The X-Axis – 4 July 2010
It’s a podcast weekend, so don’t forget to check out the show. The thread is a couple of posts down, and this week’s reviews are Sea Bear & Grizzly Shark, Wonder Woman #600, and the Iron Man Annual.
Those aside, it’s a quiet week. No issue of “Second Coming” this week – it’s running late. Incidentally, the schedule now has the new X-Men series launching next week before “Second Coming” is over. And boy, does that set my alarm bells ringing. Because from the look of it, either they’re about to spoil the ending of “Second Coming” in a pretty spectacular fashion… or there’s simply nothing to spoil.
Now, “Second Coming” has been doing a good job of giving the impression that it’s heading somewhere. But to be honest, so did “Messiah Complex” and “Messiah War”. Then again, this is the concluding part of the trilogy… and surely they’re not crazy enough to spend three years building to a non-event. So I’ve kind of been giving them the benefit of the doubt on that one. But I’m wondering now, I really am.
Actually, there is a middle ground – the big pay-off could happen in next week’s X-Force #28, which is the penultimate chapter of “Second Coming”, leaving the final chapter for a wrap-up and epilogue. Maybe. Let’s hope.
Meanwhile, some of this week’s comics:
Astonishing X-Men #34 – No, not Astonishing X-Men: Xenogenesis. This is the long-delayed continuation of the Warren Ellis/Phil Jimenez storyline. In continuity terms, it’s painfully dated – it opens with the Beast arguing with Cyclops about the direction of the X-Men, a storyline which was already resolved in Uncanny about six months ago when Beast quit the team. To give it credit, though, Ellis does gives us one of the more plausible attempts to explain Cyclops’ behaviour over the last couple of years. Anyhow, once they’ve had that argument, they fight a giant clone of Sauron and follow the baddie to his base, and that’s literally about it. For all that Astonishing usually has a couple of decent ideas per issue, it’s so light on plot that it can’t seriously be recommended for the story. What it does have is Jimenez’ artwork, and at least the inordinate gaps between issues have been put to work on making something pretty – the Sauron/Brood hybrid makes a great splash page, for instance. So if you’re a Phil Jimenez fan or an X-Men completist, then yes, buy it. If you’re an Ellis fan, hell, wait for the trade, when the glacial serialised pace will be less of an issue.
The Death of Dracula #1 – This one-shot is a lead-in to the “Curse of the Mutants” storyline which kicks off the new X-Men series. And god, I wish they’d call titles something a bit more distinctive than that. Do they not know any adjectives beyond New, Young, Secret and Ultimate?
As you can imagine, I’m sceptical about the demand, let alone the creative need, for another monthly X-Men title. And I’ve been even more sceptical about the point of a mutants versus vampires storyline, which sounds worryingly like an exercise in throwing two random elements at one another and hoping the result will fill some pages.
But this prologue does a lot to win me round. The X-Men aren’t in it at all. Nor, for that matter, is there much of Dracula – perhaps recognising that the title kind of gives it away, the story despatches him on page 8, and moves on to the much more interesting business of his sons manoeuvring to replace him. The actual lead character here is, of all people, Janus, a character from Marv Wolfman’s Tomb of Dracula run in the seventies. His rival brother, Xarus, is new. It’s, well, it’s basically the annual vampire convention, and Xarus is trying to seize power.
Fortunately, Gischler isn’t giving us a faceless horde of generic vampires. He’s doing a story about sects manoeuvring for power, and he’s gone out of his way to make them diverse. So we’ve got the traditional vampires, the lunatic warrior types, the Twilight-style pacifists, and so forth, together with a bunch of oddball interpretations that I suspect have been dredged up from the darkest recesses of continuity to round out the numbers. Artist Giuseppe Camuncoli does a solid job of keeping them distinctive and getting the general idea across with costuming – and he’s good with conversations, too. And do you know, it’s all rather good fun, in the way that villains squabbling can sometimes be. You can see the ending of the storyline lumbering towards you a mile off, but that’s not a problem, because it feels like it’s going to be enjoyable getting there.
