Customer Reviews

Testament VOL 01 Akedah

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"the most assured and original project to emerge from Vertigo since SANDMAN." - Comic Buyer's Guide

"Make no mistake, The Greatest Story Ever Told continues right here?" - Grant Morrison

"A stunning, richly entertaining book!" - Robert Anton Wilson, co-author "The Illuminatus! Trilogy"

"Rushkoff is one of the great thinkers - and writers - of our time!" - Timothy Leary

"Impossible to put down... chock full of cool, forward-looking ideas. Grade: A" - VARIETY.COM

"Intriguing! Well worth the time to check out." - AIN'T IT COOL NEWS


Testament is a book about Humanity and Gods and the struggle between Evil and Good. The book moves seamlessly between three different times and planes of existence, which are Modern Present time (but it is set slightly in the future), Past Historical Biblical time, and the supernatural Realm of the Gods.

In the modern/future present time there are three major events taking place. One being the fact that the government requires that people have computer chips implanted in their bodies. The second is the emergence of artificial intelligence that has been created by a computer scientist but unfortunately has escaped from his computer into the Internet. The third event is a major corporation is beginning a move to usurp power by changing currency/money into a new very different form that I don't believe has been revealed yet but it sounds very spooky.

So basically there are college aged radicals who have refused to have the chips implanted and are living outside the law. One of these is the son of the creator of the computer chips, who when creating them had no notion that the government would actually use the chips beyond what he or most others believed was acceptable in a way I'll just say reminiscent of the Kent State Massacre on May 4 1970.

So what is taking place in the present events is a reflection of what had taken place in the Bible. Rushkoff does a few things here that I feel need mentioning, he shows us stories from the Bible but he doesn't either show them as or disregard their being sacred events, obviously he believes they are important because they are illustrations of the Gods attempts to influence humanity, but he tells both the modern and those past in a way that makes them both entertainingly modern, relevant, and human.

Basically the story jumps back and forth between what is happening "Now" and what happened in the Bible. Instead of Just God and Satan Rushkoff has Krishna the Hindu God on the side of good along with the Christian God or more specifically the Jewish God (because the comic only has to do with the old testament) and the Evil Gods I think are Egyptian, Hindu and third is Jewish. Like every character in the story the Gods are thankfully multidimensional that is to say they don't come across as 100 percent pure good or pure evil.

Douglas Rushkoff, uniquely qualified to write such a book, outside of comics might be consider a Futurist or a Media Guru, at least an expert on such topics in addition to Judaism, which he wrote a book on called "Nothing Sacred: The Truth About Judaism" I've seen him on panels on CNN and speaking at Disinformation counterculture conferences, he is a what most would considered a modern day Renaissance Man. He writes books on Ecstasy eating Ravers, advises the United Nations, plays keyboards in the radical group Psychic TV, and writes comic books.

A Great story that makes one think about what these stories may actually be and makes one question what is the current real world's spiritual significance.

My review is based on the first 9 issues I've read only once but am looking forward to rereading them again.

Testament feels good. You end up knowing the take is different than anything you've read. It's propositive and gets you thinking about new ways to handle the myth. However, it fails to close completely. It's like it's a great concept behind, but the implementation is somewhat not as good. The storytelling is good, but characters aren't so fleshed out.

In other words, read it, though it could've been much more polished.

Haven't seen the second part, maybe it shouldn't be split.

The Good: Intellectually challenging, and very intriguing. I really want to read more and find out what where this story is going. The writing is definitely literate. The art is excellent as well.

The Bad: It feels too much like the first third of a story. Primarily set up. Which is perfectly fine, since it's a collection of an ongoing comic book. However, after reading the entire thing there were more questions than answers, and my concern is that it might be unsatisfactory and turn off readers. It was kind of confusing. If I didn't know the Bible stories, I would be even more confused. The premise requires that you be familiar with the background material to begin with, and the hard balance is not having too much exposition to compensate. It's definitely high concept.

