Lately I have been on a comic binge, revisiting some old classics, looking into new properties I have been unaware of for a long time and finally looking into materials that revolve around characters I am already fairly invested in.
While I love revisiting the in my opinion best comic series of all time DYLAN DOG, or enjoy reading new stories from some of my favourite heroes and antiheroes such as BATMAN or THE PUNISHER and like exploring new properties such as the absolutely excellent Gerth Ennis comic THE BOYS, I have to admit what draws me in more than anything else is the bizzarre and obscure, especially when a piece of work was created by an otherwise popular figure.
One such work is HOLY TERROR which is a conflicting book to me. On one hand I love the abstract style of Miller’s and there is a lot to learn and study from his work from an artist’s perspective. On the other, Holy Terror may be one of the most hateful pieces of media I have ever read.
WHO IS FRANK MILLER? #
If you don’t really read comic books, aren’t aware of THE DARK KNIGHT RETURNS or don’t know anything about SIN CITY, BATMAN or 300 in the first place, then it is no wonder that you never heard of his name.
Frank Miller is a rather influential comic book writer and artist, who is responsible for one of the best Batman comics out there and for some of the worst ones in the DC roster at the same time. A controversial element to his creations, is his abstract geometrical artstyle that developed over the years, with quite a few fans of his work perceiving the change in artstyle as a bad thing. Honestly, I can see why.
Although I see where people are coming from, I disagree and would compare Miller’s artistic Journey to the one Picasso has made, during which he started out with realistic works but then pivoted to creating ever more abstract and crude pieces, and I think that Miller’s style as seen in Holy Terror actually is quite refined, ESPECIALLY WHEN COMPARED TO THE VISUAL MIGRAINE THAT IS DK2.
Another element to Miller, is one that many artists share, which would be his political views and real world troubles seeping into his works. This is a bit of a neutral quality as for many pieces THIS WORKS EXCELLENTLY however when not done with tact or if your views are just terrible from the get go INCLUDING THOSE ELEMENTS CAN EFFECTIVELY RUIN A CREATION.
HOLY TERROR BATMAN! #
Which leads us to HOLY TERROR. When taking a glance at the comic book’s cover you would be forgiven for thinking that it is an original comic starring original characters, but once you crack it open and start reading you will see that something is wrong.
CAT BURGLAR? Empire city? A police chief? A SUSPICIOUSLY FAMILIAR LOOKING CAPED CRUSADER? Holy moly Batman! THAT SOUNDS LIKE BATMAN!
This is no coincidence, nor is Holy Terror a ripoff, but rather a calculated decision by Miller, AS THIS STORY IS A BATMAN ONE. The Cat Burglar is Catwoman, Empire City actually is Gotham and The Fixer is none other than The Batman. What happened here?
BACK IN 2006 Holy Terror was still called HOLY TERROR BATMAN as outlets reported at the time and Frank Miller himself adamantly advertised his new comic as Batman’s fight against Al-Qaeda.The announcement was concerning, less for Batman facing off against real world issues, as the dark knight was put into many situations before that handled heavy subject matter, but more because Miller sold this comic as a piece of propaganda.
Miller was rather unapologetic about how he sold his new story, and even years later when Holy Terror Batman was reworked to an original property, Miller still sold this piece as a work of propaganda. Miller also elucidated his stance on propaganda in a blog post of his found on his personal website.
My new comic book (or “graphic novel”, I suppose it should be called, because it’s square bound) is naked propaganda.
Right in the second paragraph he explains that Propaganda has gotten a negative connotation.
“Propaganda” has, over time, become a pejorative term. This is curious, since most of our MSM is precisely that: propaganda. One need only read the front page of the sacred New York Times, that Gray, Senile Old Lady, let alone explore the serpentine chasm that is its editorial page, to read news so slanted as to be beyond recognition of the facts on the ground.
