Thursday 1 March 2012

The Eye Of The Pyramid

What Happened Between Issues Twenty & Twenty-One (Swords Of Cerebus Vol 3, 1981)
Art by Dave Sim & Gene Day


JEFF TUNDIS:
(from the introduction to the 4-page Conspiracy comic, Cerebus The Newsletter #14, 2009)
The Eye Of The Pyramid is a plot that was never quite resolved. Based on The Illuminatus Trilogy by Robert Shea and Robert Anton Wilson, it wove a web through the early issues of Cerebus. A war of conspiracies drawing in Lord Julius' Social Secretary (from issues 15 & 16), Adam Weisshaupt (an actual historical figure and founder of the Bavarian Illuminatti fictionalised in the book series), the Cirinists, the Illusionists (there's even one named Shea in the city of Togith) the mysterious Mr Strangis, Astoria, Michelle and (based on the password to his safe house in What Happened Between Issues Twenty & Twenty-One) Gerrik.

While Dave Sim abandoned the plot thread (and several others) in favour of the more complex political and religious issues including the evolving Cirinist-Kevillist conflict, I suspect that Gerrik was actually the leader of The Eye. Both embittered by his upbringing and empowered by his familial ties, he's the perfect mole to bring about the fall of not only his mother's expanding empire but Palnu and Iest as well. By bringing in Astoria (whose ambition knows no bounds), however, he probably doomed himself... because in Women, it appears that she is the leader of an exclusively female Eye Of The Pyramid and Gerrik is never heard from again.

Order your copy of Cerebus The Newsletter #14 and read Jeff Tundis' Conspiracy, featuring Astoria and Sir Gerrik.

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