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Apr 12

“Haunted” – Marvel Knights: X-Men #1-5

Posted on Saturday, April 12, 2014 by Paul in x-axis

Is there a place for the Marvel Knights imprint in 2014?  The sales on the three recent Marvel Knights minis certainly aren’t encouraging.

When the original Marvel Knights imprint was launched, back in 1998, Marvel was a very different place; its titles stood out as creator-driven relaunches quite unlike the 90s house style that dominated at the time.  Mid-90s Marvel’s conservatism may have been driven partly by the financial strictures of insolvency, but that still made the new books from Joe Quesada’s office look truly new.

But Marvel Knights was folded into the mainstream Marvel Universe in 2006, for the very good reason that Quesada had become editor in chief, and his approach had spread to become Marvel’s new default.  Not everything in the current Marvel line up would fit neatly into the original MK, but a fair chunk of it would.

Instead, the remit of these minis ends up being major Marvel characters in stories by indie creators.  Whether that’s actually a hook is debatable, since it’s hardly a novelty for Marvel to hire creators with an established name from independent publishers.  It seems more like an attempt to devise a format that allow Marvel to hire them, given that they can’t really drop these arcs into the middle of the ongoing titles, nor does the market have much interest in supporting random minis.

Marvel Knights: X-Men is written and drawn by Brahm Revel, best known for his unlikely chimps-at-war series Guerrillas.  It starts with an old X-Men stand-by we haven’t seen for a while: two new mutants are detected, the X-Men race to find and recruit them.  That results in Wolverine, Kitty and Rogue going to a backwoods town in Western Virginia in search of the new mutants.

A bunch of other villains start showing up as well – not because they’re chasing after the mutants too, but because one of those mutants has the power to bring people’s memories to life.  When the only people around her were relatively ordinary locals, that was pretty manageable.  But when the X-Men show up, it’s a bit of a problem, and soon the town is overrun with characters from the archive.

Alongside all that, the other mutant is a mind-controller causing problems of her own, and there’s a whole storyline about a corrupt Sheriff and a local weirdo drug dealer group who have been kidnapping mutants and have now drifted into being a weird mutant-worshipping cult – though not one any actual mutant would care to have around.

At root, it seems to be a love letter to the Claremont era.     It’s been a good long while since anyone played up things like Rogue angsting over her villainous past, or Sabretooth killing Silver Fox (which Larry Hama retconned out 20 years ago anyway).  The villains are similarly heavy on the 80s.

There’s no doubt that it takes place in present day continuity – Kitty is in her current mother hen role, Xavier is dead, and Cyclops’ rival team are name checked.  But the final act is largely about how the X-Men are ultimately defined by all the elements of their past, not just the baddies.  And it’s a version of their past drawn blatantly from the original Claremont run; even the likes of Stonewall make it in.

Revel’s art, combined with the small cast, gives the series a claustrophobic feel, with a dense but well constructed story that builds convincingly to chaos as the series progresses.  Visually, it’s clear and well told, but sketchy in a way that you wouldn’t normally associate with such a cameo-heavy story.  That probably works in the book’s favour, keeping the emphasis firmly on the story and not letting the reader get sidetracked in trying to recognise tiny background figures.

The irony of this series is that it has a very distinctive voice and feel, marking it out from other X-Men titles – and yet one of the main things it wants to say with that voice is how much it loves Chris Claremont.  But in its recollection of both an era that defined the X-Men for years to come, and some of the classic X-Men plot structures that we don’t see so much these days, it makes a pretty convincing case for its nostalgia.

Bring on the comments

  1. The original Matt says:

    I didn’t buy it, but mostly because I wasn’t sure if it was “in continuity”.

    Disclaimer: not that I have anything against out of continuity titles, but if I was going to buy a book that’s not connected to the x-men ongoing stories, I’d rather buy a comic not about the x-men at all.

  2. The original Matt says:

    Oops, hit submit too soon….

    It sounds like a fun title. I like the Claremont era, so a love letter to that would interest me and I might still pick it up based on this review. But did it actually happen or is it more a “what if” title?

