of age through absolute hell, and his arrival upon his well-deserved power and vengeance, that is the meat and potatoes of the book. And it's filled with brilliant writing like the quote above.
Between Steve Dillon illustrating, one of my all time favorites Matt Hollingsworth coloring, and Glenn Fabry illustrating the covers, this is a fantastic looking book! It's basically the style that Image is going for these days, clean lines, deep colors, realistic but still cartoony. And it just works great. I really enjoyed looking at these images. And those covers are industry-topping. Like Brian Bolland-level.
Read this!
Preacher is this insane mix of western, supernatural horror, romance, and black comedy. One of those "impossible" genre combos but it seems to work, at least for me on a second read. It's dark, romantic, creepy, hilarious, exciting, crude, and horrifying. It can definitely be offensive to the religious, the animal lover, the southerner, the Texan, the police, the criminal, the teenager, pretty much everyone. But that's good, because we're all too serious and self-important anyway.
"Christ, I think I'd grow old overnight if I lost you."
Hidden under Garth Ennis' wild violence and profanity is a story of drama. Jesse Custer, our hero, suddenly has incredible power and finds himself in the company of an Irish vampire, Cassidy, and his ex-girlfriend Tulip. There's John Wayne, angels and demons, something called Genesis, and the Killer of Saints. But it's really Jesse's story of coming of age through absolute hell, and his arrival upon his well-deserved power and vengeance, that is the meat and potatoes of the book. And it's filled with brilliant writing like the quote above.
Between Steve Dillon illustrating, one of my all time favorites Matt Hollingsworth coloring, and Glenn Fabry illustrating the covers, this is a fantastic looking book! It's basically the style that Image is going for these days, clean lines, deep colors, realistic but still cartoony. And it just works great. I really enjoyed looking at these images. And those covers are industry-topping. Like Brian Bolland-level.
Read this!
August 14, 2016
Some weeks ago I’ve seen the trailer of the tv series and with the help of a friend here (thanks a lot, Jessica) I started this first book. I didn’t know much about the plot, only the few things I read in some reviews and on the book page. Nothing could prepare me to this. I heard the name of Garth Ennis for the first time with this comics, but I will not forget anytime soon.
This is an incredible story, with at the center three unlikely heroes: Jesse Custer, a precher possesed by a spiritual force, able to compete with God, his old girlfriend, Tulip and Cassidy, an Irish vampire. The goal: find God, mysteriously disappeared and face him.
The story is amazing, violent, blasphemous, with some ideas about religion and myth that are brilliant, intriguing and crazy. Ennis put many human question about God to a practical basis, using a disillusioned preacher for give a voice to them. Besides, he develop then in a excellent way, showing the worst side of the society through all the violence of which human beings are capable.
The artwork is not so defined, but you have to think that it has more than twenty years. Besides, it reachs the top in the pictures about supernatural, for example in the different types of angels and their skills, but also in the representation of violent scenes, that in many cases are more efficient than words.
Interesting to note that there is a western tone in this story, regarding the clashes between the team and the police, some of Jesse's principles, but also for a certain friend of him.
Personally, I love this series, but I understand this is not for all.
This is an incredible story, with at the center three unlikely heroes: Jesse Custer, a precher possesed by a spiritual force, able to compete with God, his old girlfriend, Tulip and Cassidy, an Irish vampire. The goal: find God, mysteriously disappeared and face him.
The story is amazing, violent, blasphemous, with some ideas about religion and myth that are brilliant, intriguing and crazy. Ennis put many human question about God to a practical basis, using a disillusioned preacher for give a voice to them. Besides, he develop then in a excellent way, showing the worst side of the society through all the violence of which human beings are capable.
The artwork is not so defined, but you have to think that it has more than twenty years. Besides, it reachs the top in the pictures about supernatural, for example in the different types of angels and their skills, but also in the representation of violent scenes, that in many cases are more efficient than words.
