The Filth 3

Spartacus is a very interesting character. He creates chaos wherever he goes, but he has a mind full of legitimate reasons as to why he does the things he does. I like this comment he makes to Slade after he's given the president a boob job, "That's the great thing about democracy: ANYONE can be president." I like this because he's trying to redefine what it means to be someone "important" in our society (or any human society, now or in the future). He's showing us that the president is a person too, just like any of us, he makes stupid choices and does stupid things, but yet his choices change the way we (the public) think about him -- the choices we make don't necessarily change what people think about us because our choices aren't broadcast for the entire country to scrutinize. Although, there is a reason the president is the president and he/she is supposed to be someone that we trust enough to make the right choice for the greater good. We expect him to live up to our expectations and take care of us, and when he fails us we lose our respect for him and in that regard we also lose our patriotism. Also, I might add how Dmitri shoots the president and claims, “Another asshole will take his place and no one will smell the difference.” Dmitry isn’t human and is obvious with his dislike for humanity and how we choose to run things, “Humanity can eat my SHIT” (194).

Another thing Spartacus says to Slade, "In the END, humans always pick themselves up, ORGANIZE into roles and start piling up the building blocks of CULTURE again." What an interesting way of looking at our society or all societies for that matter. By ‘culture’ I wonder what he’s referring to…is Spartacus referring to the way we live our lives: the way we grow up, the way we learn, the way we enjoy ourselves? Or is he referring to the way humans have an innate sense of community and how the lack-there-of is devastating for us to imagine? Also, there are a few things that lead me to believe Spartacus isn’t human; one would be this statement he makes as if he’s not a part of humanity and is almost disgusted with our ritualistic ways of creating ‘culture’ and the second would be how he died in a previous section of the novel, but appears now as if nothing happened to him. Are there many Spartacus Hughes? Or is he simply an immortal, or is he real at all? Maybe he’s just a hologram.

So, I’m also wondering why it is that the women in the comic all talk like this, “Oh aye. Time tay get tay fukk.” (195). Well, not all the women, but all the women involved with The Hand. I don’t understand it, the guys and even the chimp talk normal. I doubt all the women are supposed to be from a different country and this is merely an accent. They sound less educated than the men. Also, I notice how most of the scenes involving women from The Hand involve sex. The women do other things, but I’ve noticed at the beginning of many scenes when the women are introduced they have sex, and then they go do some hardcore shit. The men are seen time and time again, but they don’t have sex (with the exception of the Tex Porneau scenes) unless there is a woman present. The women are only present once in a while and they’re always doing some kinky sex scene. For example: the first scene between Greg (or Slade) when the woman from The Hand is in his shower, the scene with the woman giving oral sex to the richest pervert, the scene with the woman blindfolding Slade, and another would be the woman interrogating Anders Klimakks. The women’s roles in this story are really baffling to me, are they helping or are they supposed to be there for certain unspecified reasons? Are we, as readers, supposed to get the impression that they’re not important at all in this futuristic society except to procreate, give sexual pleasure, and helpt the men when it may be necessary? I see women in the porno scenes on the TV and being almost nothing more than sexual toys…although one exception would be Greg’s neighbor who watches him from her window.

The Filth 2

What an imagination these authors have...The sex is incredible, the idea of one man's genes becoming spread throughout all of mankind is crazy to think about. The giant sperms attacking all the woman and the man behind the madness was astonishing. It's all so surprising because of the ridiculousness (is that a word) of the concepts. Doctor Von Vermun is an interesting character; I was surprised to find out that he was in fact a villain instead of a hero. The idea of a weapon of increased time being created is out of this world. It would be the ultimate weapon; forcing people to age at an alarming rate to the point where they die of age or other diseases. It's scary to think about. One thing that really stuck out to me -- although I'm not sure how important it is but -- the way the comic fuzzes out the men's genitalia but women's breast are constantly displayed. Is this because if the dick was actually drawn the story itself would be considered pornography? Not that I really want to see drawn cocks, but I think it's unfair for the illustrators to display the women and not the men. The world in which this graphic novel is created is very different from ours in the sense that sex and drugs rule everyone’s existence (or so it seems) yet it is still a very male dominated society. Not that I'm saying our society isn't ruled by these factors, but it's not nearly as prominent and accepted like it is in this story. For example, the cop name Nick smokes crack (on and off the job) and although his partner doesn't do it himself he accepts it as a normal thing to do. In our society, (well around this area at least, I'm not sure what it's like in major cities like LA or New York, but I imagine it's not exactly like this) chances are the cop would try to hide it more. Also, he mentions it's a recreational drug and partnered with his apparent 'freedom' in engaging in smoking crack it's legal in the land where this takes place. I got a glimpse of the acceptance of substance abuse and drug use at the beginning of the comic with the dope smoking chimp, but it escalated into crack. It's surprising that it's even imaginable that a society would be accepting of something so corrupt and life damaging. I understand smoking weed (I don't even consider it a drug) but crack is another thing; most people can't live a functioning life when they're addicted to it, and half the time they don't live from the experience but die from it. Weed, on the other hand doesn't kill people it simply makes people unmotivated.Back to the idea of the male dominated society...the women are targeted when Tex Porneau (these names are hilarious by the way) unleashes his new "star" of his new or "ultimate" porno. Once again I see that women are thought of to be important or useful when considering procreating and discarded as mere sex objects when procreating is not the object of the man's desire. As this 'text' shows, men can provide sexual pleasure for other men but what they can't do is repopulate the world without women. I feel that obviously - based from the various (and obsessed almost) 'anal' references in Tex's movie titles - he views women this way (good for certain things because he obviously prefers anal). Although, our society is male dominated and so is this one, homosexual sex between men is looked down upon, and here it is almost preferred (although, on a side note, the porno magazines and movies have all involved women and men so this sudden change is odd and I'm not sure what to think). I also don't really get what Tex's ultimate agenda is. Why does he want the world to be full of Anders Kilmakks? Or does he even realize that this is what he's doing?