The Bottom Line: Ultimately, the question is, is it entertaining? I would say yes, so I definitely recommend this new book from Vertigo and hope that you would support this book as well. If it gets the chance to continue, I think the payoff will be well worth it.

There are certain works within the comic medium that serve as examples of storytelling that simply cannot be replicated in other mediums. Testament is one of those works. Juxtaposing and melding the classic biblical tales of the early Old Testament with a science fiction narrative relating extremely closely to the predicaments we face as a society today, author Douglas Rushkoff has created something jaw-droppingly unique that anybody claiming the title of intellectual should not ignore. This is a staggering work of religious/political fiction that reinforces the power of the Bible and it's continuing relevance even in this modern society while simultaneously illustrating the present and future evils of excessive government, corporate power, and even global unification. Simply put, this is fiction at it's boldest and most thought-provoking.

The stories of Testament are divided up as those of The Bible are. The classic tales of Eden, Abraham, Job, Lot, and others leading up to the epic final showdown of The Exodus are all portrayed in a straightforward and stylish manner while staggered with a narrative taking place in the near future that sees the old stories repeating themselves in a new time and place with different people playing the parts. In this case, the players are a group of revolutionaries protesting a government takeover where technology meant to help humanity has been repurposed to enslave them. This theme comes off as all too possible. Now every sci-fi fan is more than aware of the dangers of a self-replicating AI (an immortal being capable of viral behavior that processes superior thought at the speed of light and has no use for us: who seriously thinks creating this is a good idea?), but Rushkoff really took this notion to a new level when he combined it with the premise of a global currency replacing our current system of scarcity=value with abundance. But when that controlled abundance comes at the price of compliance, bending an entire population to your will becomes all too easy. Yay capitalism? The cast of characters also includes a population of gods from various cultures vying for relevance by interjecting themselves at opportune times into the narrative as it is written. This is done brilliantly from an art standpoint -where the gods often appear out of frame- in shots such as in the Garden of Eden where Astarte (also known as Isthar) ,upset along with other pagan deities at God's "prison" paradise for humanity, is seen sending her essence into the roots of the Tree of Knowledge while the Eye of Ra later becomes the snake that tempts Eve. Other times, the biblical and modern versions of the stories are told side-by-side with the deity representing the sins at work drawn in between the two. The ultimate goal of the more benevolent gods is to eventually become as one all-powerful faceless being and live up to the ideals we have of a truly omnipotent heavenly father. There is an interesting message there.

In spite of the biblical themes of this comic, I should probably warn that this is not necessarily written for your average Christian. On top of the political themes that are sure to anger and/or confuse some, those who don't give much thought to the extreme nature of the Bible (ever consider the fact that Moses was the first terrorist?) and prefer to think of it as something to be taken literally and revered blindly as it is portrayed by those looking to get into your wallet rather than a historical document to be studied objectively to extract metaphor and philosophical knowledge might want to pass. This comic is as R-rated as the Bible is. If I said it featured sex, incest, murder, nudity, prostitution, infanticide, rape, and all that good stuff, a lot of people would call it garbage. What they wouldn't want to hear, however, is that this is all taken directly from the Good Book itself. And just the first two books of it at that. However, enter this very adult graphic novel with an open mind and you will be rewarded with a new perspective on history, mythology, and politics, whether you like it or not.

The story of Testament was told in 22 issues and is available in four volumes, this being the first (issues 1-5). If the first arc of the series, "Abraham of Ur", does not put you on you rear end then you probably don't like thought-provoking works of art and it's your loss. If that doesn't describe you, then there's no good excuse not to give this a peek. The only real downside is that the series had to end at all. With so many more biblical stories yet to be told, I'd love to say that a sequel is forthcoming, but so far that isn't happening. As it stands, this is one of the most daring, interesting, and engrossing works of fiction in any medium and is really something that could only be entirely done in comic form. Don't expect to see Testament: The Motion Picture coming to the big screen anytime soon. The mainstream is simply not ready for this.

good job on the sending of the book. sorry for the late review!