Holy Terror [Hardcover]

Frank Miller (Author, Illustrator)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 11, 2011

There's a deadly menace somewhere in Empire City, and The Fixer only has until dawn to save his town - and civilization as we know it! Legendary Comics presents an all-out, head-busting, bone-breaking, neck-snapping brawl of a tale from Frank Miller, one of the most celebrated storytellers of the medium. Years in the making, HOLY TERROR features the desperate and brutal quest of a hero as he is forced to run down an army of murderous zealots in order to stop a crime against humanity.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 120 pages
• Publisher: Legendary Comics LLC; First Edition edition (October 11, 2011)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 193727800X
• ISBN-13: 978-1937278007
• Product Dimensions: 12 x 0.5 x 9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.3 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (76 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #192,946 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Frank Miller is one of the seminal creative talents who sparked the current gigantic sub-industry of motion pictures featuring comic book- initiated product. A sub-industry which had become a super-industry. This most profitable aspect of this millennium's film production, now producing an annual flow of box office profits in the Billions of dollars, was launched when Frank Miller's graphic novel re-take on the classic comic book hero, Batman, resulted in an entertainment industry-wide reconsideration of the genre in the deeper and darker vision Miller brought to it.

Miller re-defined the presentation of comic book characters and heroic fiction with his grand-daddy of graphic novels, "The Dark Knight." This revolutionary work
not only kicked off the series of Batman films based on his redefinition, but a craze for such material that has thrown dozens of such heroes into multiple film franchise heaven. Certainly chief among these has been Miller's uniquely classical take on superheroic narrative, "300," and his "Sin City" books, each of which entered motion pictures with historic successes, and each now in Miller's creative phase of achieving its highly-anticipated sequel. Miller's co-direction of "Sin City" has made him one of the hottest
directors... as well as a guiding creative force...for the new genre. Or one might say "super genre."

Miller's latest graphic novel, Holy Terror, is his first original graphic novel in ten years. Join The Fixer, a brand new, hard-edged hero as he battles terror in the inaugural release from Legendary Comics.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

207 of 264 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars Final Evidence In the "Frank Miller Has Lost It" Case (SPOILERS* September 30, 2011

By NazzNimrod

Format:Hardcover

Although I had some reservations about the subject matter compounded by the "quality" of Frank's recent work, there's so much he's done right (albeit more than 15 years ago) in comics that I have remained willing to give him another, then another, chance to make good on his early promise.

"Holy Terror" is puerile garbage of the lowest order. Miller's "art" has devolved from his last outings (hard to imagine!), and although the earliest pages are invested with some kind of experimental energy, they are also the least comprehensible in a book that makes little sense. But at least they have a spark, even if the actions depicted are near-impossible to follow and the writing/dialogue is shameful.

I assume these early pages were done almost a decade ago, when this was originally envisioned as a Batman vehicle for Miller to funnel his 9-11 anger into. Vengeful anger may not be the best motivation to tell a story, but those emotions have fueled some powerful art in the past. This isn't one of them.

This opening sequence has "Batman" (I read it this morning and cannot even remember what the lead's name was changed to after DC declined to publish it) pursuing "Catwoman" (did this character even get a name here?) after she commits a theft. They engage in a brutal extended acrobatic/arial battle, before becoming aroused and "Batman" admits he loves her - In what world does this make sense? They appear to have (or be ready to have, who can tell?) post-battle sex when a terrorist's nail bomb goes off, catching "Catwoman" in the leg.

Apparently Miller doesn't think we readers would understand that A NAIL IN THE LEG HURTS because she keeps talking about it for what seems like four pages. I assume Miller stepped on a nail sometime around the writing of this part and was surprised at how much it hurt. There's no other explanation for this much exposition regarding such a minor detail (which is never mentioned again, btw).

In the overall scheme of things it's a distraction that stalls the story so much that the reader is taken out of the moment entirely. That this book is full of moments like that ought to be a huge source of embarrassment for both writer and editor. Furthermore, the sexual psychology of the superhero psyche is well-trodden ground that has been done to death by more talented creators than Miller. His attempt here is just embarrassing and adds nothing to the story, as both characters are ciphers, devoid of personality.

After this, it looks like Miller stopped working on the book for a while and the next part has all the bad writing, art and editing of the first, but with none of the energy. We are introduced to a mysterious Jewish character who has known the terrorist act would happen but either no one would listen or he couldn't stop it or something (??) because he walks away and is never seen again, which makes you wonder WTF he was put in at all. How do I know he's Jewish? Star of David painted on his otherwise nondescript face, of course!

I forgot to mention that two fetish-dress sword-wielding Asian girls make an appearance in this scene as well, but they also leave without having any impact on the story, which again, makes you wonder why they are here. Of course, they may have wandered in from a 1987 Zalman King Skinemax fantasy vignette or Sin City - either is as likely as the other.

Finally the last part of the book, which one presumes was finished after Miller's Spirit movie bombed and his Flash Gordon movie reboot was canned by the studio, leaving little options for income but to finish this mess. I'm guessing the anniversary of 9-11 was looming and someone told him to wrap the book or he'd never see the rest of the advance.

The ending makes the first two parts look like a meticulously structured Shakespeare epic -it's THAT BAD. The heroes(?) end up in battling Jihadists in Al Quaeda's UNDERGROUND SECRET HEADQUARTERS! It's like Miller was channeling his 80's Batman for the first part of the book, but then switched to 60's TV Batman, with all the trappings of outlandish, personality-less minions and tilted panels.

Who edited this? Obviously no one, because this is an unrestrained ego cranking out a hackjob - with no regard for the reader, story, art or even page to page flow.

