The demon

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The Demon (Eng. The Demon , also Etrigan or Etrigan the Demon ) is the title of a series of comic publications that the US publisher DC Comics has been issuing since 1972.

The "The Demon" comics, which are about the adventures of the hell demon Etrigan and his human host, the obscurant Jason Blood, go back to the American author and illustrator Jack Kirby , who uses traditional elements of fantasy literature (knights, magicians , Dragons etc.) with themes of mysticism (hell, damnation, purgatory, demonism) and topoi of adventure history. This thematic mix has essentially been retained by all subsequent artists who have worked on The Demon .

Release dates

The first edition of the first series under the title The Demon came on the market in August – September 1972. This series, which appeared every two months, had only 16 issues before it was discontinued in 1974.

After several years of publication hiatus, four more The Demon stories were published in 1979 as backup stories in issues # 482 to # 485 of the Detective Comics series. A four-part miniseries followed in 1987, followed by six more stories in 1989, which appeared in issues # 636 to # 641 of the Action Comics Weekly anthology .

In 1990, DC finally decided to market the concept again as a continuous series: the series was restarted using the old title. This time it was published for almost five years, until 1995, and reached 59 issues as well as two special issues entitled Annuals. Authors of this series were first the Scot Alan Grant (1990-1993) and later the Irish Garth Ennis (1993-1995). The drawings were done by Val Semeiks (1990–1993) and John McCrea (1993–1995). A spin-off series that emerged from this interpretation of The Demon was the Hitman series , which contains the solo adventures of the hit man Tommy Monaghan, a supporting character in the Demon comics.

After an eight-year release hiatus, the six-part mini-series The Demon followed in 2003/2004 . Driven out . Subsequently, from 2005 to July 2006, DC presented the 17-part series Blood of the Demon written and drawn by John Byrne , which is the last publication in the series to date.

action

In most versions of the story, the plot of the Etrigan comics has its starting point in the legendary Middle Ages of the legend of the English knight king Arthur . The scenario of the traditional folk saga about Artur, the magician Merlin and the knights of the round table is assumed to be generally known and, without much further explanation, is linked to the premise of the old English myth complex: Etrigan comes on the scene as he from the wise Merlin is conjured up by means of a spell to help defend the ruling seat of his king, the legendary Camelot Castle, besieged by his arch enemy, the witch Morgan le Fay .

When Camelot threatens to succumb despite Etrigan's intervention against the hostile superiority, Merlin binds Etrigan with a spell to the soul of the mortal man named Jason (Iason) Blood, in whose soul Etrigan is trapped from now on. Blood's origins fluctuate: While in some versions he was created by Merlin through magic, in other versions he is a normal man whom the magician punishes by spell or even one of fate for his betrayal of Artur and his collaboration with Morgana the world set man with the predestination to become a human “host” or “dungeon” for Etrigan. In the end, however, all variants come to the same result: Merlin gives Blood - which is optically endowed with various attributes of “cursedness” (fiery red hair with a white “Scheif” running through it, gloomy, black eyes, a “dark presence “) - against his will immortality, so that he is forced to live for many centuries until the modern present.

Etrigan resides most of the time, reduced to a ghostly form of existence, in Blood's soul / spirit / head, as a kind of inner monologue partner or "inner devil" with Blood, mocks, insults and provokes him and tries to influence him, especially his to achieve own release. Blood, however, mostly denies the demon freedom and holds him as a prisoner. Sometimes, however, he sets the demon free by a spell, so that Etrigan can walk on earth again, while Blood is transported as a ghostly being inside it by magic.

Etrigan's evocation is achieved by Blood using a magical formula, which is achieved by saying the words “ Change! Change, O form of man! / Release the might from fleshy mire! / Boil the blood in heart of fire! / Gone! Gone! - the form of man - / Rise, the Demon Etrigan !! “Is carried out. (An alternative version of the invocation verse is " Yarva Demonicus Etrigan./ Change, change the form of man./ Free the prince forever damned./ Free the might from fleshy mire./ Boil the blood in heart of fire./ Gone, gone the form of man, / Rise the demon Etrigan! "). In the German versions, various loan translations were used, such as " Soft, soft son of man / Make way for the power of hell unleashed / Away with you, Oh Erdenmann, rise from the orcus - demon Etrigan. Another translation read: “ Soft, soft human form / Set forces free enormous / Boil, blood in the heart of fire / Make me a monster / A demon will turn the man / Etrigan! “In Batman: The Brave and the Bold , Etrigan appeared in Trials of the Demon . The incantation there read: "Go away, go away, you human form, Etrigan arise by force!"