More to the point, Gischler manages to convince me that there may in fact be an X-Men story in here. Xarus’ big pitch to the vampire hordes is basically that Dracula, representing the forces of tradition, has been too willing to accept that vampires are inferior and wrong, and too willing to hide away from (yes, you guessed it) a world that fears and hates them. Aren’t they natural too? Isn’t it right and normal for them to go out and kill people? All of which rather conjures up the image of the vampires invading San Francisco in order to hold an Undead Pride rally… but yes, if we’ve got a bunch of vampires who are justifying themselves using the X-Men’s stock arguments, then there is an X-Men story in here.
Reservations: the only female vampires in this story are in an all-seductress sect. The sect itself isn’t a problem (vampires are all about seduction), but the absence of women from all the other sects is maybe a little worrying. Mind you, most of the other vampires in this story are official delegations from traditionalist groups, or meatheaded warriors, so I’ll reserve judgment on that one just yet. Oh, and since Dracula is being used in this story as a symbol of vampiric tradition, I really wouldn’t have given him a primary-colours redesign. That’s a mistake, I think.
But on the whole, this is really quite promising. It’s persuaded me that there could be something in this story, and that’s a good start.
Chronicles of Wormwood: The Last Battle #4 – Garth Ennis and Oscar Jiminez’ miniseries has sailed completely off any sort of schedule, but that doesn’t seem to be as much of a problem – perhaps because there’s enough content to make each issue worthwhile on its own, and perhaps because Ennis is such a strong storyteller that he quickly draws you back into the story. This issue is much as we’ve come to expect from Wormwood – a mixture of eccentric theology, with Jesus and the Antichrist trying to escape their pre-ordained roles so that they can rail at the evils of organised religion, and some decidedly adolescent comedy. It really shouldn’t work, but Ennis has such a firm grasp of structure that he can hold it all together, and Jimenez is doing some gorgeous work here.
Flash #3 – Goodness, we’re three issues in to a Flash series and I’m still enjoying it. It’s a very traditional, Silver Agey superhero series, but without being particularly heavy on continuity – and for a character like the Flash, that seems precisely the right approach. It remains true that the Flash himself is more memorable for his powers than his personality, but the book as a whole has enough identity to carry it through – and I love Francis Manapul’s art, which is nice and clean while remaining loose enough to sell the action.
Secret Avengers #2 – This, on the other hand, is in real danger of coming across as a generic superhero team featuring characters drawn at random from a hat. I can’t quite figure out what they’re going for here. If these guys are supposed to be the Avengers’ black ops team, then you’d think the first arc should be doing something with that theme. That doesn’t have to mean “grim and gritty” – by all means, try to cross it with the Avengers’ usual stomping grounds. But this seems to be an “Avengers investigate mysterious goings on on Mars” story which any team could have done with cosmetic changes. Not doing it for me.
X-Men Forever 2 #2 – Last issue, the X-Men blew themselves up, in what’s pretty obviously a feint. This issue, Rogue shows up on a couple of pages hiding in the shadows, but basically it’s a story about the government spinning the event, and Peter Parker trying to investigate it for the Daily Bugle. The story never quite makes this explicit, but the idea seems to be that even though the X-Men’s base is supposed to be an official secret, word has got round that they’ve been blown up, and the public isn’t entirely thrilled about it. It looks like we’re getting the story where baddies take control of the security forces, and I can’t say I’m particularly interested to see that again. But I am interested to know where Claremont’s heading with the X-Men-faking-their-deaths thing. Of course, this is basically the set-up he was working with during the Australia stories of the late 80s, a period which was cut short on editorial insistence – so perhaps we really are getting back to an idea that he never really got to explore as fully as he wanted.
You missed ‘Dark’ from your list of overused Marvel adjectives…
Sadly, I have to agree about SECRET AVENGERS. The first issue was so promising, and the second issue was quite generic. Basically, the characters learn what we already knew. For the entire issue. For $4. That’s just not enough story to make it worth my money. I’ve also noticed in the solicits that there will be a fill-in artist soon. Such a shame.
“Astonishing X-Men” has a nice ring to it. But from what I’ve read about it, that’s pretty much done as a title and probably too soon to re-use it and get any real mojo out of it so soon with a re-launch and new creative team, the one out there now is limping along to its conclusion and there’s a mini simultaneously being published.