  3. Nu-D says:

    I’ve gotten to the point where I prefer stories that are either not in continuity, or are peripheral to it, as this was. Stories that are in continuity are too invested in changing the status quo, or advancing some overall scheme. Stories like this are nice, because they focus on just giving a good, self-contained story.

  4. The original Matt says:

    Yeah, I know what you mean. I do enjoy a good off to the side somewhere story. And if that’s what this is I’ll put it on the list, but if it’s off in its own separate universe I won’t bother.

  5. Ozwell says:

    The latest MK mini’s – Spider Man & the Hulk – were pretty poor efforts, made worse by the fact they’re out of continuity and essentially meaningless in the overall scheme of anything. By comparison, Millar’s Spidey arc and the original Quesada & Smith DD (which you recently discussed) look like milestones. No, I didn’t get the X men series, because fool me once…

  6. Luis Dantas says:

    I’m a bit surprised to read that there is so much regard about continuity among readers.

    It sure sounds like a lot more regard than the writers have these days.

  7. Bob says:

    Continuity has always been more important to readers than writers and editors.

    It sounds like the current MK line is DOA. I read the Hulk series and it was a confusing mess. How does junk like this get published? And for 3.99 a pop?
    Smh

  8. Si says:

    For me, the ideal setup is what, for example, Judge Dredd does (or used to do, haven’t read 2000AD since the title still referred to a future date). Most stories are self-contained, or small arcs. Most are completely divorced from each other. Not out of continuity as such, it’s just that the continuity is static. No one story matters to the character. And then there’s the occasional epic where the status quo is changed quite severely, which invests you in the world. Then it goes back to individual stories. They’re not asking you to commit to years worth of regular purchases so you know what the hell’s going on, you can read one Dredd here, another there, and be fine.

    The one Superman story I really remember is a local reprint of an old story, where aliens are on a treasure hunt on Earth, but continental drift has messed up their million year old maps, so they decide to just push the land masses around til they look like the maps. By the end of the story, Superman had saved the day, the end. I doubt there was ever reference again to the time Supes had to push New Guinea back where it belonged, or the millions of people who must have died. It didn’t matter, it wasn’t “in continuity”. It was just a cool story.

    Continuity can stick it up its jumper for all I’m concerned.

  9. Jamie says:

    “Continuity has always been more important to readers than writers and editors.”

    I don’t think it’s that, in this case.

    If you’re gonna sell ANOTHER X-Men book, what’s the hook?

  10. Nu-D says:

    The hook is a good story, well told. That’s the only hook necessary. It’s like asking, “Why should I read ‘The Red Queen’s Race’ when it’s not explicitly a part of Asimov’s Foundation/Robot universe?” You read it because it’s a good story.

    There’s nothing about this mini that’s inherently “out of continuity.” It may never get mentioned again by another writer, but nothing in here is inconsistent with any established canonical facts. If another writer wants to mention it, or use the new characters, they will be able to do so without any shenanigans.

  11. Leo says:

    Nu-D said exactly what I was thinking of saying. It doesn’t seem to be set out of continuity (though other writers don’t even need to aknowledge it).

    It’s a good stand alone story, set before Kitty joined Cyclops (maybe even before the 60’s x-men came to the present).

    Honestly, this story felt really refreshing nowadays. And in the end, even things that may have not been making sense in the beginning, they do by the end. It did have a minor possible plot hole which i rather not mention because i didn’t realise it until after i finished reading it, but if i hint about it, i may break the flow for anyone who is planning to read the story. And it’s a story worth reading

  12. Dave says:

    Haven’t most second, or third, titles in a franchise done lots of ‘off to the side’ stories that don’t really reflect continuity besides cast list and costumes? Like, Friendly Neighbourhood and Peter Parker when JMS was on ASM, Detective Comics while Snyder’s been on Batman, Savage Wolverine, Astonishing X-Men after Whedon…
    It’s just the latest example of the move towards mini-series (or seasons when they last a year or so), rather than ongoings, that this isn’t Astonishing X-Men #70+ (or whatever numbers it would’ve been on now). So the main achievement of making it its own series was to confuse as to whether or not it’s current/main/616 X-Men.

