Crossover of the Week

Winter 2005

BETTER THE DEVIL 

The members of Caballistics, Inc. must find who is targeting the organization for extermination. Appearing or mentioned are: the Templars Resurgent; the Starry Wisdom; Delta Green; the Cult of the Black Sun; Hobb’s End; the British Rocket Group; the Wild Hunt; The Carnacki-Silence spectrum generator; the Lamp of Alhazred; Exham Priory; Drax Industries; Flaxton Hall; Cavorite; Wenley Moor; Norrell; Stable Mews; Steed; the Ministry; Frank Marker; Arthur Daley; “Randall and...a partner’s name that had been scrubbed out long ago”; and the Brigadier. 

Novel by Mike Wild, 2000 AD, 2007. The Templars Resurgent are a reference to the Templi Resurgentes Equites Synarchici from Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum. The Starry Wisdom Church is from H. P. Lovecraft’s “The Haunter of the Dark.” Exham Priory is from Lovecraft’s “The Rats in the Walls.” Delta Green is from the titular supplement for the role-playing game Call of Cthulhu. The Cult of the Black Sun is a CU version of the group seen in Grant Morrison and Steve Yeowell’s superhero comic Zenith. Hobb’s End and the Wild Hunt are from the movie Quatermass and the Pit. Professor Bernard Quatermass is the head of the British Experimental Rocket Group. The Carnacki-Silence spectrum generator is named after the title characters of William Hope Hodgson’s Carnacki, the Ghost-Finder and Algernon Blackwood’s John Silence. The Lamp of Alhazred is from August Derleth’s titular Cthulhu Mythos story. Drax Industries is from the film version of Ian Fleming’s James Bond novel Moonraker. Flaxton Hall is from the television series The Flaxton Boys. Cavorite is from H. G. Wells’ The First Men in the Moon. Wenley Moor is from the Doctor Who serial “Doctor Who and the Silurians.” The Brigadier is the Doctor’s ally, Brigadier Alistair Lethbridge-Stewart. Norrell is Gilbert Norrell from Susanna Clarke’s alternate history fantasy novel Jonathan Strange & Mr. Norrell. Wild describes Norrell as having “a kind of otherworldliness,” implying he comes from an alternate universe. In the television series The Avengers, Ministry agent John Steed lived at 3 Stable Mews. Frank Marker is from the TV series Public Eye. Arthur Daley is from the show Minder. “Randall and...a partner’s name that had been scrubbed out long ago” refers to the show Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). 

This crossover writeup is one of hundreds included in my book Crossovers Expanded: A Secret Chronology of the World Volume 3, which will be published by Meteor House! All three volumes are AUTHORIZED companions to Win Scott Eckert's Crossovers: A Secret Chronology of the World Volumes 1 and 2!