“The power of sequential art compels you!”: exorcism in comics

While comics abounds with stories of possession, be it from supernatural or alien entities, the tropes tend to involve finding a technical device or a magical object to free the spirit of possessed. It can also involve finding the weakness of the visitor (e.g., Spiderman and his symbiote costume) or getting rid of the unwanted entity and the receptacle at the same time. The act of casting out the undesired entity within a religious paradigm has attracted some attention with charismatic characters who can cast out the invading spirit through their own power (e.g., John Constantine and Daimon Hellstrom), almost like Christ and various powerful Catholic Saints (e.g., St. Francis of Assisi and St Anthony of Padua). Other devices involve mystical arts such as magical rituals or incantations, but less about Abrahamic religious rituals (in Anglo-Saxon comics) or Shinto and Buddhist rituals (in manga). Drawing on a sample of horror-themed Anglo-Saxon and Belgo-French comics, and manga, this chapter investigates the place of charismatic power in comic character and the negative portrayal of institutionalized priests.