THE X-AXIS
2 March 2008
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This week:
X-MEN: FIRST CLASS #9
"The New Recruit"
by Jeff Parker, Julia Bax, Kris Justice and Roger Cruz
"How The Black Widow Got Her Mod Look"
by Jeff Parker and Colleen Coover
X-MEN: LEGACY #208 - "From Genesis to Revelations"
by Mike Carey, John Romita Jr, Scot Eaton, Klaus Janson and
John Dell
KICK-ASS #1
by Mark Millar, John Romita Jr and Tom Palmer
RASL #1
by Jeff Smith
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X-MEN: FIRST CLASS can be a strange book, sometimes. Notionally, it's
written in the margins of the Silver Age X-Men run, but in practice it
plays fast and loose with the source material. That's an understandable
choice; the early issues haven't aged especially well, although they did
contain plenty of ideas with potential.
So, First Class has been steadily developing its own parallel version of
the Silver Age, in which the X-Men have much more clearly defined
characters, and Jean Grey gets to be a stronger presence. In the
original series, frankly, she's the token girl, and not much more. That
clearly won't fly today, so Parker has been writing her as a younger
version of Chris Claremont's Jean, and given her a completely new
friend****p with the Scarlet Witch, shoved a little awkwardly into the
gap before Wanda joined the Avengers.
Jean and Wanda have appeared in some lovely back-up strips with art by
Colleen Coover, but with issue #9 they make the jump to the main story.
The X-Men's role is rather marginal in this issue. The plot involves the
recently-defected Black Widow trying to recruit Wanda for ****ELD, and
not getting very far. Jean and Wanda are both a little too nice to sign
up for a life of espionage.
Given that First Class has a rather relaxed attitude to continuity, it's
something of a surprise to see the Black Widow wearing her faintly
ridiculous original costume, which featured fishnets and a cape. It was
dumped early, in favour of a mod jumpsuit, and quite right too. Parker
and Coover contribute a one-page back-up strip in which Jean and Wanda
inspire the Widow to change her costume, but it would have been a better
call just to use the mod outfit in the lead story. After all, the Black
Widow's purpose in this story is to symbolise the alternative world of
espionage. The mod outfit works for that; the original costume makes
Natasha look like just another superhero.
But leaving that odd costume choice aside, this is another fine issue.
The actual Marvel Silver Age comics were decidedly light on girl power
stories, even in the earliest form - most of Stan Lee's heroines had to
wait for later writers to give them a backbone, and Jean didn't get one
until the late seventies. Jeff Parker, and artist Julia Bax, are
inserting the kind of story that, with the benefit of hindsight, the
Silver Age should have included. It's a straight action story with
characters who were horribly underused back in the day, and Parker's
revisionist take on these characters has definitely done them a favour.
Rating: B+
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Apparently we're meant to call the post-"Messiah Complex" stories
"Divided We Stand." It's easy to forget, as the DWS logo is the size of
a postage stamp and tends to get lost on the cover.
But the last DWS title is X-MEN: LEGACY #208, the first issue of Mike
Carey's retitled X-Men series. Reading between the lines, it seems that
part of the aim here is to draw a clearer distinction between the
various X-Men titles and explain why we need three of them. But we
plainly don't need three monthly X-Men titles, and so X-Men has now
become... something else.
Quite what exactly, I'm not sure. I can tell you what's in this issue.
At the end of "Messiah Complex", Professor X was shot in the head. It
turns out that the Acolytes spirited his body away, and they're trying
to save his life, on the reasonable grounds that the surviving mutants
can't afford to lose such a major player. But Xavier's mind is a bit of
a mess now that a bullet's been through it, and so Exodus is trying his
best to put it back together.
The resulting story is a mixture of Xavier having semi-random flashbacks
about the early days of the X-Men, and the Acolytes standing around in
one of those chrome-and-concrete bases that villains are so fond of
these days. Considering that these people like dressing up in
brightly-coloured leotards, you'd think they'd have some more
interesting taste in interior decor. But I digress.