I agree that Propaganda is a Neutral term. Many of my own efforts and writings can be described as propagandistic, whether it be my efforts to communicate that SOUND DESIGN IN GAMES ought to be talked about more, or when it comes to the decision of NOT DEVOLVING INTO APOLOGETICS when discussing dishonest influencers spreading lies about North Korea. Elwood and Myself have clear goals in mind. We want to make you think about how you view the world and yes, we make an effort to make our writings persuasive, embracing the inevitably subjective nature of media.
No doubt this viewpoint can backfire, which we try to keep in check. When you write propaganda it is easier to lie while hiding behind the shield of personal opinion. You do not want to make your people look bad, nor do you want to give your adversaries the benefit of the doubt. It also can easily devolve into something malicious, spreading ideas that may not be scientific, moral or sensical but rather come from a place of ignorance and rage baiting.
Propaganda is a form of advertisement at the end of the day and it does sell something, yet instead of the product being something tangible that has some form of commercial value, what is being sold are intangible ideas, and just like it is the case for selling products, PROPAGANDA CAN SELL YOU SOMETHING THAT IS ROOTED IN LIES. Some propaganda is equivalent to selling you an honest to god vacuum that does exactly what is described, while other propaganda is more akin to selling you a Dyson product; You may be dazzled by it’s futuristic looking aesthetics, but the claims of better performance are bogus.
Bias lies at the core of propaganda. “Here is an opinion or ideal. BELIEVE IT”. It is straightforward and can inspire real change in the world, positive change like advocating for a more sustainable life or battling debilitating problems such as addiction crises within a community, but it can easily be used for malicious ideas too, especially when it relates to advocating for the erradication of a people, promoting self destructive belief systems and ideology such as Inceldom, or exploiting popular characters in service of pressuring the public to consider enlisting in a war effort or foster hate towards a specific kind of people.
Miller describes propaganda works of old as a chivalrous thing. Captain America punching out Hitler, superheroes fighting the real evils of the world and in Holy Terror’s case, tackling the evils of Al Qaeda.
Arguably some of these works aren’t that harmful, especially when compared to some modern works such as the Wolfenstein games which undoubtebly depict a fight against a fanatical evil without delving too deep into real historical events. Using concepts such as Nazism or Terrorism as an avatar of evil can work for a story too, although the potential for a piece of media like that being anything more than a revenge fantasy is slim. Again, not a bad thing! I LOVE WORKS SUCH AS INGLOURIOUS BASTERDS OR WOLFENSTEIN!
THE QUESTION HOWEVER IS WHO LANDS IN THE CROSSFIRE OF THIS KIND OF MEDIA. Many works of propaganda of the past were created with malicious intent. There is a world of difference between the average german and a Nazi, ethnic groups versus how those groups may be defined through stereotypes and this also applies to TERRORISTS VERSUS THE AVERAGE MUSLIM.
BATMAN’S PERSONAL JIHAD #
Which is where Holy Terror blunders. It is a piece that gets lost in the weeds as a result of Miller venting his anger. The Graphic Novel is a deeply personal piece, which unveils Millers troubles with dealing with 9/11. The fact that the book released in 2011 and still mainly revolved on the fall of the twin towers shows that Miller likely still didn’t quite process or get over the happenings of that one terrible day.
IF THERE IS SOMETHING INTERESTING ABOUT HOLY TERROR, A STUDY OF MILLERS OWN TRAUMA WOULD BE IT. The beginning of the novel genuinely isn’t all that bad. It starts with Catwoman and Batman having a scuffle on the rooftops of Gotham and getting a bit carried away with their erotic escapades. Visually the very beginning of the piece also showcases some of the issues with Millers style, as many of the beginning panels lack clarity and are a mess of shapes and lines. After a while something happens, Catwoman is injured and she is in utter shock. A nail is in her leg, something terrible has happened.
Which is where we are introduced to the scene of a woman overlooking Gotham. She seems to despise America and everything it and the city stands for.