The Filth

The Filth reminds me of The Ticket That Exploded in the way that it's cut up and takes the reader on a turn without warning, as well as the way it's provocative and violent. Yet, this time around I'm more distracted by the drawings and how they illustrate the story. Sometimes it takes me longer to read a page in this book than other books because I spend a lot of time looking at the pictures and what's going on inside of them. The concepts are really interesting too, especially the idea that the Dr. Soon created a "terrarium" of sorts to host tiny cooperative organisms to persuade viruses (or other diseases such as cancer) to help the body instead of kill. Another interesting part was the superhero part and how the person in the comic is actually reading the comic he was previously a part of. I think it's interesting that the characters Adam and Eve have the names they have and how Adam is very adamant about breaking the barrier between their world and the world of the person who is writing their lives. I like the concept that the people in the comic book are real people yet forced to live a life written or "prescribed" for them. The bouncing back and forth between the different scenes and different situations going on is also very interesting and different to think about. Officer Slade and his battles with amnesia (if he's even suffering from it and The Hand is really just manipulating him), I like the professional assassin who's a dope smoking chimp (I think this character is interesting and I look forward to seeing more of him throughout the story)...The superhero part of the comic is very cliché because most comic books are superhero comic books, yet this time they're not necessary battling a super villain but their whole existence that takes place on paper and with words and illustrations - it's also ironic and somewhat predictable that S.O. is obsessed with going into the oversphere even though he's not entirely sure it exists. There's so many contradictions that I find it a bit hard to wrap my mind around it, and the bouncing between situations and characters without warning is also a bit confusing - yet as I read on the characters cross paths and the scenes make more sense (in that I can comprehend them easier) as the story continues. I'm curious to find out what happened to put S.O. on the other side -- he is now disabled and unable to go back to his life as he once knew it, he's forced to read the comics involving his life. I like how he explains that there's other volumes or other stories involving him and Eve but in a provocative and "sick sex situations I've never even thought of," yet he admits to watching them because, "it's the closest I can get...to how it once felt to love you." Although he never had these sick sexual experiences with her, the only way for him to feel the love he used to is by being turned on by her loss of control and decency? This is weird and hard to understand, but interesting because it is so hard to understand. I can't wait to read more.

RiboFunk

So, this is one of the more interesting books we've read in this class so far...I think anyway. I find it interesting because of the way it's broken up into different stories. I'm a bit confused by how they're all related, although I know all the characters are apart of the same world which I'm also pretty sure is our world perhaps just in the future. I'm drawn to the idea of multiple species that interact, like splices and humans. I'm also drawn to the idea of changing oneself (bodymods) for multiple different reasons. One character, for example (the PI who is in more than one story) is required to have bodymods if he wants to continue working for the Protein Police. The descriptions of all the different types of people and creatures is, at some times, unimaginable because of the boundaries the author pushes. It's hard for me to picture a human with jaguar and fish qualities, or "tattoons" that move. I like how the many different characters choose different things to do to their bodies, and how it's almost unthought of to not have body mods done. In Brain Wars the person writing the letters mentions to his "host mother" that his love interest has less than 20% bodymods and that this is something impressive. For a person to be happy being the way they are without artificial changes to their body is hard to come by in this time; let alone in a time where people can make themselves run faster, learn faster, climb up buildings, have leopard patterned skin, or change themselves into roaches (although this seems to be looked down upon as a race that is disgusting and I agree, who would want to be a bug?) - but even in our days people do things to enhance their bodies (although it's mostly for physical appearances and often done not for oneself but for the image portrayed through our society that becomes harder and harder to reach.

The revolution of the splices is something I saw comming. It's only natural for a independent thinker kept in captivity and slavery to dream and fantasize about being free. After reading "Little Worker" I was surprised at how complacent she was with her life style, although that was all she knew, she didn't have any thoughts or feelings about being free. As the book continued though I began to see, especially in "The Bad Splice" that not all splices where treated as well as little worker was and had they been treated better this need for revolution may not have arised. But, even given respect and treated well, a being cannot be satisfied with their life as a servant. The former PI (I cannot seem to find his name since he talks in the first person and is hardly every addressed by his name) even grasps this concept when Graham-Ballard becomes upset and says, "Creatures with up to forty-nine percent human genes are property?" (157) He is doing his job, but the morality of slavery becomes something that he starts to question; afterall, what right do humans have to rule over a creature simply because they're not considered human?