A colorist is credited, but, like many of Miller's recent books this is a B&W book - but with some spot reds this time! This color scheme has been used effectively in say, the Grendel comics, but here it's overuse only serves to distract from the story - leaving the reader wondering "why are 'Catwoman's' boot soles red while the rest of the page is black & white?

Also, what's up with all of the portraits scattered throughout the book? The original use - showing the losses of innocents is cliche, but tolerable. After that, they become nonsensical - as various political figures are mixed with (terrible) drawings of nobodies (at least as far as the story is concerned). I guess it fills space...

To Sum Up:

The writing and plotting is trite and insulting. Miller's phony-baloney "hard-boiled noir" style is the work of a deluded creator - it's so hackneyed that it stops the story instead of propelling it.

Miller's artwork has degenerated to the point that it seems to be an afterthought - while I appreciate that it's highly stylized, it shouldn't be so stylized as to fail to tell the story. It looks like there are panels that Miller spilled ink on, and rather than re-draw them, he just brushed it over most of the panel underneath. This is laziness, not an effective way to tell a story.

Overall, there are so many things that should have been fixed but were left in that the book unfolds like an FU to readers/victims who are left with the feeling that Miller & his publisher have so little respect for them that the content doesn't matter.

I assume the publishers were well-aware of the quality of the book and published it as an expensive (but slight) hardcover in order to take advantage of Miller's aging fanbase before word of mouth entirely kills sales. No one could read this and think it would've been published if it wasn't by Miller. And if someone else had done this, you'd never had heard of it...

This is putrid - another black mark on Miller's once-promising career, and the last work of his I'll be picking up. Avoid at all costs.

92 of 133 people found the following review helpful

1.0 out of 5 stars If Miller can't care you should not care October 1, 2011

By Veese

Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase

Be forewarned. The only reason to purchase this worthless mess is to see just how far Miller has sunk to the depths of madness and contempt.

Originally I was compiling a lengthy review of "HOLY TERROR" covering story, plot, etc. but realized this horrendous tomb was not worth any more effort on my behalf than Miller exhibited on any page of this book.

Like others here I am in total agreement that this is not only Frank Miller's worst output in his storied career, this is an example of Miller's contempt for the Graphic Novel genre and any audience his work is intended for. No matter if you are a fan of his work dating well back into the `80s (Daredevil, Dark Knight) as I was or a potential reader completely new and curious about the "controversial" 911 subject matter, Miller has delivered nothing less than a punch in the face and kick to the groin of anyone who pays to suffer through this utter garbage.

I use the word "contempt" for the genre and audience because this is a creator who has professed over and over his influence and mentor in comics has always been Will Eisner. Eisner was one of the most respected proponents, teacher even of comic book or graphic novel storytelling. Miller spits in the face of every rule here and you can't even defend he does so for some sort of artistic "voice" or groundbreaking storytelling advantage. Even the most hardcore fan of Miller's work will struggle to get through the story and decipher action on many, many pages.

I'm not offended by a "plot" centered around a superhero (Fixer/really Batman) avenging himself against a 911 terrorist attack, I'm talking about obvious lack of engagement between creator and reader and even creator and his own vision. Since Miller toiled on this mess for over a decade you can literally pinpoint the pages in the book where he went from having some sort of artistic vision in his mind and look for the book, stopped, walked away, came back worked a bit more stopped again and then years later just wanted to get the thing done and absolutely hacked out the majority of the second half. I bet Miller wrote and drew the last third of this book within this year and most of the final pages were completed weeks before this book saw print. It's just stunning how poorly even by Miller's simple black and white, blocky ink swipe style how bad this book looks. He doesn't even spot blacks or use any sort of contrast in the last half. It's there in the beginning ala Sin City, then just gone. It's simple open line art packed with pages and pages of panels with ugly head shots. And the dialog...beyond insulting to any level of intelligence.

So here is how one can imagine how this mess came to be. In 2001 Miller was so angry about the 911 attack in NYC that he had an idea for a story where a fictional alter ego tracks down and gets revenge on those that did us harm. He began work with a passion, gave up, eventually walked away from his then publisher DC Comics for assorted reasons and dropped the idea for some time. When it came time to finish it and collect a paycheck, he started up again but clearly had lost any form of passion or idea of where he was going with it. It didn't matter, he hacked it all out and the joke is on those of us dumb enough to pay for this abuse.

Had to select one star but really give it ZERO stars. AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

33 of 50 people found the following review helpful

2.0 out of 5 stars Powerful images, weak story September 23, 2011

By Pedro Roman

Format:Hardcover

Ten years have passed since the infamous September 11, 2001, when we stopped perceiving the world as a safe place. During this time, Frank Miller has been building this project, which was firstly described as a "Batman vs. Al-Qaeda."

The result is disappointing.

Holy Terror presents us with a simple and almost inexistent plot, attempting to show more than tell.

Miller has therefore created Holy Terror more as an album of striking images that as a story told in comic. The format of the book (landscape) supports this conclusion.

Of the 120 pages, over half contain just a picture or two. The dialogue is sparse. There is some symbolism and political criticism, but they are mainly irrelevant: they don't provide or give any depth to the story.

The imagery is very powerful. There are scenes that seem to have life and make us stop to savor them. Some narrative experiments work very well and the restricted and intelligent use of color is very effective.

There are pages I would bid high if auctioned on eBay. For many, these pictures may be reason enough to buy Holy Terror. However, the visual power of the album is not enough to compensate for its shortcomings and I fear that the negative reviews Miller received for his All Star Batman will be repeated with Holy Terror.