She gets invited by a local to enter the club with him and lucky for him, she agrees. She takes a swig of alcohol, which she remarks was her first as in her country people do not drink booze and when entering the nightclub they see the faces of the many party people dancing beside them. When asked if she has something under her coat, she replies with “paradise” and after a bang a shower of nails kills everyone inside.
A running theme of Holy Terror is the showcase of portraits, similar to what you would see on TV after a tragic event such as a school shooting or terrorist attack. It is a powerful visual as it puts faces to tragedies and for a comic such as this one, feels remarkably personal. This might be a work of fiction, but the many individuals that pass in it are shown to the reader with the same gravitas of news reports displaying the faces of victims in the real world. With more bombings we get to the most striking pages of the Novel, depicting so many portraits of Batman’s neighbours that they eventually get innumerable, the faces of the individuals begin to fade with the overwhelming amount of panels that are stacked atop each other. Maybe some of the victims are unknown and were never recovered, maybe some weren’t inhabitants of Gotham and came from abroad, some families may never get the closure they deserve; THIS VISUAL IS AMAZINGLY DONE and frames how Miller perceived the 9/11 attacks; It wasn’t just an attack on the United States, it was an attack against the many thousands of his neighbours that lost their lives that day.
The panels directly correlate to Millers trauma in the real world as he was in New York at that day the towers fell and saw it happen. He described the fall of the towers as the day 3000 of his neighbours died, a statement he has made for around half a decade and a theme that isn’t exclusive to Holy Terror as he explored this tragic event and how it affected him personally in his controversial THE DARK KNIGHT STRIKES AGAIN.
Sadly the graphic novel turns from emotional character study of it’s author to an unmasking of the author’s ignorance. Miller destroyed the thought provoking elements of Holy Terror by letting his emotions overtake his writings, turning Holy Terror INTO A PRODUCT OF HATE.
With questionable dialogue, depictions of angry shouting arabs and real life politicians and turbaned goons screaming JIHAD! while assailing our heroes, the graphic novel does not cover terror or Al Qaeda with tact. The book can also be summed up as a killing spree, a fantasy which is equivalent to your typical “If that happened to me, I would have…” story you have with your mates during a lunch break, which while it may be cathartic for some doesn’t really add anything to the wider discussion of the subject. THE BOOK ALSO PUTS ISLAM IN THE FOREFRONT EVEN THOUGH MILLER ATTESTED THE BOOK WASN’T GOING TO BE VERY RELIGIOUS which is a shame.
PLAIN RACISM AND DISDAIN #
A few parts elevated Holy Terror from A LITTLE TACTLESS to QUITE DISAPPOINTING, panels which even for a piece that was specifically made to vent frustrations are quite questionable.
So Mohammed, Pardon me for Guessing your name, BUT YOU’VE GOT TO ADMIT THE ODDS ARE PRETTY GOOD IT’S MOHAMMED… What’s the plan?
On the next page there is another panel which only adds fuel to the fire.
CATWOMAN: Yeesh. That’s a lot of CHUNKS OF TERRORIST.
BATMAN: AT LEAST WE KNOW THEY’RE THE SAME SPECIES.
HOLY FUCK, FRANKIE! Those panels speak for themselves. From a build up of attacks, drawings of arabs holding guns, carricatures of middle eastern leaders and references to religious practices to straight up racism.
Even if those panels are supposed to be some kind of joke, THEY BARELY READ LIKE ONES, maybe because what we got so far in this graphic novel was DEAD SERIOUS. This also shows that Miller is approaching a subject that needs some precision by stumbling over it and blasting it with a shotgun, as markers he perceived as “belonging to the enemy” could very easily be misconstrued as shitting all over a religion.
