Prophet (volume 1, issues 21-26)
Prophet is an unconventional superhero character created by Rob Liefeld – a prominent comic writer and artist and co-founder of Image Comics. Prophet first appeared in Youngblood #2 in July 1992, and shortly after that spawned its own standalone title, which however lasted only eleven issues. This was followed by the second, eight-issue series, written by Chuck Dixon in 1995 and by a single one-shot released in 2000, so just 20 issues were published in total.
The story evolves around John Prophet, a poor and homeless man living in the World War II era, who volunteers to participate in the medical experiment of a time-travelling scientist from the future, who transforms Prophet into a super-soldier. Prophet is then placed into stasis for many decades, with a plan to revive him in the distant future to help fight the evil Disciples. Eventually found by Youngblood, Prophet awakens disoriented in a future world he does not recognise and does not belong to.
What is worse, Prophet finds out that he had been awakened from stasis several times without his knowledge and used as a highly effective yet mindless super weapon in the Vietnam War. Prophet feels responsible for the hideous things that he was forced to do, even though he doesn’t have any recollection of them. This deep sense of guilt and remorse takes him on a spiritual journey to discover who he really is.
The original Prophet was a classic reflection of the 90s comics: full of muscle-bursting men, anatomically incorrect women, uber-large weapons and fountains of blood. The action was everything and the storyline was convoluted at its best and utterly incomprehensible at its worst.
It came then as quite a surprise, when Image Comics announced at the 2011 New York Comic Con, that Prophet will be one of the five titles from Liefeld’s Extreme Studios comics which were earmarked for a relaunch.
Rather than starting anew with the issue #1, the rebooted series, written by Brandon Graham and illustrated by Simon Roy, picked up on the numbering of the original series and launched with the issue #21 in January 2012.
The new series takes place roughly 10,000 years in the future. Brandon Graham says: ‘In the first issue, Prophet has to blend into an alien city and find his contact to get orders. The city is in fact a living spaceship that died after it landed and is slowly rotting away. The aliens that live in it are a fermentation-based caste society.’ he continues: ‘In the second issue, in order to cross a desert, Prophet joins an alien caravan where each of these giant alien beasts feeds off the waste of the creature in front of it until eventually the waste becomes a refined product that they go around selling. Prophet gets mixed up in an assassination plot of the caravan leader.’ The first story arc also reveals that there are now dozens, if not more, Prophet clones scattered throughout the universe.
New Prophet features a four-man rotation of artists: apart from Simon Roy, who drew the first three issues of the reboot, the comic is illustrated by Farel Dalrymple, Giannis Milonogiannis and Brandon Graham, who illustrated one issue himself.
The new Prophet it unrecognisable – it has completely departed from the adolescent’s dream-like 90s original and presents instead a more sophisticated and grown-up version of John Prophet and his universe. The reboot, which was a complete success, shows the startling possibilities that emerge when an old, well established but perhaps a bit stale, comic character is paired with a young, inventive creator. The re-launched Prophet received largely very positive reviews from critics and fans of the original series alike. The editors of Amazon.com even named the collected edition Prophet, Vol. 1: Remission (issues 21-26) the 5th best graphic novel of 2012.
The success of the rebooted Prophet proves time and again that the best way to revive an ailing franchise is to hand it over to the people who are good at their trade and give them carte blanche. Highly recommended.