#Constantine: distorted illusions

[rustandruin]

Constantine: Distorted Illusions by Kami Garcia and Isaac Goodhart

Thursday, 23 March 2023

Let me first start by saying I LOVE this line of YA DC comics. It’s a solid introduction to iconic characters for younger readers and serves as a great bridge to the comics. I’ve devoured Beast Boy and Raven, which Garcia wrote.

That said… I’m a bit ambivalent about this one.

I’m a big John Constantine fan. Like annoyingly so. But while I think it is a fun idea so tackle his younger days and explore his relationship with his father as well as his propensity for getting himself into messes (this recreating the pattern he’ll encounter as an adult), I think this was a slight miss for me. Because he didn’t feel like a teenage John Constantine.

He felt like a generic teen boy protagonist who is stubborn and does magic and accidentally summons a demon and causes trouble. There was none of the nuance and grit that makes him so unique. He didn’t feel like there were traces of the adult he’d grownup into. As a result it didn’t really feel like a Constantine book. Which was a bummer because I really wanted to like this! (Maybe if it had been a different author? One who could set the story in the U.K. and let Constantine stay true to his rough and tumble roots? Maybe something set at a school he eventually is kicked out of for doing magic? I don’t think there was much value in sending him to the U.S. Though I was hoping he’d meet teen Zatanna.)

Even the whole thing with him and his dad and how all that was resolved felt very… safe and teen. I’m glad this story was told but I think it could have been told more subtly and less on the nose. There was a lot more declaring of feelings and history than gently guiding us through it.

The art of this was interesting. Not sure if this is the style I’d pick for a Constantine YA comic. It reminded me of animation from the 80s, like She-Ra esque? Something about it felt just a bit too sleek for this character, though I really appreciate the poses and overall drama of the composition and the various character designs. It’s cool because it really highlights how comics needs to be a real marriage of medium to be most effective. The Teen Titans books work because Gabriel Piccolo’s art captures the big energy of characters like those and so those books feel further like the stories of those characters.

That said. I really dug when we saw Constantine in the teen version of his future outfit. I’m a sucker for that beige trench coat.

I’ll probably read the next one that comes out and will keep reading this whole line because I love what they’re doing. I’m giving it an extra star because it’s Constantine.

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️

[venus-of-the-hrdsell]

If they wanted to publish a YA Constantine graphic novel they could have done something interesting and give us a slasher format horror story with him as a protagonist. If there's anything good he does is survival at extreme conditions.

DC comics needs to think outside of the box.

[dumbassalex]

So I wanna talk Constantine Distorted Illusions some more, not just about it's editorial language mistake. Specificaly about how Kami Garcia changing the magic system and Johns living situation changes how we look at John as a person.

Because Hellblazer John is kinda permanently in survival mode, as somebody who went through lotsa trauma since leaving the womb, he had to learn to build defence systems and survival skills. He was failed by his father and by the system as a mentaly ill queer kid from the 50s/60s that ended up homeless in his teens, so alot of his cynical and selfish behavior makes sense when looking at John as a survivor.

The way magic works in his story also supports looking at John as somebody who worked hard to get where he is.

Here comes Distorted Illusions....oh boy.

So firstly Johns mother is alive, his father is absent rather than abusive, and there's a supprtive and seemingly nice step-father. Secondly he lives in a middle-class (or even upper class) household. Has been born with some of the strongest natural talents for magic thanks to his dads blood, making magic something you have to be born a special way to be able to use rather than something you learn through hard work, his step-dad is another very powerful magician, and John is given support and oputurnities to train and learn more magic by his family and family friends, exept he doesn't take them and shoots them down. So already John comes from somebody who's an asshole as a defense mechanism to somebody who's an asshole basicly for the sake of it.

Next is my biggest problem with John in the story, and that's how vengeful he is, everytime somebody doesn't let him do whatever he wants or he experiences consequences for his actions, rather than learn he does something spiteful (like stealing a magic book from the lady that was supposed to teach him, or trying to curse the guy that blacklisted them from every club in the city for burning up his equipment).