We also find out later that terrorist HQ is a mega mosque built by the Saudis, which for the most part remains empty in Gotham. Catwoman infiltrates it later by incapacitating a woman clad in a burka and using it as a disguise. She is eventually found out anyways and after a few lengthy monologues and a grand entry by Batman, every terrorist in the mosque gets absolutely obliterated.
The only suggestion that not every member of this terror organisation is a native middle easterner, is when Catwoman talks to a scotsman that casually refers to his brethren as SAND MONKEYS.
Additions that make little contextual sense with the wider story of Holy Terror, are small cutaways. One of a woman being stoned and another of a man beating on a burka clad woman. Those panels do not really add anything to the story and appear without context and I can only think of their inclusion as another jab at Islam which is not representative of everyone that practices that religion.
WHAT IS TERROR? #
Aside from the blatantly racist panels, what might frustrate me most about this graphic novel isn’t that it’s pretty much just a revenge fuelled powerfantasy, my problem rather is that it miscommunicates what Terror normally is and how one would fight it.
In Holy Terror we see Gotham City be invaded by foreign warriors that have some kind of combat training, even flying in Jets that can bring down the Statue of Liberty, quite literally waging war on freedom itself, while for Terror attacks in the west the point isn’t domination or annexing a region and taking control of territory. It’s more about sending a message, and people that radicalised themselves in some way deciding to commit an atrocity in service of their ideology and in response to what is going on in their lives.
Don’t get me wrong, the attack Miller witnessed many years back in New York was far from an ordinary event, even for an act of Terrorism: The plan included many steps and was highly organized, from attaining flight training, to being able to hijack multiple planes and to finally crash those planes into the towers required much more dedication and know-how than picking up a gun and going to town square. 9/11 still was far from an invasion. Again, it’s about that message, or “reacting”.
The Islamic State’s M.O. was fear, spreading terrible execution videos online to portray themselves as warriors that don’t know fear and they were quick to claim attacks all throughout the west as their own doing, even if all the suspect did was taking matters into their own hands and deciding to do something terrible. Many of these attacks might not be as coordinated or thought through as they seem at first.
While it sucks to put all these deaths into context as it diminishes the cost of life that happen due to these attacks, for our own sanity’s sake we also have to keep in mind that an act of terrorism is exceedingly rare and the death toll is generally low, at least in the West. TERROR HAS WON WHEN IT EMBEDS ITSELF, when one is too afraid to go outside, feels like they are made impotent having to see the brutality but not being able to do anything against it, and when we get overtaken with anger. Terror in the West doesn’t really strike buildings, vehicles and infrastructure, it’s intended to attack the heart, and it left a mark on Miller’s.
A NAZI’S PERSONAL JIHAD #
Holy Terror did not have a chance in giving the subject matter what it really deserves - a critical look into what terror is, how it forms and who usually commits it. In Frank’s eyes at least according to Holy Terror, it is an organized invasion while in real life it often is a reaction from a societal outcast that has had enough.
Some of the most lethal spree killings after 9/11 also came from a different background; Less “Turban and Sabre” and more “Armband and Hakenkreuz”.
“Christchurch” immediately pops into ones head when thinking about Nazi-ward terror. Brenton Tarrant went on his own “Holy Crusade” that day, entering a Mosque and unloading his assault rifle on the attendees inside. He exited to get to his car but not to escape, but reload. His killing spree claimed 51 lives that day, indiscriminately killing innocent men, women and children that were just going about their day. What could motivate a person to commit such an atrocity? I THINK IT’S FEAR.
Tarrant was embroiled in far right extremist communities long before he decided to go on his rampage and in his eyes, the innocent Mosque goers he was about to kill, were invaders who were slowly ethnically replacing white skinned communities around the world. On 8chan he wrote:
“Well lads, it’s time to stop shitposting and time to make a real life effort post. I will carry out and [sic] attack against the invaders, and will even live stream the attack via facebook.”
He also revealed later that his attack was going to be his own personal “Jihad”, reassuring readers that he will meet them in the afterlife, like a holy warrior embarking on his final battle.