Interesting to note that there is a western tone in this story, regarding the clashes between the team and the police, some of Jesse's principles, but also for a certain friend of him.
Personally, I love this series, but I understand this is not for all.
July 27, 2017
2ND READ-THROUGH: It’s been about 8 years since I first read Preacher, and since I’ve been watching (and loving) the new television series, I figured what better time to revisit the source material? While the show and the comic are vastly different, at least in terms of story (the characterizations seem fairly consistent), I found this first volume to be everything I remembered. Violent and funny and nihilistic and strange. Since originally reading this, I’ve regarded it as my “favorite comic series of all-time,” and after re-reading this, I still stand by that.
August 2, 2016
Ovaj strip je jedna od onih stvari zbog kojih se osjećam starim. U glavi sam nekako još uvijek u ranim dvadesetima, odnosno mislim da mislim kao što sam i tada mislio. No, naravno, to je samo privid. Godine konzumiranja raznih oblika umjetnosti odnijele su svoj danak. Danas teško da nešto može ostaviti utisak na mene. Preacher nije ostavio utisak, ali u njemu sam prepoznao stvari koje bi mi zagolicale maštu da sam ga čitao kada sam imao petnaest godina.
Mislim, nije Preacher loš strip, u dijalozima ima zabavnih glazbenih referenci (za neke od njih se treba mentalno vratiti u devedesete), poneka fora uspije nasmijati, ali uz sve hvale koje strip dobiva očekivao sam nešto više.
Kako je jedan prijatelj rekao, čitajući sažetak ovog stripa mi se nesvjesno vraćamo u ranije godine kada su nas slične priče oduševljavale pa želimo ponovno doživjeti taj ushit. No, kada kreneš čitati vidiš da je to iskustvo proživljeno, potrošeno. I zato se neću pretvarati da je Preacher nešto genijalno i posebno, nego ga ocijeniti onako kako sam ga doživio u ovom trenutku.
Mislim, nije Preacher loš strip, u dijalozima ima zabavnih glazbenih referenci (za neke od njih se treba mentalno vratiti u devedesete), poneka fora uspije nasmijati, ali uz sve hvale koje strip dobiva očekivao sam nešto više.
Kako je jedan prijatelj rekao, čitajući sažetak ovog stripa mi se nesvjesno vraćamo u ranije godine kada su nas slične priče oduševljavale pa želimo ponovno doživjeti taj ushit. No, kada kreneš čitati vidiš da je to iskustvo proživljeno, potrošeno. I zato se neću pretvarati da je Preacher nešto genijalno i posebno, nego ga ocijeniti onako kako sam ga doživio u ovom trenutku.
March 20, 2022
Preacher follows a gang of three washed-up misfits that have all been dealt cruel hands by fate. First there’s Jesse Custer, a vulgar, foul-mouthed yet all-around upstanding and gentlemanly preacher living a dull life in a small Texas town called Annville. He wears the mantle of a preacher while exuding the aura of a gritty, spaghetti western antihero. He spends more time praying to John Wayne and channeling Clint Eastwood than he ever spends seeking guidance from God.
Things take a major turn for Jesse when he accidentally gets possessed by the spirit of a supernatural entity called Genesis, the cursed child born out of the forbidden fornication between an angel and a demon. The entity contains the essence of absolute goodness and absolute evil, fusing together with Jesse’s soul and granting him unimaginable power. Now a force to be reckoned with, Jesse makes himself quite a few dangerous enemies and he doesn’t plan to let his newfound powers go to waste. He has a bone to pick with the scum of the earth and plans to use his powers to make amends with his past trauma and regrets. Most of all, he has it out for God more than anyone else for allowing all the chaos and evil in the world to spiral out of control in the first place. He goes on a journey to find God and give him a piece of his mind.
