Chissà cosa ne pensa Justin Bieber (alias Sprite) d'essere vissuto eternamente...

Gli umani erano più
semplici, allora, più piccoli,
più stupidi, ma i celestiali
ne intravidero il potenziale,
sapevano cosa sarebbero
potuti diventare un giorno. (pagina sconosciuta)

Anche lassù si sbaglia...

Quando parlavo,
le parole stavano
ad ascoltare, e quando
tacevo, i venti solari ces-
savano di soffiare per
timore di disturbare
i miei pensieri. (pagina sconosciuta)

E scusate se è poco...

I confini
delle nazioni sono linee
tracciate sulla sabbia. Gli
imperi sorgono e crollano.
Noi siamo senza tempo.
Saremo qui ancora domani
e per centinaia di
secoli da ora. (pagina sconosciuta ...probabilmente lo resterà in eterno).

Sicuramente gli Eterni, arrivati sulla Terra diecimila anni fa (appena, così per dire, dopo l'ultima glaciazione) si sono persi la lettura de La nausea di Sartre.
( )

I grabbed this version of the Eternals to give myself a heads up on the upcoming movie and picked the Gaiman reboot since I’ve read lots of his stuff. There are 100 seemingly immortal beings living on Earth, but they don’t remember and live like ordinary humans. The comic deals with one that hasn’t forgotten, and he is waking the others to deal with the Dreaming Celestial that is sleeping near SF. The best way to do that is to keep it sleeping. This gave me enough of a background that I should do fine with the movie. I may see if the library has the Jack Kirby run of this since it was his baby. ( )

Last time I read this graphic novel it was simply because I was devouring everything that Neil Gaiman had ever written (a typical pursuit for any author that I’m obsessed with), but unfortunately this was prior to the Marvel Cinematic Universe coming into fruition and not having read most (or much at all) of the Marvel canon, I had essentially no context for the story at all. Come to think of it, I probably only knew Spider-man and the X-Men at that point, neither of whom feature into this narrative of the Eternals at all. Whoops. But, having now seen almost all of the current Marvel films as well as the cinematic adaptation of the Eternals, I actually found this story to be quite readable. It’s still a lot more super-hero-y than I’m used to getting from Neil Gaiman (I fell in love with his Vertigo lines long ago and can’t get enough), but this was still a fun romp through the exceedingly complicated Eternals storylines. Gaiman writes of a new awakening of the group and challenges them to grapple with their unexpected powers and purpose in the universe, a seemingly self-explanatory narrative that should play out nicely. Unfortunately, I feel like the whole thing was a few degrees short of well done, but I can’t quite put my finger on why. Maybe the cast of characters was too large and it needed focusing, or maybe the background of the Eternals was too complex to really flesh out alongside the inevitable action sequences and character introductions. Yet, the kernels of an epic story are here, and we can see a clear line of influence towards what became the modern cinematic story of the Eternals: focus the characters a touch more and give them a goal to work towards, and you have a pretty solid addition to the Marvel universe. ( )

Good storyline, decent art. ( )

You would think if any combination of creators could do justice to the concept of an immortal set of warriors placed on Earth to protect mankind it would be Gaiman and Romita; but this 2006 reboot just falls short.

While there are some great character moments, an interesting plot, all supported by some impressive art I feel it’s handcuffed by it being tied into the larger events of the Marvel Universe that were happening at the time, the Civil War throughline in particular.

I would have liked to see what Gaiman and Romita could have done if given free-reign to go totally cosmic with the original concept. ( )