“I have provided links to my writings below, please do your part spreading my message, making memes and shitposting as you usually do. If I don’t survive the attack, goodbye, godbless and I will see you all in Valhalla!”
What his message was does ultimately not matter, nor do I want to link to his manifesto as I would be doing this scum a favor. What mattered here was the material he recorded. His goal was to finally produce a video where one can watch Muslims suffer and with his final call to proliferate the video and meme the atrocity as much as possible, people across the world sought out the video and downloaded it for themselves, regardless of affiliation to the far-right. Who knows, you may have downloaded that video yourself back then.
A NATION’S JIHAD #
After all, Tarrant’s Jihad was in vain. The people of New Zealand banded together in support of the victims of Christchurch, their way of showing solidarity was by using a local tradition.
With stomping, grimacing and shouting Kiwis across the countries showed that their spirit cannot be shot down. The “Haka” as the performative dance is called is a Māori tradition which is performed for all sorts of occasions. Competitions, weddings, celebrations and in this case to mourn the victims of the Christchurch shooting.
The beautiful thing about these displays is that they show that the settlers of New Zealand embraced a native tradition instead of doing away with it. We can see Māori, Muslim, Caucasian, really any kind of people perform this dance in the collection of videos above, a sight that likely made Tarrant’s skin crawl as it in part invalidated his ideology. “Invaders” picking up the song and dance of the people they are trying to demographically replace? That just does not make sense!
Affected family members of the victims also had their two cents to share, facing the terrorist that brought destruction to their lives.
Other family members decided to confront the Terrorist in a different manner, by forgiving him.
TERROR DOES NOT HAVE ONE FACE and neither are the victims always godless infidels. In this case study, the many people who fell victim to the Christchurch shootings, happened to have beards and dark, thick hair some were clad in Hijabs and others in Burkas, even others didn’t even dress all too differently to non-muslims.
51 Panels were drawn that day, exclusively depicting the faces of muslims; Something Miller’s Propaganda on Terrorism didn’t account for.
Miller let Terror win. He has completely immersed himself in his hatred, spiraling down a pit of despair. America is facing an existential threat, an enemy that knows exactly what it wants, an invasive force that is trying to destroy freedom, peace and democracy itself.
In this interview with NPR on January 24th 2007, an almost distressed sounding Miller is speculating on why Terror is coming to get the US. He ephasises how much good America has done for the world and how young Americans are taught to look back at their countries legacy in a negative light.
The host of the radio show pushes back and proposes to Miller that many would say that the terror we see in the world is a direct consequence from American meddling. In response to that, Miller changes the focus of the discussion to the enemy.
Miller was hurt. Badly hurt. But this interview shows that he has no idea what he is talking about when it comes to the blood on the USA’s hands. His answer to Terror is American Exceptionalism and perpetuating the idea that the answer to Terror is total annhilation.
The skewed representation of what terror actually is, leads to unfortunate consequences.
THE JIHAD OF ISLAMOPHOBES #
Christchurch didn’t only show another face terror can bear, it didn’t just show the pan-religious and pan-ethnic strength and solidarity of the Kiwis, but it also showed humanitie’s uncaring and uncompassionate side.
When scrolling through comment sections under news videos reporting on the mass murder, we get a mix of comments. Many are supportive, but way too many allege that the intense media coverage was a sign of pro-Islam biasing and hate comments range from making fun of the situation, to judging the speaker for deciding not to forgive the killer. The following are comments under this video.
A mix of comments to shake ones head at. Some commenters even we nt as far as to taunt the victims by posting the death toll and even others directly referenced the terrorist’s manifesto, behaviour that cannot be tolerated.