Along his journey, Jesse reunites with his ex-girlfriend Tulip and befriends an Irish, vampire junky named Cassidy. Tulip is a hotheaded gunslinger that was raised by her tough-as-nails yet affectionate, sharpshooting father who taught her how to hunt, stand on her own two feet and take no nonsense from anybody. She’s a wild tomboy with a lot of heart and has quite a bit of catching up to do with Jesse after he abandoned her for unknown reasons at the peak of their relationship.
After hearing Jesse’s story about fusing with Genesis and going on a mission to find God with his newfound powers, Cassidy happily joins the preacher on his quest while Tulip works on patching things up with Jesse after learning of the dark secrets behind his sudden disappearance. Cassidy also has some demons of his own to work out as he battles with alcoholism, drug addiction and a wavering moral compass on top of never being able to walk around in broad daylight because of the curse of vampirism placed on him as a young boy. Despite their numerous imperfections, the three come together in hopes of finding God. Not in the metaphorical sense, but to kick his ass for abandoning his throne in heaven, neglecting his duties and letting humanity drown in the cesspool he created with his own hands. The three outlaws seek to set things right through very unsavory means.
Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy encounter some incredibly disturbed villains along the way, including Jesse’s own family of backwater devils that include a tyrannical religious grandmother obsessed with maintaining pure bloodlines, a violent psychopath that brutally murdered anything Jesse dared to love as a child, and a crazed hillbilly with a fetish for farm animals. Then there’s a secret religious order akin to the Illuminati called The Grail, which includes the outrageous Klaus Starr whose violent antics along with his obsession of trying to use Jesse’s powers to fulfill his own plans usually end up leaving him with a few missing limbs and making a mockery of himself. There’s even a KKK loonie that built himself a giant sex doll made out of the severed, bloody body parts of butchered livestock. The violence is so outrageously gruesome that it somehow manages to be equally horrendous and hilarious. A lot of the dark and shocking moments in this series are delivered with heavy undertones of black comedy, making you laugh, cringe and gag all at the same time. It’s a wild ride that pulls no punches, and the scares are absurdly creative if nothing else.
The three protagonists have a lot of depth to them, every villain is a wicked bastard and the side characters all have their own heartwarming struggles to overcome. The most notable minor character that I was rooting for from beginning to end was a mentally disabled boy nicknamed Assface. The boy idolized Kurt Cobain to an unhealthy degree and unfortunately, he thought that following in his idol’s footsteps by blowing his head off with a gun would earn himself the love and admiration he always wanted. After his failed suicide attempt, he’s left with a gaping hole that continuously oozes fluid from his now deformed face, which earned him the nickname Assface. Instead of letting his deformity bring him down, he goes on his own personal journey of self-discovery and finding comfort and acceptance through rock music. This is just one of many touching tales throughout the series.
Preacher is outrageous, shocking, and it isn’t afraid of offending anybody with its sharp-edged humor, but it also captures the personal flaws and imperfections that every single person carries. The action is spectacular, the characters are heroic and monstrous in equal measure, and you can never prepare yourself for whatever bizarre travesties it will throw at you next. Stephen King even cited Preacher as being a big inspiration behind his surreal fantasy masterpiece The Dark Tower, and it’s not hard to see how. It’s the perfect blend of gritty western, dark fantasy, shock humor and over the top horror-fueled action sequences. It’ll definitely send you through an unforgettable trip through the wild west.
Things take a major turn for Jesse when he accidentally gets possessed by the spirit of a supernatural entity called Genesis, the cursed child born out of the forbidden fornication between an angel and a demon. The entity contains the essence of absolute goodness and absolute evil, fusing together with Jesse’s soul and granting him unimaginable power. Now a force to be reckoned with, Jesse makes himself quite a few dangerous enemies and he doesn’t plan to let his newfound powers go to waste. He has a bone to pick with the scum of the earth and plans to use his powers to make amends with his past trauma and regrets. Most of all, he has it out for God more than anyone else for allowing all the chaos and evil in the world to spiral out of control in the first place. He goes on a journey to find God and give him a piece of his mind.