And while the new Adjectiveless “X-Men” storyline with the vampires may play into the themes of the book, I find it really odd as a kick-off story for a new ongoing core X-Men series. Sounds like a somewhat generic idea and more of a breather-type of arc between bigger stories.
That may be why it’s starting before Second Coming finishes, because they can’t really do anything until that’s resolved and yet another status quo is introduced – if there even is one (boy, I hope, at least if they’re going to fix the over-arching M-Day one that they’ve been saddled with for the last 5 or 6 years).
But it seems like a pretty soft sell to me.
“Ordinary?”
THE ORDINARY X-MEN #37
WRITTEN BY JEREBOAM Q. KNACCERHAMPA
PENCILS BY COLEEN DORAN.ALPHA-13
I would buy that comic.
“X-Men Today?”
“America’s Got X-Men?”
“mXn?”
“Bamf Bamf! It’s Cyclops And The X-Men?”
“X-Men Ever After?”
And so on.
//\oo/\\
X-Men: The Video Game: The Comic
Even worse…
X-Men: The Video Game: The Comic; The official comic of the official video game of the official movie of the original comic.(With maybe some elements of the official cartoon)
“Eponymous X-Men”?
We’re asking for trouble here – I bet they’re itching to dust off X-Treme X-Men…
I did read in an interview that X-FORCE #28 was the real ending of the crossover, and that SECOND COMING #2 was an anthology-style epilogue, so I’m not too bothered by the scheduling yet.
I agree that DEATH OF DRACULA was surprisingly entertaining. Still not sure about Paco Medina as an artist for the new X-Men title, though (remember NEW WARRIORS ?).
Wait, no X-CAMPUS #1 ?
I’m confused with all these vampires–weren’t all of them incinerated with the Montesi Formula in Dr. Strange? Even though vampirism reentered the Marvel Universe with the resurrection of Varnae, how did all those vampire sects spring up from that time?
For what it’s worth, the anchorite sect in Death of Dracula does appear to have female members, in their first appearing panel. I’m not sure making all female vampires either pacifist or seductress is any better than just seductress, but they’re there.
So, what I’m hearing you say is that the new X-Men series is “True Blood” for the direct market?
A comic book company cashing in on a more popular cultural phenomenon ever so slightly too long after it has peaked?
Why, I’ve never HEARD of such a thing.
//\Oo/\\
I share your reservations about the way female vampires were portrayed in The Death of Dracula. My impression after reading was that every female character with a walk-in part was called “bitch” or “whore” at some point in the issue. Memory is probably exaggerating, but still…
Also, the preview for next week’s X-Men has a really odd scene between Jubilee and Pixie. Is there some established relationship there that I’ve missed along the way? Otherwise, it just reads like a trite girls-dishing-over-iced-drinks scene, where the fact that the two characters are both young women is enough to justify them acting like lifelong best friends. Why wouldn’t Cyclops send someone like Paige, Emma or Logan instead?
Anyways, hopefully as his run goes Gischler will show that he has as much of a grasp on three-dimensional women as he has on plotting.
As far as I know, Jubilee doesn’t know Pixie. They did the same thing with her in her anthology appearance. They had her all chummy with the “new”/”young” X-men as if they looked up to her, when it truth, they had never met on panel. Jubilee doesn’t have a lot of X-men she casually associates with because they decided to kill off and progress most of “her” comrades.
Astonishing X-men was OK to me. I just didn’t remember anything about the story and not much happened. A lot of nothing seems to happen in all of Ellis’s X-books. Agent Brand was nearly useless in this issue, and she only appeared in a few panels. I kept wondering where she went.
I find it strange that people criticize Secret Avengers 2 for not having a lot of plot development and moving too slow when if we compare it to Avengers #2, it fit more into its 24 pages than Bendis did with 32 pages (which was also full of double page spreads). I openly admit it wasn’t the BEST issue and many of the characters faded into the background with their bland dialogue, but at least it put things into place so hopefully issue 3 will be off and running. That’s me being optimistic because Brubaker has rarely let me down… excluding his Uncanny run.
wanderer: I would be inclined to agree if it weren’t for the higher price tag. There was a time that “better than other books on the stands” and “trusting a writer’s back catalog” would have been good enough reasons for me to stick around for an entire story arc before bailing. At $4 a pop, though, it just isn’t worth it, especially with the fill-in art coming up. I want high-quality, consistent story and art all the way or comic book companies aren’t going to get my money.