Those commenters who allege that the media was biasing things in the muslims favour by creating a show-trial for the world to see miss some blatantly obvious points which should be apparent to onlookers from the get go. For one, not many terrorist attacks happened in New Zealand when compared to other countries such as the United States or Germany and secondly, the last time a massacre like Christchurch happened was 76 years before the year of the shooting during a prisoner of war camp riot and keep in mind, the 51 victims and many wounded of Christchurch were all attacked by a singular person. While the death toll is nowhere near what was counted at September 11th, this shooting essentially was New Zealand’s equivalent to 9/11.
It also is a blatant lie that terror is underreported when it hits westerners. Since the fall of the towers, terrorism has been a nigh constant topic of discussion and focal point in the news. Kids who were born around the 2000’s like myself may not have seen and processed 9/11 as our parents did, however we grew up hearing all about it and cannot imagine a world without terror anxiety, airport frisks or for Germans specifically the yearly speculations if an attack will hit the local Christmas market yet again.
WE HAVE MADE OUR BED AND ARE FORCED TO LIE IN IT. Islamic terror is not going away any time soon as we created a Golem that is more than just a few religious cranks in the desert. They got money, weapons and training and in the past they were told to destroy governments we didn’t like. We couldn’t have foreseen that one day they would overthrow and control entire countries, but here we are. The next batch of terrorists that will haunt the world in the next 50 years have likely already been created during the Russo-Ukrainian war, and those guys are browncoated Orthodox Christians, not pork and alcohol abstaining Muslims.
Maybe in the years to come, we will be the ones that have to decry “this is not what Christianity is about!” or “White-skinned doesn’t equal terrorist!”. Sooner or later we might get a taste of what many muslims and “middle eastern looking” people have been exposed to for decades now. We might experience a time in which we have to deal with the same judgements and stereotyping we have inflicted on others.
I would like to fight towards the opposite outcome, for a more compassionate world were we judge the actions of individuals without needing to paint broad strokes. We previously have and still can learn from mistakes made in the past, and while I don’t believe in any religion, maybe a fight for less judgement, hate and discrimination would be my Jihad.
That is what Jihad actually means by the way, “a struggle or effort”. Everyone follows their own personal Jihad, for some it is the destruction of a people, or in order to dwindle the morale of communities, but for a majority of people, their Jihad is becoming a master at their craft, caring for their family, or pursuing their dreams. Don’t let a problem we artificially created control you, don’t be consumed by hatred and make that hatred cloud your judgements like it did Miller’s and make an effort against just going with the flow and adopting narratives that do not bring value to your life. That could be part of your own personal Jihad.
What is your Jihad? Maybe it’s time to think about that.
EPILOGUE #
LOOKING BACK on Holy Terror and Frank Miller, this comic looms over Millers legacy like some kind of spectre. While Miller proudly exclaims on his website that he has worked on a variety of comics like Sin City and 300, Holy Terror is not mentioned or shown anywhere.
Miller has previously denounced Holy Terror in an interview with The Guardian and he has faced repeated backlash for the book that represented his very own Jihad.
“Whenever I look at any of my work I can feel what my mindset was and I remember who I was with at the time. When I look at Holy Terror, which I really don’t do all that often, I can really feel the anger ripple out of the pages. There are places where it is bloodthirsty beyond belief.”
Although Holy Terror made me ask “ What are you dense? Are you RETARDED or something?” multiple times while reading, ultimately I think that Miller has moved on from Holy Terror and genuinely sees that book as a mistake. Any review you have read out there that criticizes it for its terrible ideas and the like are most likely accurate.
The contents are pretty bad and I wouldn’t really recommend you read it if you are looking for a great story you can really sink your teeth into and chances are that you will not enjoy Miller’s artstyle either.
I maintain that Holy Terror is only genuinely interesting if you see it as a deconstruction of the author’s mental state at the time and decide to pay less attention to the geopolitical messaging within the novel, but either way please do not buy it.
Thank you very much for reading the inaugural release of fumi! If you enjoyed it and have interesting books to recommend or want to share your thoughts on this article, feel free to shoot me a mail!