John Romita draws the flashback scenes, while Scot Eaton covers the
Acolytes. This isn't simply an allocation of pages; at times, the art
swaps back and forth from panel to panel. It's sensible casting; Eaton
is an acceptable house-style superhero artist, who provides a solid
contrast for Romita's more expressive work. And in fairness to Eaton,
he does get some variation into a string of conversation scenes.
The central idea is to present us with a series of flashbacks that cast
doubt on Xavier's motivations for forming the team - or at least suggest
that Xavier is doubting himself. It's not an exercise in wholesale
revisionism, so much as a gentle teasing out of the inconsistencies in
the original idea. Despite his talk about peace and harmony, all Xavier
actually does to achieve it is to set up a private army. The suggestion
is that, at least to some extent, Xavier has been indulging his own ego
and creating his own myth; and now, over the last couple of years, it's
all fallen apart.
Incidentally, as Carey promised in interviews, the story is light on
actual continuity. Nothing here depends on specific stories; it's all
based on very familiar aspects of continuity, all of which are explained
clearly enough for new readers. The only arguable exception is a
passing allusion to Cyclops' history with Mr Sinister, but new readers
won't be lost.
Now, this is certainly an interesting direction for the character. There
have been problems with the idea of Xavier as a saint ever since 1970,
and the ill-conceived "I was hiding in the basement all the time" retcon
- which wasn't supposed to make him a heartless bastard, but
unintentionally did. Xavier's not perfect, and the idea of the X-Men
moving on without him, leaving him without his accustomed role, has
plenty of story potential. I'm intrigued as to where Carey is heading
with this plot.
What I don't get is X-Men: Legacy as a title. It surely can't be an
entire ongoing series about Professor X having flashbacks, can it? Is
it an all-purpose dumping ground for backwards-looking stories? I'm
just a bit lost as to what the premise is meant to be, once we get
beyond the immediate story.
But we can worry about the bigger picture when we get there. Carey's
interest in the X-Men's mythology (and even, most unfa****onably, its
continuity) has been a notable feature of his stories, and he's probably
been the most successful of the current writers in building on what came
before. For the old-school X-Men fan, this looks like being a great
story.
Rating: A-
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Mark Millar tends to play the underdog when promoting KICK-ASS, claiming
that it doesn't have Marvel's marketing machine behind it. On the one
hand, that's a little bit disingenuous. It's on the website, it's in
the catalogue; that's a pretty big promotional push in its own right,
compared with an indie book. On the other hand, you could say the same
thing about Marvel Illustrated: The Iliad, so it's not as though Millar
is being completely unreasonable.
Still, he's gone to some lengths to promote Kick-Ass himself,
distributing viral videos pur****ting to feature the lead character.
Sometimes, Millar's self-promotion can grate a little bit, but in this
case, I'll give him credit - if nothing else, it's more innovative than
just doing another Newsarama interview.
Millar likes his high concepts. The high concept here is "What if
superheroes existed in the real world?", which has been done a thousand
times before. However, it usually involves somebody in the "real world"
getting superpowers.
This book takes a less familiar road (although I'm pretty sure it's not
unprecedented). Dave Lizewski is a normal teenage boy, inspired by
comic books to become a superhero and do good. Unfortunately, he doesn't
actually have any powers or abilities. But that's not going to stop him
from putting on a make****ft costume and going on Neighbourhood Watch
patrol.
According to Millar, this is not a cynical comic. By his standards,
he's right. Mind you, it's not as bright and ****ny as his Fantastic
Four either. But it's basically a story about a well-meaning kid who
decides to go out there and do good. Millar's Ultimate Defenders were
not dissimilar, in concept, and he treated them as a joke - a pathetic
bunch of wannabes. In contrast, Dave is pitched quite emphatically as a
good citizen who's going to start some sort of movement. He's trying to
bring something better into the real world, and we're plainly meant to
root for him when it goes wrong.
It's also surprisingly light on those self-congratulatory "isn't this a
great idea" moments that usually litter Millar's stories, as I mentioned
in my Fantastic Four review a couple of weeks ago. There's still a bit
of awkward shorthand, but Millar's suppressed a lot of his writing tics
here, and he's better for it.
John Romita draws this issue as well, with a slightly softer quality
than I'm used to seeing from him. He wisely steers clear of drawing
Dave as a proper superhero, but makes him make****ft without being
entirely ridiculous. He goes to town as normal with the action scenes,
mind you, which seems a little bit at odds with the premise.
