Lazarus Churchyard: The Final Cut

by Warren Ellis, D'Israeli

Collected volume of the Lazarus Churchyard series.

He's an ex-terrorist from the scrag-end of London with a connoisseur's understanding of every foul narcotic known to humanity. He's a four hundred year old derelict and hated by at least half the inhabitants of a poisoned and depopulated Earth. He's actually a bit of brain locked inside a body sculpted from intelligent plastic that renders him immortal. And all he wants to do is die. Meet Lazarus Churchyard, suicide-crazed unkillable junkie trapped in a future so disgusting that it makes him the good guy by default. Lazarus Churchyard was what happened when the British got their hands on cyberpunk. Tundra commissioned two sequel books to the original 40-page story -- which included stories not illustrated by ur-LAZ artist D'Israeli -- which were collected into a trade paperback in 1992. Lazarus Churchyard: The Final Cut sets things right and supplants the long-out-of-print earlier edition by bringing together the core stories by Warren Ellis and D'Israeli, and finishing the collection with a brand-new story created especially for this book.

Genres: Comics, Graphic Novels, Fiction, Science Fiction, Graphic Novels Comics, Fantasy, Science Fiction Fantasy

128 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1993

About the author

Warren Ellis is the award-winning writer of graphic novels like TRANSMETROPOLITAN, FELL, MINISTRY OF SPACE and PLANETARY, and the author of the NYT-bestselling GUN MACHINE and the “underground classic” novel CROOKED LITTLE VEIN, as well as the digital short-story single DEAD PIG COLLECTOR. His newest book is the novella NORMAL, from FSG Originals, listed as one of Amazon’s Best 100 Books Of 2016.

The movie RED is based on his graphic novel of the same name, its sequel having been released in summer 2013. IRON MAN 3 is based on his Marvel Comics graphic novel IRON MAN: EXTREMIS. He is currently developing his graphic novel sequence with Jason Howard, TREES, for television, in concert with HardySonBaker and NBCU, and continues to work as a screenwriter and producer in film and television, represented by Angela Cheng Caplan and Cheng Caplan Company. He is the creator, writer and co-producer of the Netflix series CASTLEVANIA, recently renewed for its third season, and of the recently-announced Netflix series HEAVEN’S FOREST.

He’s written extensively for VICE, WIRED UK and Reuters on technological and cultural matters, and given keynote speeches and lectures at events like dConstruct, ThingsCon, Improving Reality, SxSW, How The Light Gets In, Haunted Machines and Cognitive Cities.

Warren Ellis has recently developed and curated the revival of the Wildstorm creative library for DC Entertainment with the series THE WILD STORM, and is currently working on the serialising of new graphic novel works TREES: THREE FATES and INJECTION at Image Comics, and the serialised graphic novel THE BATMAN’S GRAVE for DC Comics, while working as a Consulting Producer on another television series.

A documentary about his work, CAPTURED GHOSTS, was released in 2012.

Recognitions include the NUIG Literary and Debating Society’s President’s Medal for service to freedom of speech, the EAGLE AWARDS Roll Of Honour for lifetime achievement in the field of comics & graphic novels, the Grand Prix de l’Imaginaire 2010, the Sidewise Award for Alternate History and the International Horror Guild Award for illustrated narrative. He is a Patron of Humanists UK. He holds an honorary doctorate from the University of Essex.

Warren Ellis lives outside London, on the south-east coast of England, in case he needs to make a quick getaway.

Reviews

[Rick · Rating 4 out of 5]

The prolific and popular Warren Ellis, creator of Transmetropolitan, Planetary, Red, and numerous other titles, began his first ongoing series, Lazarus Churchyard, in 1991 for the short-lived Blast! magazine. In 1992, Atomeka (via Tundra) released a three-issue series quickly followed by a collection of the entire run illustrated by D'Israeli that featured the vaguely cyberpunk eponymous character. After a "plasborging" experiment replaced roughly 80 percent of his body with an intelligent, evolving plastic, Churchyard can react in 0.132 of a second to any situation and adapt accordingly. Additionally, the plastic processes toxins of all kinds, essentially granting him immortality. The tales open some 400 years after the experiment with the weary Churchyard longing to die. While at times clumsily written, Lazarus Churchyard successfully and entertainingly showcases many of Ellis's literary tropes such as transhumanist themes and biting socio-political commentary. Though much of the material covered later became commonplace, in 1992 there was nothing else quite like it.

[Luke Kondor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Proof that Warren Ellis came out of the womb slinging pathos-riddled sardonic sci-fi.

Paired up with D'Israeli's idiosyncratic flair and you've got something that feels oddly fresh, even thirty years later.

[BellaGBear · Rating 4 out of 5]

very very weird, but also kinda cool. This is not a comic easy to get in to though. I mainly got through it because I really loved Transmetropolitan, Vol. 1: Back on the Street and the rest of the series.

But if you like creepy and you like Warren Ellis and weird sci-fi this is really the book for you!

[furious · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ellis's first major comics work. You can see the through-line clearly, he sets up many of his favorite tropes & recurring character-types. A lot of this is revisited in Desolation Jones, as well. The treat here, for the US reader, is D'Israeli. Great cartoony art that is reminiscent of Marc Hempel / Brendan McCarthy.