Along his journey, Jesse reunites with his ex-girlfriend Tulip and befriends an Irish, vampire junky named Cassidy. Tulip is a hotheaded gunslinger that was raised by her tough-as-nails yet affectionate, sharpshooting father who taught her how to hunt, stand on her own two feet and take no nonsense from anybody. She’s a wild tomboy with a lot of heart and has quite a bit of catching up to do with Jesse after he abandoned her for unknown reasons at the peak of their relationship.
After hearing Jesse’s story about fusing with Genesis and going on a mission to find God with his newfound powers, Cassidy happily joins the preacher on his quest while Tulip works on patching things up with Jesse after learning of the dark secrets behind his sudden disappearance. Cassidy also has some demons of his own to work out as he battles with alcoholism, drug addiction and a wavering moral compass on top of never being able to walk around in broad daylight because of the curse of vampirism placed on him as a young boy. Despite their numerous imperfections, the three come together in hopes of finding God. Not in the metaphorical sense, but to kick his ass for abandoning his throne in heaven, neglecting his duties and letting humanity drown in the cesspool he created with his own hands. The three outlaws seek to set things right through very unsavory means.
Jesse, Tulip and Cassidy encounter some incredibly disturbed villains along the way, including Jesse’s own family of backwater devils that include a tyrannical religious grandmother obsessed with maintaining pure bloodlines, a violent psychopath that brutally murdered anything Jesse dared to love as a child, and a crazed hillbilly with a fetish for farm animals. Then there’s a secret religious order akin to the Illuminati called The Grail, which includes the outrageous Klaus Starr whose violent antics along with his obsession of trying to use Jesse’s powers to fulfill his own plans usually end up leaving him with a few missing limbs and making a mockery of himself. There’s even a KKK loonie that built himself a giant sex doll made out of the severed, bloody body parts of butchered livestock. The violence is so outrageously gruesome that it somehow manages to be equally horrendous and hilarious. A lot of the dark and shocking moments in this series are delivered with heavy undertones of black comedy, making you laugh, cringe and gag all at the same time. It’s a wild ride that pulls no punches, and the scares are absurdly creative if nothing else.
The three protagonists have a lot of depth to them, every villain is a wicked bastard and the side characters all have their own heartwarming struggles to overcome. The most notable minor character that I was rooting for from beginning to end was a mentally disabled boy nicknamed Assface. The boy idolized Kurt Cobain to an unhealthy degree and unfortunately, he thought that following in his idol’s footsteps by blowing his head off with a gun would earn himself the love and admiration he always wanted. After his failed suicide attempt, he’s left with a gaping hole that continuously oozes fluid from his now deformed face, which earned him the nickname Assface. Instead of letting his deformity bring him down, he goes on his own personal journey of self-discovery and finding comfort and acceptance through rock music. This is just one of many touching tales throughout the series.
Preacher is outrageous, shocking, and it isn’t afraid of offending anybody with its sharp-edged humor, but it also captures the personal flaws and imperfections that every single person carries. The action is spectacular, the characters are heroic and monstrous in equal measure, and you can never prepare yourself for whatever bizarre travesties it will throw at you next. Stephen King even cited Preacher as being a big inspiration behind his surreal fantasy masterpiece The Dark Tower, and it’s not hard to see how. It’s the perfect blend of gritty western, dark fantasy, shock humor and over the top horror-fueled action sequences. It’ll definitely send you through an unforgettable trip through the wild west.
Read
December 30, 2018Священик із тяжким минулим(ТМ), його колишня дівчина, вампір і певна сутність-плід любові янгола й демона, яка демонструє, що не все у світі чорно-біле, рушають на пошуки бога, аби поставити йому кілька базових питань із серії “як бог допускає оце от усе”. Це геть не моя трава, що стилістично, що тематично, тож я, правду кажучи, навіть не дуже розумію, як воно працює для тих, для кого таки працює: підозрюю, що працює якраз на контрасті між цими завищеними банальностями – і чорним гумором нижче пояса. Особисто мене весь цей шок-контент штибу однооких інцестуозних луїзіанських фермерів, виїбаних курей, сраколицих, відірваних членів і т.д. стомлював неілюзорно. Я не святенниця і не проти виїбаних курей у тексті! Але я – не цільова авдиторія цього тексту й не розумію, нахіба це все конкретно тут.
