Sunday, August 11, 2013

Clash Of The Theologies!!

You know whom you don't mess with?

You don't mess with Ibis the freakin' Invincible, that's who!!

An ancient Egyptian prince, given the all-powerful Ibisstick by the god Thoth, puts himself into suspended animation for 4,000 years so he can be with his cursed lady love, awakens in modern day to fight Nazis and crooks...that's pretty badass. Especially when your gimmick, the Ibistick, can do literally anything.

So what do you do if you're Ibis and the war ends? Why, with no more Nazis to smite, he goes after demons! Specifically, he's going after one of Lucifer's top lieutenants, Azaroth:


Now, you really don't want to get on Ibis' bad side...



OMG, he went full Live And Let Die on that demon!! And just causally turned his back and walked away while he 'sploded!!!

That, my friends, is badass.

But the rest of Hell's denizens aren't about to take this lying down, as Lucifer has a task for Beelzebub!

So, some overly-complicated time traveling leads Beelzebub to a second Ibisstick that was sealed inside an ancient pyramid. Armed with the all-powerful weapon, it is GAME. ON.


D'oh!! But whereas Ibis is just a man without his Ibisstick, Beelzebub has other resources he can call upon:

Everyone, please utter these words at work tomorrow...

Anyway, this leaves Ibis in a pretty tight situation:


Well, game over then, right?

No, because Beelzebub forgot to read the fine print!



So the power of the ancient Egyptian gods trumps that of Christian demons! That opens a theological can of worms...

And the moral of our story?

Ibis, you have the power to take out Lucifer, and you don't do it? "I'll get around to that someday"?? Dude, get off your lazy ass and take out the source of all evil!! Go!!

Nope, instead he uses his powers later in the issue to fight the "fairy genii" and the "Loch Ness Dragon" (which he kills!!). But Lucifer? He just goes on his merry evil-making way. Thanks for nothing, Ibis!!

From Ibis The Invincible #5 (1946)

2 comments:

Sean Levin said...

Long-time reader, first-time commenter. Worth pointing out that
"Yor Dla" is Roy Ald spelled backwards. Roy was an editor at Fawcett. The "Llednew" is probably a nod to Wendell Crowley, another Fawcett editor.

Martin Gray said...

Ibis is so cool, there's plenty of time to beat the devil! I wonder if he went out shopping for turbans with Sargon.