Review of Jonah Hex (2010) by Shiira — 12 Aug 2010

From his 2008 novel "Man in the Dark", Paul Auster writes: "In the men's room, he finally took the trouble to examine the money and was encouraged to see the face of Ulysees S. Grant engraved on the front of the bill.

" Owen Brick, the man in the dark, wakes up one day, inexplicably, staring up from a hole. In the other America, there was no 9/11, no war with Iraq. This America of August Brill's making has state after state breaking away from the union after George W.

Bush was sworn into office. And while some things may remain the same(Grant on the fifty-dollar bill), there are differences that makes this "weird world roll on." The weird world rolls on in "Jonah Hex", too.

Set in the civil war, this alternative western, because of its graphic novel pedigree, doesn't play like a descendant of Ned Buntline's play about Buffalo Bill("The Scouts of the Prairie"), and the "shoot 'em up" novels of Zane Grey and Max Brand, which lent the film genre its template.

Because Jonah Hex(Josh Brolin) was originally a comic book character, not only is the cowboy an anti-hero; he's also an anti-superhero, as well. He has two daddies: John Wayne and Superman. When President Grant asks for the services of the confederate soldier-turned-bounty hunter, it's like Jimmy Carter forming a partnership with The Man of Steel, had Richard Lester's "Superman" employed the former peanut farmer instead of a generic commander-in-chief.

In this other America, Eli Whitney left behind plans for fiery orange balls, and it's of considerable significance that Colonel Turnbull carries out Whitney's superweapon designs to fruition. The science is incongruous to its time period.

American Atheist leader Maddalyn Murray O'Hair often liked to say that we'd have a man on the moon, as early as the nineteenth century, was it not for the church's influence. That's why the science in "Jonah Hex" fascinates.

The scientifically advanced cannonball hints at the absence of god. This other America has the potential of putting a man on the moon; this other America with its alternative Eli Whitney, presumably has an alternative Leonardo DaVinci, as well.