Переклад подекуди прямо дуже жвавий, скажімо: “Чого ти доїбавсь” – закінчення –сь! Прекрасний відповідник до “Why you fucking with me”! “Ох ти ж, їбать мене” – оце “Ох ти ж” взагалі супер, дуже складно знайти частки, які й роблять діалоги живими, а тут із цим віртуозно. “Хуй вони тут, друже, а не головні. Хай від’їбуться і лопочуть отими своїми величезними крилами десь подалі” – менш винахідливо, ніж оригінал (“They’re in charge of the square root of fuck all, mate. All they have to do is piss off and nonce around on those stupid great wings of theirs”), але синтаксично дуже круто (оце “Хуй [], а не” – дуже органічно звучить, а це непросто підібрати!).
Але переклад потребує редактора. Скажімо, в ньому більше критичної кількості монструозних синтаксичних підрядників штибу “Я просто кажу, що може бути, що це щось більше за те, з чим ми тут здатні самі впоратися...”, чи от (4 “що” у реченні! 4!!!): “І я подумала, що зможу обернути всю ту лють на щось таке, що треба мати, щоб убити іншу людину”
Подекуди кальки такі, що тільки переклад назад на англійську дозволяє зрозуміти ситуацію: скажімо, “Ні талану” – це ж, припускаю, “No luck”? Але ж у нас кажуть “Не пощастило” чи “Непруха”, а “Ні талану” спантеличує.
Чи от діалог: “Давай перейдемо до питання твого знайомства з Тюліп, ге?” – “Ти батожиш мертву коняку, друже. Я вже розповідав тобі все, що знаю”. Flog a dead horse – ідіома, якої в українській не існує, перший аналог, який спадає на думку – “знов за рибу гроші”. Лишати загадкову кальку точно не варто.
Ще от задумалася про те, що обсценна лексика для підсилення ефекту в англійській і слов’янських мовах синтаксично вмонтовується по-різному. Скажімо, розповідає сильно здивований свідок нападу вампіра: “А там отой гидомирний парубок кусає Гореса за шию і п’є його кляту кров” – мені оце “клята кров” виглядає неорганічно, йдеться ж не про характеристику крові, йдеться про те, що свідок сильно здивований ситуацією. Мені здається, в нас це реалізовується не прикметниками, а радше вставними частками: “кусає, бля, Гореса за шию” абощо? І отаких речей там багато. Але в цілому, звісно, мовна винахідливість перекладачів вражає, це nie lada wyzwanie.
Переклад подекуди прямо дуже жвавий, скажімо: “Чого ти доїбавсь” – закінчення –сь! Прекрасний відповідник до “Why you fucking with me”! “Ох ти ж, їбать мене” – оце “Ох ти ж” взагалі супер, дуже складно знайти частки, які й роблять діалоги живими, а тут із цим віртуозно. “Хуй вони тут, друже, а не головні. Хай від’їбуться і лопочуть отими своїми величезними крилами десь подалі” – менш винахідливо, ніж оригінал (“They’re in charge of the square root of fuck all, mate. All they have to do is piss off and nonce around on those stupid great wings of theirs”), але синтаксично дуже круто (оце “Хуй [], а не” – дуже органічно звучить, а це непросто підібрати!).
Але переклад потребує редактора. Скажімо, в ньому більше критичної кількості монструозних синтаксичних підрядників штибу “Я просто кажу, що може бути, що це щось більше за те, з чим ми тут здатні самі впоратися...”, чи от (4 “що” у реченні! 4!!!): “І я подумала, що зможу обернути всю ту лють на щось таке, що треба мати, щоб убити іншу людину”
Подекуди кальки такі, що тільки переклад назад на англійську дозволяє зрозуміти ситуацію: скажімо, “Ні талану” – це ж, припускаю, “No luck”? Але ж у нас кажуть “Не пощастило” чи “Непруха”, а “Ні талану” спантеличує.