So really John went from a lower class survivor that worked for everything and built a hard shell of cynicism and assholery to a middle to upper-class entitled asshole who needed an ego check. While John being a punk in his teens and young adulthood was a reflection of his mindset on life, world and the system that failed him and his mates, DI John is not much more than a poser who likes the aestethic and sound but holds none of the soul and values of punk.

It also changes how we look at the "well-off gentleman" look of John.

His blue suit (and originaly white gloves) is like a smart facade of a smart and elegant man when he's actualy a street rat, it helps the con-man part of John.

Meanwhile DIs Johns "classic" outfit is like a more mellowed out version of his classic outfit, where while both show off his middle-class status and money, his final outfit is more "normal" and "smarter" rather than the pretty obviously artoficialy raggety but still expensive clothes he wore before.

[wait----------what]

Sometimes its best to ignore random people's opinions when you didn't ask for them. It probably just got on the wrong end of the Internet for a bit and is fine

Yeah this is not one of those times, this thing deserved the hate it got

[petty-d4bblr]

Told you he was wizard Barbie!

Fans: can we have a continuation of Spurrier and Co's excellent Hellblazer comics, please?

DC: No. But you can have a Constantine novel where he looks like Wizard Barbie.

[batmanego]

distorted illusions constantine

[liliegrayson]

constantine: distorted illusions (2022)

writer: kami garcia artist: isaac goodheart

[ravensvirginity]

Everytime i remember Constantine: Distorted Illusions i wanna go back to Kami Garcias Teen Titans stuff to see if they were all THAT bad and i am scared of the result.

I've never read the Constantine book but Garcia's Titans books are imo not great BUT I can't just blame her bc they have a huge amount of executive meddling to just create the ideal ya graphic novel

[constantineshots]

THANK YOUUUUUUU

Distorted illusions took 40 years off my lifespan so heres my take on a young 70s punk john instead

[librarycomic]

Constantine: Distorted Illusions written by Kami Garcia and drawn by Isaac Goodhart. DC Graphic Novels for Young Adults, 2022. 9781779507730. 192pp. http://www.powells.com/book/-9781779507730?partnerid=34778&p_bt

This graphic novel reinvents Constantine as a hot, eighteen-year-old, bisexual British musician/song writer who dresses in black and favors punk music. He's also a talented magician like both his father and stepfather, Roderick. Constantine's relationship with his father is not good, and when Roderick tries to set up an apprenticeship for Constantine, he rejects that, too. But his friend Veronica gets him to reconsider -- if he does the apprenticeship to learn about magic he can be the lead singer for her band. The story is a mix of drama involving the band, its gigs, and demonic magic gone awry.

The way creative teams weave in LGBTQ+ content into so many of these DC graphic novels for young people is great, and this is no exception. The weirdest thing about it is seeing Constantine without his cigarettes (read an adult Hellblazer graphic novel if you don't know what I mean), but seeing him cast as a teenage bad boy who mostly does the right thing is fun. I enjoyed this book, and would have absolutely loved it when I was about fourteen.

[ninelivesart]

Part 2 of my insane plan to draw all the MCs from the books I’ve read this year.

John Constantine from Constantine: Distorted Illusions by Kami Garcia and Isaac Goodhart.

[dumbassalex]

Oh..oh my god, i was reading Constantine Distorted Illusions outta morbit interest (save the prayers, i did this by my own choice, i deserve this) and outside of everything mentioned i gotta mention this absolute Great Britain sized FUCK UP

Now most of you will not notice but this...this is not Chechen, this is CZECH. That's a whole another place. This is an official DC property released worldwide and they make this sort of a fuck up.

And here is the funniest part, this shit happened before with the Boston bombings from 2013 and i think Trump once mistaken the two, even tho Chechnya is near Russia, Czechia is basicly right in the center of Europe, even called Heart of Europe at times.

This took me like 20 seconds to fact czech (well technicaly a single fucking second as a native czech but when it comes to Google it was about 20 seconds).

Kami Garcia and Steve Wands (the letterer) and the two editors didn't fucking notice this.

Also i wanna just add some more fire to this, the translation box says "no one listens to these things anymore" when the czech box says "no one buys these things".

