Reviews with content warning for Forced institutionalization - From Hell: Volume one

Just because you’re self aware you’re not completely absolved.

This is my introduction to Alan Moore who’s a legend in the world of comics. I feel like I’m committing a sacrilege as a comics fan by giving this a bad review but I’m pretty sure even fans of this comic will understand my reasons.

I’ll start with some positives. I appreciate the level of detail put into this by Moore and Campbell. They have recreated the known facts of the case down to the smallest detail. I’m impressed by the level of care and effort.

But I personally don’t like Campbell’s art style. It’s not that it’s bad and I understand why others would like it. But I personally find it both too detailed and not detailed enough. I appreciate the effort Campbell went through basing his art on old photographs of the period. But I had trouble telling what things were on multiple occasions. Often a character would appear and I would not recognize their face.

Now onto Alan Moore’s writing which requires going into the plot. From Hell is about the murders of Jack the Ripper. In 1888, five women were brutally murdered in the Whitechapel district of London and the killer remains unidentified to this day. From Hell depicts the Royal Conspiracy mostly based on the work of Stephen Knight. Basically the story goes that Prince Albert Victor (Grandson of Queen Victoria, and second in line for the throne) conducted a secret marriage with a commoner named Annie Crook and had a child with her. When the Queen found out she had Annie committed to a mental institution. A group of Whitechapel women attempted to blackmail the crown and in response Victoria ordered her personal doctor William Gull to get rid of the women. He murdered them and the crimes were attributed to Jack the Ripper. There’s also a bunch of stuff about Freemasons (who pop up in pretty much every conspiracy theory).

I’m just going to say this theory is ludicrous and I’ll tell you why. The royals would not respond this way if the prince conducted a secret marriage and produced a child. I know because pretty much the same situation happened to Victoria’s uncle King George IV. When George was still a prince he conducted a secret marriage with a Catholic (according to Knight’s original theory Crook was a Catholic which is why the secret marriage was such a big deal but for some reason that’s not mentioned in From Hell) woman named Maria Fitzherbert and according to some sources the two had children. Fitzherbert wasn’t committed to an asylum and as far as we know nobody was killed to keep the secret of the marriage. It was completely unnecessary. Any marriage conducted without the approval of the reigning monarch would be invalid. Even if the marriage was approved George would be disinherited immediately for marrying a Catholic. The same would go for Albert Victor.

If Mary Kelly and her friends attempted to blackmail the royal family it would’ve gone nowhere. They had no proof and this was in the days before DNA testing. Anybody could claim they had a secret child with a royal. Even Albert Victor after his death would be accused of fathering a different child out of wedlock.

I’m curious whether or not Moore believes this theory. In his lengthy appendix at the end of the book he presents all the sources he used for research. Half of the time he seems to be pointing out how ridiculous and unrealistic the theory is. But the other half of the time it seems he’s making excuses for it.

That’s the main issue I have with From Hell. It feels like Moore wants to have it both ways. He wants to condemn people sensationalizing the story of Jack the Ripper and dressing it up in “supernatural twaddle” while at the same time doing the exact same thing. He’s self-aware of it and I appreciate that but being self-aware does not absolve you. In his Appendix II at the end he points out how previous theories usually involve Mary Kelly being involved in some wrongdoing because it was assumed she must’ve done something to warrant her brutal death and dismemberment. Moore condemns this but in his story Mary Kelly is a blackmailer which results in her being killed. Moore is still depicting Kelly as being somewhat responsible for her own death instead of showing the truth that she was an innocent woman brutally killed.

Moore does focus more on the victims than other media based on Jack the Ripper but it’s still a pretty uneven split. So as previously mentioned in From Hell, the killer is William Withey Gull, personal physician to the queen. Gull was a real person and from all accounts not only a talented doctor but an alright person. He was an early supporter of women in medicine which is quite the contrast to his depiction in From Hell where he’s depicted as a misogynistic killer of women. Moore uses Gull’s own biography written by his son-in-law but twists the information to fit his theories.

Again although Moore does focus a bit more on the victims than other previous works about Jack the Ripper he still spends a lot more focus on the killer. The murders and dismemberment usually happen off panel but when we get to Mary Kelly’s murder (the most brutal by far) we spend a whole chapter focusing on her brutal dismemberment where everything is shown. Moore says in his appendix that he did this so we could see the human body maybe the way the killer saw it. He wanted us to view the wonder of the human body from a non-emotional place. I understand the intention but the problem I have with that is, Mary Kelly was a real person and what was done to her was horrible. We already view her dismemberment unemotionally enough because previous Jack the Ripper media has taken away her humanity. If Moore wanted to show us the wonder of the human body I suggest he should’ve had a scene where Abberline talks to the coroner while he dissects an unnamed body of someone who died of natural causes.

After Gull dies we get this whole chapter of him ascending. This is the part that really upsets me. Moore is so close to making something really unique and groundbreaking and different from all the other accounts of Jack the Ripper but here’s where he fails. We have this whole chapter of Gull ascending and traveling through time and space where he sees future serial killers like Ian Brady and Myra Hindley and Peter Sutcliffe. It’s giving much more attention to the murderers than to the victims. Why don’t instead we see Mary Kelly ascending and meeting Elizabeth Short or other famous murder victims?

Moore says in Appendix II that he didn’t originally want to write about Jack the Ripper because he thought it was “too played out”. I think his initial reservations might’ve been correct as I don’t think he adds anything new to the vast array of media about Jack the Ripper.

I'm giving this a 1.75 out of 5 stars. I appreciate the effort but I think Moore really needed to say something new to justify this book.

Content Warnings

amvera's review against another edition

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dark informative mysterious reflective medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A

5.0

I read Moore's Watchmen last year and was really looking forward to reading more of his work.

Knowing very little about the Whitechapel Murders, this book was a very good introduction to the subject. Extremely graphic too, so beware! I appreciated the appendices at the end which explain a lot of details that might not come as obvious to someone not familiar with Victorian London (or London all together), with many expressions, the author's though process and the choices made in different panels throughout the book. That was clever and of great help!

Content Warnings

taleofabibliophile's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.25

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