Чи от діалог: “Давай перейдемо до питання твого знайомства з Тюліп, ге?” – “Ти батожиш мертву коняку, друже. Я вже розповідав тобі все, що знаю”. Flog a dead horse – ідіома, якої в українській не існує, перший аналог, який спадає на думку – “знов за рибу гроші”. Лишати загадкову кальку точно не варто.
Ще от задумалася про те, що обсценна лексика для підсилення ефекту в англійській і слов’янських мовах синтаксично вмонтовується по-різному. Скажімо, розповідає сильно здивований свідок нападу вампіра: “А там отой гидомирний парубок кусає Гореса за шию і п’є його кляту кров” – мені оце “клята кров” виглядає неорганічно, йдеться ж не про характеристику крові, йдеться про те, що свідок сильно здивований ситуацією. Мені здається, в нас це реалізовується не прикметниками, а радше вставними частками: “кусає, бля, Гореса за шию” абощо? І отаких речей там багато. Але в цілому, звісно, мовна винахідливість перекладачів вражає, це nie lada wyzwanie.
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March 10, 2012
I honestly do not understand why this series was so beloved. I found it dull and derivative, with inferior art-work and unremarkable writing. I tried reading several volumes, but not a one of them reached above a "1 star" rating, and I've long since forgotten which they were. My advice: give this one a pass and move on to something better, like "The Sandman", "Persepolis" or "The Unwritten".
UPDATE: Upon reading many of the reviews I think I understand a little better the root of this series' popularity. It's got swear words! It's got brutal and unnecessary violence! It's got racist & homophobic epithets! It's got an insultingly-streotypical portrayal of the American South/West/SouthWest that is rivaled only by the Family Guy episode "Boys Do Cry"! It's got insulting portrayals of religion, religious people, and religious figures! Oh how DARING! In short, it's a lazy, crass appeal to the adolescent. It's the sort of thing a High School student would write/draw, believing their ideas to be SO original, but which even small children would recognized as tired, cliched and lowest-common-denominator-approved. Again, if you're looking for a thoughtful examination of the supposed themes (religion, America, etc.), check out "The Sandman", or Michael Moorcock's "Von Bek" stories.
UPDATE: Upon reading many of the reviews I think I understand a little better the root of this series' popularity. It's got swear words! It's got brutal and unnecessary violence! It's got racist & homophobic epithets! It's got an insultingly-streotypical portrayal of the American South/West/SouthWest that is rivaled only by the Family Guy episode "Boys Do Cry"! It's got insulting portrayals of religion, religious people, and religious figures! Oh how DARING! In short, it's a lazy, crass appeal to the adolescent. It's the sort of thing a High School student would write/draw, believing their ideas to be SO original, but which even small children would recognized as tired, cliched and lowest-common-denominator-approved. Again, if you're looking for a thoughtful examination of the supposed themes (religion, America, etc.), check out "The Sandman", or Michael Moorcock's "Von Bek" stories.
June 25, 2010
5.0 to 5.5 stars. Smart, original, very well written and a ton of fun to read. Garth Ennis is a master. Highly recommended!!
September 4, 2016
I guess one of the reasons why I started to read Preacher was to see how it compared with the TV series. I wanted to give AMC's new show a run. However, Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg do not have the leeway of adapting much of the content that is in Garth Ennis's crazy world to television. The show is ok to me, but the graphic novel is so much more. What can you really say about it? Psycho, dark, hilarious, brutal, disgusting, and excellent are some of the first things that come to mind when describing this. You have to read it to believe it. Volume 1 gives us a nice backstory of what's to come. I'm certain that I will be enjoying the ride.
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