Transmetropolitan

Title: Transmetropolitan
Writer: Warren Ellis
Artist: Darick Robertson
Published: 1997 - 2002
Genre: Futuristic, humour, somewhat horrid.
Pages: 60 x ~23 pages, plus some extra stuff


Transmetropolitan. Yes.

I first started reading Transmet back in 2007, but then stopped as I moved to England. Now, couple of weeks ago, I moved to Espoo, and the comic was handy, so I re-read the first ~30 issues, and the rest for the first time.

Transmetropolitan is about a journalist called Spider Jerusalem, who writes a popular column into a big city newspaper. He hates it there, but he can't write anywhere else. Along for the ride are his filthy assistants, first assistant-become-bodyguard Channon Yarrow, and second assistant Yelena Rossini. They hate him, but since they know he's doing the right thing, they stick by him.

What's the right thing, then? Going against the current president, and when it turns out that the new president is even worse, making his life hell. So, it's about politics and presidents and journalism and what people in power (at least think they) can get away with. And what they're willing to do to keep the power. I'd guess the comic was based on the W administration, if it had not been started a couple of years before him. Art imitates life, or life imitates art?

But it's also about the City, and its people, in a futuristic world in America, which doesn't seem too far fetched, scarily enough. Hence the 'somewhat horrid' -part. There are people who are transitioning to be aliens, people who take weekend breaks as dolphins, reservations for cultures and kingdoms gone. And there's people dying needlessly, children selling their bodies for money, and two-headed cats.

And it's about Spider, his thoughts, attitude, willingness to try and do the right thing, and his drug abuse. It's a scary and extremely funny look into the future, written exquisitevely by Ellis and drawn gorgeously by Robertson. And if I were a man, I'd shave my head, get a spider tattooed on it, and dress like Spider. Just because I could.


"I hate it here. I hate the way it smells (except when you get into a fully residential quarter where people are predominantly first-gen American: the way people express their culture in their cooking is one of the few good reasons for being alive).

"I hate the way it looks (except for the weird beauty that hits you in the eye every other second). I hate the way it thinks (except when it buys this newspaper). I hate the things it does to itself (except when it lets me do to them).

"I hate the way it loves me, and I hate the way it makes me feel.

"I hate it here... but God help me, I can't imagine living anywhere else."