[emilysworldoffandoms]

Books I Read in 2023

Wilde Child By Eloisa James (Romance)

Looking for Me…in this Great Big Family By Betsy R. Rosenthal (Middle Grade Verse)

My Last Duchess By Eloisa James (Romance)

Wilde in Love By Eloisa James (Romance)

Our Souls at Night By Kent Haruf (Fiction)

Too Wilde Too Wed By Eloisa James (Romance)

Nick and Charlie By Alice Oseman (YA Novella)

Born to Be Wilde By Eloisa James (Romance)

The Woman in the Purple Skirt By Nasuko Imamura (Fiction)

Say No to the Duke By Eloisa James (Romance)

Crumbs By Dance Stirling (Graphic Novel)

The Reluctant Countess By Eloisa James (Romance)

Demon in the Wood By Leigh Bardugo & Dani Pendergast (Graphic Novel)

Write for Your Life By Anna Quindlen (Non-Fiction)

Let There By Laughter By Michael Krasny (Humor)

Mary’s Monster: Love, Madness, and How Mary Shelley Created Frankenstein By Lita Judge (Biography in Verse and Pictures)

Soft Thorns By Bridgett Devoue (Poetry)

Wolfed: Cursed By Love: Book One By Leia Stone (Urban Fantasy Romance)

Constantine: Distorted Illusions By Kami Garcia & Isaac Goodhart (Graphic Novel)

A Life Force By Will Eisner (Graphic Novel)

Dropsie Avenue By Will Eisner (Graphic Novel)

Love & Other Words By Christina Lauren (Romance)

The World Keeps Ending and the World Goes On By Franny Choi (Poetry)

The Valentine’s Hate By Sidney Halston (Romance)

Fagin the Jew By Will Eisner (Graphic Novel)

Autoboyography By Christina Lauren (YA)

You Are Here By Dawn Lanuza (Poetry)

Wolfed: Book Two: Promised to Him By Leia Stone (Urban Fantasy Romance)

New York: The Big City By Will Eisner (Graphic Novel)

To the Heart of the Storm By Will Eisner (Graphic Novel)

The Outsiders By S.E. Hinton (Classic YA) [Re-read]

True Beauty By Yaongyi (Graphic Novel)

The 13 Clocks By James Thurber (Verse and Pictures)

Chasing Cassandra By Lisa Kleypas (Romance)

Banned Book Club By Kim Hyun Sook, Ko Hyung-Ju, and Ryan Estrada (Graphic Novel)

Coven By Jennifer Dugan (Graphic Novel)

Exes & O’s By Amy Lea (Romance)

2 Am Thoughts By Mackenzie Campbell (Poetry)

My Greenhouse By Bella Mayo (Poetry)

Unterhaken By Leela Corman (Graphic Novel)

Morning Haikus By Carin Weisman Crook (Poetry)

HER: Volume 3 By Pierre Alex Jeanty (Poetry)

These Are My Big Girl Pants By Amber Vittoria (Poetry)

When in Rome By Sarah Adams (Romance)

Mr. Wrong Number By Lynn Painter (Romance)

Hollow By Brandon Boyer-White & Shannon Waters (Graphic Novel)

Set on You By Amy Lea (Romance)

The Sun & the Star By Rick Riordan & Mark Oshiro (Middle Grade)

Practice Makes Perfect By Sarah Adams (Romance)

Haikus for Jews By David M. Bader (Poetry) [Re-read]

LVOE By Atticus (Poetry)

Schwartz’s Hebrew Delicatessen: The Story By Bill Brownstein (Non-Fiction)

Spy X Family Vol. 1 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

My Hero Academia Vol. 1 By Kohei Horikoshi (Manga)

Imogen, Obviously By Becky Albertalli (YA)

Spy X Family Vol. 2 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

Spy X Family Vol. 3 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

True Love Experiment By Christina Lauren (Romance)

A beautiful composition of broken By r.h. Sin (poetry)

Spy X Family Vol. 4 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

Spy X Family Vol. 5 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

All About Me! My Remarkable Life in Show Business By Mel Brooks (Memoir)

Whiskey words & a shovel By r.h. Sin (Poetry)

Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself By Alan Alda (Memoir)

Spy X Family Vol. 6 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

The Unhoneymooners By Christina Lauren (Romance)

