Let There Be Rao

For once, or at least for twice or thrice, there's some real mythmaking going on in modern comics. Like Geoff Johns' delightful Blackest Night series, in which theories on death, resurrection, and the source of all life are bandied about between all-out brawls, the current storyline in Action Comics reflects a genuine interest in expanding the mythic aspect of comic storytelling that makes the books, in my opinion, true to their oral and folkloric roots.

Flamebird and Nightwing, the yin and yang of Kryptonian creation myth, explore their ancient manifestations in the new AC issue via that ever-useful Krypton crystal technology. At long last, we learn the full pre-history of the Kryptonian race, with Rao himself taking center-stage, in a Tolkien-esque exposition replete with beautiful images of the universal fires that predate existence and a truly traditional love triangle myth that explains the introduction of discord into Rao's perfect order. Vohc-the-Builder creates and the Flamebird destroys in a lovely allegory of the Vishnu/Shiva universal balance motif that permeates so much of global mythology.

But the balance tips with the introduction of a third party to serve as Rao-the-Father's "Eyes in the Night," known as the Nightwing. The resulting conflict tears the cosmic family apart and leads to the creation of the terrible Phantom Zone. An eternal prison of spiritual torment (Hell) is born out of the jealous spite of an overweaning servant (Lucifer) of the supreme deity (God-the-Father). There were moments in AC #886 that felt like reading the Old Testament, Hesiod, or Ovid, and that's really freakin' cool.