Malachi Ward's Ritual Three: Vile Decay: The Erosion of Democracy

The Canadian government recently signed the Trans Pacific Partnership, a massive trade agreement hailed by the current (until October 19^th) Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Hailed by the PM and his party as a milestone of Canadian trade, the focus of the press has been mostly on the impact of the TPP on the Canadian Dairy industry and the Auto Manufacturing industry (and with reason as this appears to be the final nail in the Canadian car industry’s coffin). But little has been said about the massive loss of privacy provisions that are included in the TPP. I didn't think anyone would ever include privacy provisions in a trade deal, but here it is. The TPP features many anti-privacy measures and limits the ability of governments to prevent the safekeeping of sensitive information within their own borders. This means that shortly our provincial and federal governments will no longer be able to require sensitive data to be stored locally (i.e. within it's boundaries and therefore, within it's jurisdiction). Adding to this the Mickey Mouse clause of copyright extension to prevent Disney from losing Mickey Mouse for another 20 years and thus also preventing countless works from being made available costing hundreds of millions more to the public, and you have a strange agreement where the winners are not the Canadian public as mentioned, but a handful of multi-billion dollar companies. 

In addition to this, Canada has recently passed a law that is eerily similar to the U.S Patriot Act in the form of Bill C-51, effectively creating a mass surveillance state with little oversight over what the government is doing with our information. I fear many do not understand the surveillance apparatus being installed around them. We all have this idea of George Orwell's 1984 where the repressive conditions laid out by the State can be seen with cameras everywhere. But the system didn’t place cameras around their house, they’ve placed them directly in their pockets through our smartphones, in our living rooms with our laptops. And we didn't stop it from happening. 

Whenever I think of this destruction of privacy, I think of Malachi Ward’s Ritual #3: Vile Decay. Even more so nowadays with the Canadian federal elections just hours away. In Ritual Three: Vile Decay an older woman recalls to her grandchildren the moment she felt the world went wrong. Using a virtual environment, she recalls her memories of protest, and ultimately how pointless it all felt. I feel like this in many ways; one day I’ll explain to my children that, when these moments happened, we were powerless to stop the slide because we failed to comprehend the severity of what was happening in front of us.

Brilliant rioting scene

The colours used by Ward in Ritual is stunning, his pacing is extraordinary. As the woman recalls her involvement with the riots (in a great crowd seen, rarely seen in comics due to the complexity of staging such panels), she also remembers the aftermath. As she and her friends are talking about what just happened, the conversation drifts towards the mundanity of everyday life. They too are unable to comprehend what is transpiring ahead of them. As they walk back towards their house, the group disperses under the sunrise of a new day. A darker day, where the spark of revolution has failed and the surveillance State prevailed. The brightness of the colours contrast immensely with the grim reality laid out by the world on the page. There are countless imageries of constructions and crumbling, both physical, societal and digital. It's exceptional. A remarkable work of speculative fiction. Much like Ritual Two: The Reverie, Ward finds inspiration in our troubling realities, the loss of a loved one, the loss of our privacy, and he crafts a relevant and affecting comic. I bought this in 2014 and I remember it vividly to this day.

I’m writing this, days before the 2015 Canadian election where the three major parties are fairly close in the polls and we’re unable to predict a clear winner. The only party who seems to understand the brutality of those repressive measures and who's willing to tackle them (The NDP) will be coming in third. It seems that the party who leads the charge on C-51 and caved in on internet surveillance through the TPP (the Conservatives) might win again, or that the party who doesn’t care about the implications of any of those two issues (the Liberals) might also win. I don’t think Canada will be a different country on Monday, but it will certainly be a less open and free country. One teetering ever closer to the dark and gloomy world presented in Ritual Three: Vile Decay. 

Endlessly staring into that abyss

Malachi Ward Ritual #2: The Reverie: The Most Powerful Wish Dimension Ever Discovered

A Dream Machine

Malachi Ward's Ritual #2: The Reverie is a fantastic look at dread, loss and family trauma. It organically integrates it's science fiction element and allows the reader to focus on the drama that unfolds. I was thoroughly impressed by this comic book. I read it this summer in San Francisco (Thanks to the amazing inventory skills of Mission: Comics & Arts) and it has been in the back of my mind ever since. 

We follow the story of Lina and Stevin, two siblings whose life is told over 22 years. We see them grow from mischievous kids to blasé teenagers. As a teenage boy, Stevin didn't really care about listening to his dad on a "take your kids to work day", where he talked about the exciting sci-fi complex where he works. We feel their pain as young adults they lose their mother to a serious illness (most likely cancer). Their family is shaken so solidly, that they are never quite able to move on. Their father has been completely swallowed by grief and time would not heal his wounds. Six years after their mother's passing, when Lina returns home to visit her brother Stevin, she notices her father sitting silently in the dark living room, completely overcome with grief. Three years after that and the pain still bleeds like an open wound. After a party where he drunkenly mistakes his sister-in-law for his wife, he retreats and disappears completely, leaving Stevin and Lina struggling to locate him.

Open Wounds

The pieces all come together in the second half of the book as Stevin and Lina attempts to rescue their father. He has taken refuge in The Reverie, "The most powerful wish dimension ever discovered". He had access to this machine at his work and his friend, unable to refuse him access after seeing his pain, allowed him to take refuge inside for months. Stevin and Lina venture into the machine to retrieve him, and I will give no further details. Needless to say, this trip ends poorly for all involved.

The Reverie

The book is divided into two sections: the first uses a condensed time frame and follows a strict form, while the second is on on white paper and is much looser in terms of page structure. In the first half, each page has 12 panels, black gutters and black paper. The strict adherence to this form seem to represent history: a dark immovable, unchangeable past. The dread and family trauma forever permeats the children's formative years. The second half`s looser structure indicates the present and it's mutability and uncertainty.

Flexibility of the Present

Ward manages to create recognizable characters from childhood to adulthood. They evolved and are recognizable over time. Stevin matures through the story. We see him evolve from an aimless troublemaker to a son who genuinely cares about the well-being of his family. His physical form also matures throughout the story, yet he remains recognizable throughout. The creation of the dream landscapes were nice to see, but what really struck me was how well the characters were handled throughout the book. The focus, both from the story and from the art emphasize that this is first and foremost, a character study in depression, grief and family trauma.

Grief

Ritual appears to be self contained. I've read Ritual #3 and although some sci-fi elements are included, it had no relations to the previous issue. If you are so fortunate as to find a copy of Ritual anywhere, grab it. You will not be disappointed.