The Soulmate Equation By Christina Lauren (Romance)

M*A*S*H: A Novel About Three Army Doctors By Richard Hooker (Fiction)

Mixed Blessings By William & Barbara Christopher (Memoir)

Never Have Your Dog Stuffed and Other Things I’ve Learned By Alan Alda (Memoir)

Red, White, & Royal Blue By Casey McQuiston (Romance)

Spy X Family Vol. 7 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

SOTUS Vol. 1 By Bittersweet (Manga)

SOTUS Vol. 2 By Bittersweet (Manga)

While the Duke Was Sleeping By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

Beach Read By Emily Henry (Romance)

Spy X Family Vol. 8 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

Spy X Family Vol. 9 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

The Scandal of it All By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

Not That Duke By Eloisa James (Romance)

Unorthodox Love By Heidi Shertok (Romance)

The Duke Buys a Bride By  Sophie Jordan (Romance)

This Scot of Mine By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

Kissing Kosher By Jean Meltzer (Romance)

The Duke’s Stolen Bride By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

My Roommate is a Vampire By Jenna Levine (Romance)

The Virgin and the Rogue By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

The Duke Effect By Sophie Jordan (Romance)

SOTUS Vol. 3 By Bittersweet (Manga)

Percy Jackson: Chalice of the Gods By Rick Riordan (Middle Grade)

Tiny Dancer By Siena Cherson Siegel (Graphic Novel)

Zatanna: The Jewel of Gravesend By Alys Arden (Graphic Novel)

Everything I Know About Love I Learned from Romance Novels By Sarah Wendell (Non-Fiction)

The Roommate Pat By Allison Ashley (Romance)

Spy X Family Vol. 10 By Tatsuya Endo (Manga)

Two Rogues Make a Right By Cat Sebastian (Romance)

The Things They Carried By Tim O’Brien (Fiction)

Count Your Lucky Stars By Alexandria Bellefleur (Romance)

The Bromance Book Club By Lyssa Kay Adams (Romance)

Mockingjay By Suzanne Collins (YA)

The Official Quotable Doctor Who: Wise Words from Across Space & Time By Cavan Scott and Mark Wright (Quote Book)

God Plays Hide and Seek Poems By Greta Elbogen (Poetry)

Women Holding Things By Maira Kalman (Poetry/Verse/Photos)

The Little Liar By Mitch Albom (Fiction)

Love Brought Me Through the Holocaust: A Daughter’s Memories By Judith Koeppel Steel (Non-Fiction)

Himawari House By Harmony Becker (Graphic Novel)

Undercover Bromance By Lyssa Kay Adams (Romance)

Unordinary By uru-chan (Graphic Novel)

Son of : A Gripping Account of Terror, Betrayal, Political Intrigue, and Unthinkable Choices By Most Hassan Yousef (Memoir)

Love & Latkes By Stacey Agdern (Romance)

Twelve Tribes: Promise and Peril in New Israel By Ethan Michaeli (Non-Fiction)

Never on Shabbas! By Henry Leonard (Political Cartoons)

The Little Guide to Taylor Swift: Words to Shake It Off (Quote Book)

This Winter By Alice Oseman (Novella)

Heartstopper Volume 5 By Alice Oseman (Graphic Novel)

Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth By Noa Tishby (Non-Fiction)

Counting the Cost By Jill Duggar (Memoir)

How to Educate a Citizen: The Power of Shared Knowledge to Unify a Nation BY E.D. Hirsch Jr. (Non-Fiction)

Two Tribes By Emily Bowen Cohen (Middle Grade Graphic Novel)

Foster By Claire Keegan (Novella)

[pushovermediacritic]

I was tagged for this meme by @tobiasdrake, but it got too long so I'm making a separate post.

Last Song: Bridge of Life by P!nk, from the Happy Feet 2 soundtrack:

Hot take, I think Happy Feet 2 is better than Happy Feet 1. There are some lower lows, but it has higher highs. Erik's big moment, the krill subplot, and the songs are all great. And the way dancing is justified as the solution to the problem makes much more sense than in 1.

Favorite Color: Blue. Always has been, always will be. The ocean, sky, the walls of my goddamn bedroom. I love blue.