  13. ZZZ says:

    The thing that kind of turned me off this book in the early going (admittedly, before we had the whole story about exactly what’s going on) is that I feel like we’ve seen the “people harvesting a drug from mutants/superhumans” plotline way too many times recently. I feel like in the past few years, literally every time a superhuman goes missing or there’s a new drug on the streets, it turns out that someone’s making a drug out of superhumans.

  14. Jamie says:

    “The hook is a good story”

    Erm, no, a hook is what you use to market a book. “Hey readers, THIS one’s actually a GOOD story!”

    No.

  15. The original Matt says:

    Well my point was more along the lines of: if it’s out of continuity, then often times these books main hook is “look how different it is when contrasted to the normal x-books” and I’ve seen that enough. If it’s in continuity and off to the side somewhere (ie, it doesn’t have to be “earthshaking” or “matter”) and it’s a good story, I’ll pick it up later.

    If it’s an x-book that not really an x-book (along the lines of the noir comics they did a few years back) then bugger off I’m not buying it. If I want to read something that’s not x-men, I’ll read something that’s not x-men, not a book that’s x-men but not.

    If it’s off to the side and a good story I’ll pick it up at a later date. If it’s off to the side and sucks I won’t bother.

  16. Leo says:

    IMO it’s off to the side and a good story. I have dropped most of the main series, because they are far too many, far too expensive and too little happens in each issue but a mini like this, even if it doesn’t matter in the overall state of things, is good

  17. LiamKav says:

    Chris Sims once wrote a good article on continuity, and why it does/doesn’t matter. The crux of it came down to Marvel and DC being big, shared universes. You invest in them. You want to believe in the characters. If someone comes in and just ignores prior continuity, it’s chipping away at the foundation of that universe. It’s making it harder to suspend your disbelief.

    Obviously, there are varying degrees. If you can only tell a story about the FF by pretending that Reed and Sue have never been married and have no kids, you shouldn’t do it in the main universe (or maybe you shouldn’t do it with Reed and Sue). On the other hand, if you’ve got a great story that involved ignoring a single line of dialogue from an issue of Tales to Astonish #36, then go ahead and ignore that line. But all the stuff in the middle you have to be careful about. Every time you ignore an old story, you’re inviting your readers to not care about the current story. “If the writers don’t care, why should I?”

    I think a lot of it comes down to how writers view it. Continuity is a gift! It gives backstories, meaning, weight. Look at how the post-2005 series of Doctor Who has used it… if it helps the story, use it. If not, just don’t mention it. Similarly DS9 used the continuity of the Star Trek universe to great effect. Whereas Enterprise tried and half succeeded, and Voyager ignored it and was terrible.

    So, yay to continuity. Or something.

  18. Chief says:

    Continuity should be respected for all the above reasons. I’m always baffled that it’s ignored so much in today’s day and age especially when you literally have all the information at your fingertips.

    When I was a kid in the early 90’s, there was no internet and trades were almost non-existent. If I needed to find out information on a character or storyline I wasn’t familiar with, I had to check trading cards, OHOTMU’s, ask friends, ask people at the comic store, devour back issue bins, etc. It was a rewarding experience when I finally figured out a backstory that I wasn’t familiar with, and it made the current story I was reading more enjoyable.

    Now you can find almost any character’s entire backdtory instantly on Wikipedia. There’s really no excuse for not following history because it’s “alienating new readers” or “too compliacted.” I really hate this ADD generation.

  19. mountainshark says:

    Maybe I missed it, but when did Rogue get back her Ms. Marvel powers?

  20. Paul says:

    She didn’t. She just borrows powers from the other X-Men before going on missions. I know.

    @Chief: The golden age of continuity represented by OHOTMU is easy to overstate. The 1980s OHOTMU had the luxury of summarising stories that were largely out of print and that many of its readers had never actually read first hand. It wasn’t above taking liberties to streamline history and make it read more smoothly than it had on first publication. (In fact, one of the problems with the more recent version of the Handbook was its dogged insistence on cataloguing literally everything that a character had done RATHER than imposing any kind of shape or structure on it.)

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