Nobody Was Ready for Grant Morrison’s Most Personal Superhero Story, But Time Proved It Was a Classic
Grant Morrison is one of the most beloved creators in the history of the comic industry. Morrison began their career in the UK and was lucky enough to be chosen to meet with DC brass Jeanette Kahn and Dick Giordano, becoming a part of the late ’80s British Invasion. This meeting led to Animal Man and the rest is history. Since then, the Scottish scribe has worked with every major American comic company and has become a superstar known for their work on Batman, Superman, the Doom Patrol, Animal Man, the X-Men, the Justice League, and amazing creator-owned work like The Invisibles, among others. Morrison found success at every company they went to, but they were especially known for their work at DC Comics, helping change comics forever.
Morrison was one of the pioneers of Vertigo, their work paving the way for the imprint. Their work at Vertigo was much more personal; while all writers include pieces of themselves in their work, it’s easy to figure out what Morrison was into at any given time by reading their work. The Invisibles was a deeply personal work, for example, dealing with the writer’s own beliefs in the paranormal and view of the world and you honestly felt like you were getting to know them with their work. Eventually, Morrison fans would get a book that was honestly pretty explicitly autobiographical, reuniting the writer with one of their most beloved creations in a collaboration with an artist who would become their greatest partner: Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery. In 2026, this book is a cherished part of the Morrison canon but 30 years ago, it was an entirely different story.
Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery Seemed Destined to Fail
The Doom Patrol contained some of Morrison’s best stories and is one of the main reasons they became the star they are today. This series was the most bizarre superhero book of the late ’80s, which is honestly saying something, with Morrison pulling ideas from numerous places. Flex Mentallo is a perfect example of this. Introduced in issue #42, titled “Musclebound”, Flex was a character that anyone who had read old Silver and Bronze Age comics could recognize. He was based on the old Charles Atlas ads, which promised to take you from nerd to hulking muscleman. Flex was given a book that taught him the power of muscle mystery, allowing him to flex his muscles in such a way that manipulated reality.
Flex was a fun character in a fun book and fans loved him. Morrison’s run on Doom Patrol ended in 1993 and it wouldn’t be until 1996 that Flex returned in Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery, with Morrison joined by fellow Scot Frank Quitely on pencils. The story would dig into Flex’s origin – he was a fictional character created by Wallace Sage, a metahuman who was plugged into the Telephone Avatar – except in this book, all of Flex’s superhero adventures had happened. Meanwhile, in the “real world”, Wallace Sage is a superstar artist and he wants to kill himself. The story weaves back and forth between Flex looking his friend the Fact and Sage talking about his life on a suicide hotline.
The story is fantastic; the Flex parts are a love letter to comic history, each issue dipping into a different era of comics. Meanwhile, the Sage portions of the story are about an artist coming to terms with where their ideas came from. Morrison based Sage in this comic on themselves, using their own childhood and teen years in the story. It’s a deep, layered comic that has connected with fans since its first reprinting in the early ’10s. Now, I know what you’re thinking – why did it almost 20 years for a ’90s Grant Morrison comic, when they were at the height of their sales powers, to get reprinted? Well, that’s because it was a fantastic failure.
To start with, it was about a lower-level character that no one had seen for years. It also came out right before JLA dropped, which was the book that really made them into a superstar. However, that wasn’t the biggest problem. The Charles Atlas estate found out about the book and decided to sue DC. This hurt the book immensely; the publisher ended up barely sending any copies out and weren’t allowed to reprint it after Morrison became even more popular in the late ’90s. You couldn’t find the book anywhere on the aftermarket; I should know, I looked for years. DC finally reprinting it was a godsend, because it gave Morrison fans who couldn’t find the book a chance to read it. It’s now rightly lauded as a masterpiece.
Flex Mentallo Has Become An Important Part of the Morrison Mythos
Grant Morrison’s career is almost as interesting as their books. Morrison is a chaos magician with a grudge with Alan Moore; you can write books just about the things they’ve said in interviews (and if anyone wants to pay me to do it, sound off in the comments). I’ve always been something of a Morrison connoisseur and for a long time Flex Mentallo was one of my holy grails. When I finally got to read it, I was blown away by it, while also completely understanding the failure of the book. It can be inscrutable even if you like Morrison and knowing the writer’s history helps make the book that much better; without that knowledge, you might not be able to get into it.
In 1996, Flex Mentallo got hit with a perfect storm that no one could have expected. Flex Mentallo had existed for three years, so the Atlas estate finally taking action was a shock for everyone. Morrison was about to hit the next level in 1996, and this book could have been a huge part of their coronation. However, the whole situation with the Atlas estate and the fact that the character hadn’t been thought of in years put the nail in its coffin. Flex Mentallo: Man of Muscle Mystery almost died before it ever had a chance to fly, which would have been a terrible tragedy for fans.
