by Jonathan Hickman and Tomm Coker
I was recently made aware of this book as an antisemitic graphic novel. As a fan of Hickman, specifically his recent X-Men work, I was both startled and concerned that Black Monday Murders centered around a secret cabal of bankers who control the world’s finances. I read most of volume one, and unfortunately, there were enough antisemitic overtones to ring the alarm, make me nauseated, and put down the book – and Hickman’s works for good.
If this is unfamiliar to you, you may have heard stereotypes of Jews as bankers, money lenders, and in control of world events through finances. (One philanthropist often targeted is George Soros.) This is an antisemitic trope dating back to the 1900’s and the fabricated Protocols of the Elders of Zion. From the Wikipedia article:
The Protocols purports to document the minutes of a late-19th-century meeting attended by world Jewish leaders, the “Elders of Zion”, who are conspiring to take over the world. The forgery places in the mouths of the Jewish leaders a variety of plans, most of which derive from older antisemitic canards. For example, the Protocols includes plans to subvert the morals of the non-Jewish world, plans for Jewish bankers to control the world’s economies, plans for Jewish control of the press, and – ultimately – plans for the destruction of civilization
In Hickman’s secret cabal, one of the families is the Rothschild family. All the others are fictional. I cannot overstate how hugely problematic this is. The Rothschilds are a real family of Jewish bankers who have been targets of real antisemitism for centuries, most recently from Congresswoman Greene. Saying the Rothschild family – who are again, REAL JEWISH PEOPLE – are murderous “pure bloodline” devil worshippers who control the world’s wealth – which yes, all shows up in this book – is about as blatant antisemitism as it gets.
By the way, another cabal family’s surname is Ackermann, which is also an Ashkenazi (Eastern European) Jewish name.
Hickman even ties in Judas, centuries old antisemitism. This is not a matter of not doing enough research. It is doing exactly enough research to create a story absolutely undeniably antisemitic that Jews and more importantly white supremacists will understand.See more here.
THE LITERAL CHARACTER ON THE COVER HAS HORNS. WTF HICKMAN.
Listen, is there a possibility none of his is intentional? …Maybe. I’m willing to extend the benefit of the doubt to everything…except the Rothschilds. Who are real people. Who are constantly targeted for the exact conceit in this book. And any amount of research will show you that. There was no reason to use their name in this book if the rest of them are fictional. Absolutely none.
I am no longer reading comics by Jonathan Hickman.
And, Hickman: how fucking dare you. Comic books and the graphic novel genre were literally created by Jews because of antisemitism. University quotas and barring Jews from fields of work forced them into fields of publishing, pulp magazines, and yes, comic books. At the height of the Holocaust, a Jewish genocide rooted in conspiracy and scapegoat theories like the ones you peddle in this book. How. Fucking. Dare. You.
Reading Art 
you’re unhinged. maybe you should take a deep breath and realize it’s fiction and Jewish people are more than likely not offended by this… unless they’re looking for something to be triggered by.. story doesn’t actually mention anything about Judaism.. it does touch on black magic and demonic forces.. immortal beings and aliens..
take a friggin chill pill
I’m a Jew, will. I know more about antisemitism than you, I know it when I see it. I have been a victim of it and I’ve lost family because of it. And I’m not the only Jewish person talking about this comic book – another Jewish person told me about it. You seem to not understand the Rothschild family are Jews and this is a specific antisemitic trope for centuries and today. Including the Rothschilds IS mentioning Judaism. Something can be prejudiced without naming itself as such.
Again, it’s unfortunate that you seem more invested in protecting a book rather than acknowledging how it is harmful.
Also, telling a Jew to take “a chill pill” when antisemitism is on the rise around the world, during Jewish Heritage Month, is rich.
oh come on. this book is more about the race of lizard people trying to control the world, than anything religious. just because they have a jewish name doesnt mean the writer is talking shit on Jewish people as a whole.. just evil rich ones.. and it is satire.
im just sad you deleted my last post.. and that i’ll never know if the rothchilds take control over the immortal ruling classes.
the artwork is just fantastically creepy.
but yeah.. you should dig into the conspiracy side of things a bit more if you think those theories are antisemitic.. yes, the people on the surface level of these theories may very well be antisemitic.. but in all reality, it’s the Jesuits that are evil.
I think the last print of BMM points out evil has no race or religion.. as seen in the funeral scene.. with all races and religions being present(with their immortal evil people).
seriously.. its fiction. I’m glad you are speaking your mind.. and bringing up pertinent issues.. but maybe it’s just fiction.. and we could keep it at that.
Peace be with you
I didn’t delete your post. You commented on my About Me page. If you think antisemitism (or any form of prejudice) in fiction makes it harmless then I encourage you to do more learning. (And again please learn about how the Protocols of the Elders of Zion has been used to harm all Jews. The exclusion of lizard people doesn’t make it less antisemitic.) Antisemitic tropes especially in villains are common and it reinforces negative beliefs even subconsciously. It’s no different from racist, transphobic, etc tropes being used in fiction that can still create real harm.
The comic book medium was created by Jews to combat antisemitism and stand up to fascism. So when someone consciously or not uses it with antisemitic tropes I’m going to stand up for it.
I was interested to see this post, I’d quite enjoyed Manhattan Projects for a while – though manic psychedelia isn’t really my thing – but Black Monday Murders seemed much more up my street. And I immediately felt the same way, and the previous instance of concocting secret conspiracies (admittedly inter dimensional alien ones) around the Jews who built the bomb, along side this banking conspiracy trope was too much for me. It may be lazy writing, it may be a failure to realise that anyone takes the Jews rule the world through a secret government tropes seriously, but unfortunately they fuel the organised right wing globally. And the conflation of the PEZ tropes and the Ike-Lizard hypothesis comes straight from the alt-right. If it’s a satire of these things (and I recognise that there are clearly satirical drives in TMP), it’s difficult to see where the object of that satire is the conspiracy, or the conspiracy nuts, this feels much more like a right wing satire, using established anti-Semitic tropes to undermine ‘the establishment’ – but the presence of Jewish families, money and secret governance does not appear to be part of the satiric drive, rather the ‘factual’ scaffolding upon which the satiric / fictional conspiracies are hung in the two works. It made me uneasy enough for me to ask the opinion of the guy who ran my comic store, and on having it pointed out, he too was clearly disturbed by it. Having said that in the couple of years that have passed I’ve not really heard anyone else call it out until stumbling across this post. It may be a lazy accident, but it’s a dangerous one. More confirmation stories for budding nazis.
Oh wow, this one is blacklisted for me now. It’s almost painfully obvious what Hickman was trying to say with the comic and people like Will up there refusing to acknowledge it just infuriating.
I picked up the vol. 1 trade at the library today. A friend mentioned they’d been reading it — nothing more.
For me, the Rothschild name leaped out alarmingly in this story context. Haven’t had a chance to look at what’s known about the publication background yet, but I want to understand how this got out of the gate at Image and onto shelves — apparently with very little press comment so far.