“Don’t.”

And the second of our essays on Rising Action. Check out Tim’s here.

Alex: Action – and its real-life twin, violence – have always been interesting in WicDiv. From the very first time we saw the gods’ powers used to kill, the presentation has been a mix of stylish (Matt Wilson’s incredible pop-art effects) and horrifying (those Ellis-esque exploded explorations of anatomy). Action, versus violence.

Even in the first issue, you see that balance shift. Luci killing the two snipers – a cool one-liner; the gore seen at a distance; arguably in self-defence, though we’ve just seen that Luci can melt the bullets before they touch her – is very different to her apparent murder of the judge. The latter also marks the first appearance of one of those recurring phrases WicDiv is so fond of:

Thanks to McKelvie’s facial expression, and Clayton Cowles’ lettering, there’s a lot of meaning mixed into that one word. It’s an instruction – the judge trying to maintain his authority as Luci rebels against it – but it’s also a plea – a desperate, fearful man begging to stop what comes next.

Alas.

The next time that phrase makes an appearance, at the end of the first arc, there’s a similar shift in balance. Issue #5 gives us our first god-on-god fight scenes, and they’re glorious if fairly brutal, but any pleasure you might get from them is subverted by the conclusion:

This ‘Don’t’ is pure fear, Luci’s mask slipping in the face of what’s coming. Again, the plea isn’t heeded.

Since then, when violence has reared its head, it has almost always been presented as something ugly. Minerva breaking Kerry’s body by slamming int into a wall. Baal needlessly pounding Morrigan’s face into the train tracks. Sahkmet straight-up eating her father. Even when Amaterasu flexes her powers in the skies of Japan, Urðr immediately calls out how inappropriate it is.

The nearest we get to a ‘fun’ fight is Baphomet versus Inanna, and once again that’s hard to enjoy given the conclusion, both in issue #11 and in its replay in #20.

And then along comes ‘Rising Action’, and the rules change.

I watched Die Hard for the thousandth time last weekend, and it got me thinking about the rules of action movies. In order to make the guy with the gun their hero, these films have to draw a line between ‘killing’ and ‘murder’. When John McClane empties a machine gun into Marco’s groin, he kills him. When Hans Gruber shoots Ellis in the head, he murders him.

‘Rising Action’ basically conforms to those rules. The Pantheon don’t actually kill one other, but when they crack each other’s skulls, that’s action. It’s all cool entrances and backflips and laser katanas. Despite them arguably playing the ‘bad guys’ this arc, that’s equally true of Ananke’s faction.

When Ananke starts using violence, though, that’s murder. Look at the way she flays Minerva’s parents in #21.

That’s fine, though, because that’s what the Big Bad is supposed to do. The action movie rules are intact, so the rest of the characters still get to indulge in their pyrotechnic laser shows, courtesy of the jaw-dropping skills Wilson has been showing off over in The Mighty Thor; and their one-liners and comebacks; and in one case their giant fetishistic Megazord with breast panels that pop open to reveal Fembot-style nipple guns.

It’s all fun and games, until someone loses an eye. And their arms. And… Jesus, I’m actually struggling to identify which severed body parts of Ananke’s are which.

And, naturally, this is where “Don’t” makes its reappearance. Not once, but three times: in Urðr’s plea for some fucking sanity, in Baal’s appeal to Laura’s better nature, and finally in one last terrified bit of begging from Ananke herself.

Alas.

In case the graphic body horror didn’t make it clear enough, or the reactions of Persephone’s peers (compare with Minerva and Amaterasu’s faces in #20 – there’s not too much difference), the “Don’t”s place Persephone’s actions firmly on the side of violence, not action. Murder, not killing. Big Bad, not action hero.

There’s none of the catharsis here that you get when John McClane drops Hans Gruber from the 30th floor of the Nakatomi Plaza. It’s an uneasy horrifying moment, even in the face of all the bad things we’ve seen Ananke do.

Especially because of those bad things, in fact. Because they firmly established the rules that let us enjoy the gods beating on one another, rules that Persephone pretty resoundingly breaks here, even though you as the reader might be inwardly wishing: Please. Don’t.