Spinner Rack: The Spectre (1992)

 

The Spectre

Run: 1992-1998 / 62 Issues & 1 Annual

Written by John Ostrander 

Drawn (mostly) by Tom Mandrake 

I've sat here for a few minutes with my fingers on the keyboard just trying to figure out how to start this post. It's hard to put into words just how complex, layered and brilliant this book is. Once again we join Jim Corrigan, 1930's tough guy cop, still attempting to come to grips with the choices his alter ego, The Spectre, makes. Being the "embodiment of God's wrath" and feeling compelled to avenge and punish all who've committed (or, in some cases, are about to commit) horrible acts against others, Jim has a tough time getting his human conscience to the surface in order to control Spectre.

Throughout the story Jim is faced with some pretty tough moral dilemmas in the face of what he believes God would, or would not, want him to do. The story makes a compelling case for a progressive view of Christianity, which is something you don't see too often. Ostrander's own views and questions about Christianity and his experience at seminary school really define the tone of this book and, unless you're an unquestioning sheep, chances are good he works through questions you may have had. It's amazing this book is twenty years old because many of the dilemmas tackled are still prevalent today. That says something about or society, I think.

All of this is cloaked in a non-traditional, often violent and gritty, story about a 1930's cop in a modern world with an extremely powerful alter ego. That's just a fluff, superficial description. There's just so much more to this story that my limited abilities as a writer are inadequate to properly detail it.

Tom Mandrake's art is similarly complex and dark. Lots of moody, appropriate style throughout. I can't imagine this book drawn by anyone else. 

To date I've read Spectre's adventures in Adventure Comics and the 31-issue (and one Annual ) Doug Moench-penned 1987 volume. While I'm pretty wild about both of those, Ostrander and Mandrake's volume is, to me, the definitive Spectre book. And while it does have elements from both of those books, it stands alone and tells what I believe to be the final Spectre story.