Does it work? Yes, for the most part it does, but there's a little bit
of smoke and mirrors going on. We've got a lead character who decides
to go and be a real-life superhero for no terribly obvious reason.
Millar is at pains to stress that the character doesn't have a proper
origin story, presumably in order to play up the idea that he's "real."
But that just begs the question: why is a boy who has been so clearly
set up as a Normal Teenager, and who has nothing even remotely
approaching an "inciting event", suddenly deciding to do something that
nobody in the real world has ever been mad enough to attempt? There's
an obvious credibility problem in here, and while Millar and Romita
skilfully disguise it, I'm not convinced they've actually answered it.
That's my main reservation here.
Still, I have to admit I rather liked it. Steve Niles is going a bit
overboard with his cover quote ("Kick-Ass is exactly what this industry
needs"), but it works. I'm not quite sure what you do with it as an
ongoing series, but it's a good first issue, and I'll give Millar a
chance to see where he's going with it.
Rating: B+
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RASL is pronounced "Rassle", apparently. I though I'd mentioned that at
the outset, just in case any confusion otherwise marred your reading
enjoyment.
This is the long-awaited new series by Jeff Smith, the man who brought
you Bone. That book was one of the most successful indie comics of the
last decade, so there's a lot of interest in what Smith does next. And
what he's produced is a 32-page black and white series about an
interdimensional art thief.
RASL is a guy who steals paintings, leaving his eponymous tag behind,
and then escapes by jumping away through the "drift." Unfortunately,
this process isn't quite as easy as it sounds; not only does it involve
a wonderfully cumbersome contraption, but it hurts like hell, which
means it takes a while before he can try it again.
Oh, and he's got an Obviously Significant Tattoo, no doubt to be
explained in future issues.
Here's the thing. On the one hand, it's the sort of issue where you
can't help but admire the craft. While I suspect the lead looks a
little younger and more cuddly than he might have intended, there's no
denying Smith's ability to tell a story. There's an extended chase
sequence towards the end, which is excellent in pacing and execution.
There's no doubt that you're dealing with somebody who's very good
indeed.
On the other hand... the next issue isn't out till May. So apparently
this is a quarterly, and I don't think it's paced very well for a
quarterly title. When you boil it down, not a great deal happens in
this issue. To be sure, what happens, happens impressively. But you
could sum it up in a few sentences, and the page count is mainly taken
up with allowing scenes all the space they need. We don't really get to
know the lead all that well; instead, we get an introduction to what he
does, and what he can do.
So this reads more like the first 32 pages of a graphic novel than the
first issue of a serial. And I'm sure it's going to be an excellent
graphic novel. Whether I would buy it in this format is another matter
entirely. Monthly, maybe. Quarterly... nah, that's stretching it. It's
good, but I'd wait for the collection.
Rating: A-
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Also this week:
CRIMINAL #1 - This is the second run of Ed Brubaker and Sean Phillips'
Criminal, presumably working on the theory that good reviews can be
transformed into better sales through a clearly signalled jumping-on
point. In another smart move, the new series begins with a single-issue
story, albeit one that apparently forms a trilogy with the next two
issues. We're in the 1970s, to explore somebody's back story, but the
story stands alone. Crime stories have always been Brubaker's forte,
and this book is allowing him and Phillips to play to their strengths
with a genre that they do better than anyone else in modern comics.
Crime books aren't really my thing, and this book still holds my
interest, which is usually a good sign that it's doing something right.
A
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There's more from me at If Destroyed, and if you're desperate for more
Article 10 columns, you can always hunt through the archives on Ninth
Art.
http://ifdestroyed.blogspot.com
http://www.ninthart.com
Next week, the new Cable series kicks off, as does Brian Vaughan's Logan
mini. "Divided We Stand" continues in Uncanny X-Men, and there's more
stern-faced bloodletting in X-Force #2.
--
Paul O'Brien
THE X-AXIS - http://www.thexaxis.com
IF DESTROYED - http://ifdestroyed.blogspot.com
NINTH ART - http://www.ninthart.com
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