[Andrew · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an early Warren Ellis work. Very raw & chaotic. Pretty funny, at times, though very dark.
The art, by D'Israeli, is quite good.
Worth reading, if you're an Ellis fan and you want a quick fix of weird dystopian SF.

[Lawrence · Rating 3 out of 5]

https://gnomeship.blogspot.com/2020/0...

[Daniel Powers]

Very dark, but beautiful.
This is the type of legendary story which I love. It has an immortal quality to it, mythic and never ending just like Lazarus’s life.

[Brenton · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lazarus Churchyard was Warren Ellis' answer to cyberpunk, according to his foreword. Not wishing to relegate himself to what he considered, at that point, a dead genre whose "dulling bones [were] being picked over", Ellis either disregarded or re-imagined many of the tropes of cyberpunk while doing what he does best: running pell-mell with the outrageous possibilities that face us, culturally and technologically, in the near(far) future.

Early works by any author often lack a particular quality of refined sophistication that seasoned experience brings, but they make up for it with a raw, eager wildness of spirit, like the throes of a newborn animal that tests its gangly legs with a few enthusiastic, if clumsy, leaps. This is Laz; being one of Ellis' earliest original creations, it is not perfect, but it burns bright with fascinating, bizarre ideas. One can see Laz as a test vehicle for things that Ellis would later do with Transmetropolitan and more.

I'll note that Lazarus Churchyard also contains what is, thus far, one of my favorite ghost stories of all time. "Lucy" is far from conventional, yet operates with sublime effectiveness as a tragic late-night bar room tale with morbid overtones. If for nothing else, pick up Lazarus Churchyard: The Final Cut and read the "Lucy" chapter on a lonely, overcast evening, perhaps with some low-volume radio static in the background...

[Owen Watts · Rating 5 out of 5]

I was 13 when Lazarus Churchyard was reprinted in the Judge Dredd Megazine. I was far too young for it - it made no sense to me and was as brutal as it was bewildering. It spoke of a cavernously confusing future - of deep and terrible apathy - but I thought it looked cool as fuck. D'Israeli became my artgod - and his ruined and nasty characters and environments I longed to replicate. Reading it now 13 years later in a handsome Image volume (printed earlier in 2001 actually) given to me as a birthday gift by my oldest friend Robbo - I find it's not as dense after all. The stories, whilst slightly "it's the 90s and this is a dark adult comic fuck all you guys" gratuitous, is still brilliantly inventive and compelling - and D'Israeli's art - although not as polished as it is now is still startlingly unique. He even manages to sneak Fishpaste in. Which I get. There's still an evil mystery to this distant future - these hidden edges make Lazarus's character shine through and it makes me yearn to dive into the hideously off future of Ellis' Transmetropolitan which shamefully I've read very little of. Very happy to own this. I think I now have everything D'Israeli's done in trade form. ...soon I will build a half-man, half-graphic novel homunculus AND WE WILL TAKE OVER THE GLOBE.

[D.M. · Rating 3 out of 5]

I have a pretty low tolerance for science fiction, and there's no mistaking that's what Lazarus Churchyard is. There's normally just so much cyber-this and that-plasm I can take before I toss a book aside, but Ellis manages to put just enough here to keep me going. He never relies on the cyberpunk format to dictate the direction of the story, but follows the main character through his travails...which are caused by the cyberpunk world he lives in. This isn't epic fiction, or even classic comics, but it is a fun, strange, fairly violent ride in the vein of 2000AD, with some striking art in the mix. Ellis wears his influences proud and plain, so readers shouldn't be too surprised at his lifts from Hunter Thompson or William Gibson or anyone else along the way.
Though the book is credited to Ellis and D'Israeli, also included here is a bit of work from Garry Marshall, Gary Erskine, Steve Pugh, Phil Winslade, Woodrow Phoenix and an uncredited page from Duncan Fegredo.

[Michael · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm surprised it took me so long to find a copy of this. Laz is a great Ellis character, and it's very obvious that this work would be the basis for all of his later work. Here, Ellis was unleashed. It's a great way to start as a writer. The Hunter S. Thompson references are obvious, but in keeping with the counter culture post-cyberpunk narrative.

[Matt Piechocinski · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this early work by Ellis, but sometimes, his ideas are really out there, and I kept finding myself having to go back and reread what the hell was actually going on. I found it kind of distracting. But, the Lazarus character is pretty neat.

[Tom · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book, and I reread it every year or so.

Taking place in a desolate future, a man who cannot die desperately tries to find a way to.

I'm not revealing anymore...READ THIS BOOK!

[Paul Grimsley · Rating 5 out of 5]

this was the book that hipped me to warren ellis -- it is a cult classic; fucking amazing art and something that one read lodged in my head and had me waiting for years until the trade appeared.

[Christopher · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very fun and funny. I much enjoyed the art at well.

[Mayank Agarwal · Rating 2 out of 5]

Just didn't get the humor and the punk art was not to my taste.Did liked the plot and the main character now only if i could understand what he was trying to say it would have been fun.

[K.Q. · Rating 3 out of 5]

A perfect proto-Transmetropolitan.

[Camyluna · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Lucy's Drowning" still breaks my heart.