Last Book: I recently read 5 random graphic novels from the library. Some were okay, some kinda sucked.

The Heart Hunter had an okay premise but the paneling was terrible and the writing was unbearably corny, using every "heart" idiom literally. Like "this character is honest and has high empathy, so they literally wear their bleeding heart on their sleeve". Shit like that, all over the place.

The Black Mage had better paneling but even worse writing. It was trying to do an anti-racist take on Harry Potter, but with 10,000 more anime references and no sense of subtlety or how to write a mystery. Like, the main character is the only black wizard at a white wizard school, and he meets the headmaster who is literally in KKK robes, then later he meets the ghost of Harriet Tubman who tells him that this school used to be a base for the KKK and he's like "wow, that's horrible", and I'm like HOW DID YOU NOT CATCH ON BEFORE NOW?! There's a whole mystery about why he was admitted to the school and one of the teachers mentions, for the first time, the mandatory school "ritual" all the students have to attend, then a few pages later it's revealed the ritual is sacrificing him to power the school.

Legend was pretty good. A classic "fight the corrupt government" thing with an actually well-written mystery to solve. Though the plot twist regarding the plague had me doing a triple-take because of how much it reminded me of COVID conspiracy theories, until I looked it up and learned this graphic novel came out in 2015 and any relation to COVID is purely a coincidence.

By Night was okay. Good writing, but the story was pretty slow and weak. It felt like it really wanted me asking questions about all the mysteries it was setting up, but like almost all the mysteries were answered already, or could be extrapolated from existing information easily. And the other world clearly has some sort of government and politics, but it doesn't feel like it, it feels like an empty fantasyland. Too much telling, not enough showing.

Constantine: Distorted Illusions was pretty good. A look at John Constantine's teenage years as a rebellious youth. The paneling was solid and the writing had a good sense of realism. The plot was a little bare-bones, but it had some cool moments. Great art and character designs.

Last Movie: Dr Sleep, the sequel to The Shining. I liked it. It was very "Stephen King", but I thought it was an interesting direction to take the story and it worked well as an action-horror movie in contrast with the first movie being straight horror. In that aspect, it reminded me of the transition from Alien to Aliens. I reject the complaints that the girl being super-powerful made her a Mary Sue. Like yeah, she's strong, but her power is literally the MacGuffin, she's got a distinctive personality and character arc, and she doesn't solve all the problems. Hell, she hardly solves any problems, she mainly just plays support for the adults so they can solve the problems.

Last TV Show: The last episode I watched was for Dragon Ball Daima, but I'd put Dandadan here, since I binged all the episodes that were out a week or so ago. It's good shit. Weird but good, you can see the DNA of Chainsaw Man in it, and some distant inspiration from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure. The running scene set to a remix of the William Tell Overture had my jaw on the floor.

Sweet/Spicy/Savory: Savory, all the way. In fact, I took a food class in college and had to report everything I ate, and it turns out I eat too much protein and not enough carbs. Ever since then, I've been trying to increase my sugar intake, but that's hard to do since I don't really like fruit.

Relationship Status: Single and lonely.

Last Thing I Googled: The last thing I Googled on Ecosia was "dortitos" because I was looking for the meme that went like "to. open. dortitos. bag.". Unfortunately, search engines suck now and no amount of quotes or pluses will make them search for "dortitos" instead of auto-correcting it to "doritos", so I couldn't find the meme.

Current Obsessions: Dragon Ball and One Piece are eternal, but Daima has definitely re-sparked interest in Dragon Ball. I don't know if I really have a "current" obsession, like right now, though.

Tagging: @unnounblr

[gamerbulten]

Constantine ve Robins, DC'den kendi Genç Yetişkin kitaplarını alıyor Kami Garcia'nın yeni bir Teen Titans ki...

[johncon]

Sounds like a real win-win. Just be careful in the in-between.

Constantine loops his arm through the red-clad male's and leads him to a nearby pub, taking a seat at a booth and patting the spot next to him. So can you travel in time as well, or only dimensions?

heyyyyyyy, hotstuff

- @wheelbarrowofstagefourcancer

Hello, love- do you need some assistance? There's this residual of dimensional teleportation around you.