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| Issue 23, "The Butterfly Collector"
Writer: Grant Morrison
Summary: Now an extra-dimensional character pops in. Under Case's artwork, Red Jack was my favorite villain for the year. Jack lives in a very large house, which is strangely built and has no windows. He stole Rhea to marry her, and lives on pain and agony, especially that of butterflies, of which millions are pinned to the endless walls of his house (hence the name, "the Butterfly Collector"). The next scene features the Chief and Josh looking at the Lorenz Attractor (Read _Chaos_ by James Gleick for more information. Rather nice stuff). The Chief introduces a new character to DP: Dorothy Spinner, a super- psychic ape-faced child who can create things from her mind, who will become extremely involved in the book. (Actually, Dorothy appeared in Issue 14, and predates Morrison's arrival -ed.) Rebis visits his/her (hir? hem?) er, Eleanor's boyfriend and we discover that Rebis has an infatuation with recursion and dolls :-). This scene is very touching and rather upsetting if you're into character development. Morrison has been accused of lacking in the characterization department. I agree that he could do more, especially if the scenes are going to be like this.
Meanwhile... More teasers for the Brotherhood of Dada show up. We are introduced to Holly, who wakes up on the beach and a big creature who looks NOTHING like the Dada Star of Artistic Symbolism grabs her for the Brotherhood (more on this later). One of Jane's personalities (or is that Janes' personalities...) discovers who took Rhea Jones and transports the DP there after a rendezvous. [note: Jane uses the cut-up technique to discover the identity of Rhea's kidnapper. Morrison's been reading Burroughs again... -ed.] After they enter, Rebis, Cliff and Jane are separated mysteriously -- I believe it's just to give us a tour of how weird Morrison's thinking this time, but it's rather enjoyable. The issue ends with Cliff running into Red Jack, a 17th-century nobleman with strange grillework and a ceramic mask for a face, holding Rhea in one arm and a knife in the other hand, who announces to Cliff that the wedding is over. "Freakbeat Vivaldi sampled and spliced together with the screams of murdered women and butterflies." Interesting stuff.
Annotations: Jane uses the cut-up technique to discover the identity of Rhea's kidnapper. This is an old method for creating "random" poetry and prose, started by the Dadaists. Tristan Tzara wrote many poems in this way, and William S. Burroughs has been known to use this method. p. 20: Jane is listing the names of the known victims of the historical Jack the Ripper. All of them were London prostitutes.
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