Going off on a tangent: And frankly, if something is good enough for me to buy at $4/issue as a monthly comic, then it will be even better for me to buy at less than that for the entire collection. Did you know that the new Batwoman hardcover — which is well designed, well written, beautifully illustrated, and includes some nice extras — costs less than the sum of buying all 7 individual issues? The *hardcover*. I swear, it’s like Marvel and DC are trying to find ways to drive me away from comics. Tangent complete.
“Did you know that the new Batwoman hardcover — which is well designed, well written, beautifully illustrated, and includes some nice extras — costs less than the sum of buying all 7 individual issues?”
Does the HC include the Question back-up strips?
If not, that would explain the lower price point, since it’s likely 25+ pages shorter than the original issues.
I’m hoping the last chapters of Second Coming manage to pull something worthwhile out of the whole event, if only because I enjoy these reviews and it would be a shame to see Paul driven off of the X-Books now, when he’s managed to endure the likes of Austen’s run.
“Does the HC include the Question back-up strips?
If not, that would explain the lower price point, since it’s likely 25+ pages shorter than the original issues.”
It does not include the Question strips, no, making it a good FIFTY-SIX pages shorter than the issues!
Do they not know any adjectives beyond New, Young, Secret and Ultimate?
No, they really don’t. And once they do learn a new one, it’ll be slapped all over every new launch.
I have to say, Paul Cornell did a pretty decent job of a vampire war in Captain Britain & MI: 13, but I don’t know if it had the legs to be a larger storyline, and I’m a bit surprised to see them doing it again and on a larger scale. I suppose the Hugo nomination for Cornell’s story made them think it was worth doing.
But this seems to be an “Avengers investigate mysterious goings on on Mars” story
I think if you append “not written by Bendis” there, then you’ve got what they’re going for.
I’m confused with all these vampires–weren’t all of them incinerated with the Montesi Formula in Dr. Strange? Even though vampirism reentered the Marvel Universe with the resurrection of Varnae, how did all those vampire sects spring up from that time?
The last in-continuity Blade miniseries ended with a magical ritual resurrecting every vampire that had ever existed on Earth. Of course, even before that we saw very old vampires popping up again all over the place without explanation.
Nope, no Question backups in the hardcover, but I never wanted those. If DC hadn’t raised the price of the individual issues, they wouldn’t have felt it necessary to include the backups in the first place.
Supposedly, the whole “mutants vs. vampires” idea came from one of the suits. It certainly sounds like it did.
It seemed rather odd that no passing reference was made to Dracula’s recent failed invasion of Britain in the miniseries. After all, those sects who had turned against Dracula were arguing for what he had attempted to achieve. You’d think somebody would have mentioned it.
Niall, you’re assuming that anyone at Marvel cares. They only really admitted MI: 13 existed after it got a Hugo nomination, but by then it had been cancelled for months. They can’t keep continuity straight between their major titles, so I’d be more surprised if someone did reference the “Vampire State” arc.
@ThekelvinGreen
Too true. Look how badly continuity is in Marvel (and DC) these days. It’s worse for Marvel though because they used to have a reputation for being very strict with their continuity and making sure the majority of it fit together, essentially going out of their way to write out characters in team books and explain the circumstances behind their disappearances. Today, we’re lucky if nothing is ignored 3 issues down the line.
Speaking of Paul Cornell, I was hoping for an Action Comics review. Marvel cared so little for him that they let him get scooped up by the competition, so I was interested in seeing how well his first issue came out.
@Thom
I agree. The pricing in comics is beyond ridiculous for the [lack of] content they provide and how quickly most of them can be read. It’s why I’m so selective these days, less willing to try new content without browsing it or reading reviews (doesn’t help that most new books are canceled within 6 months), and have effectively dropped a large sum of books.
I really enjoyed the Question back up (until the villain revea at least)
It seems like both the big 2 are phasing out the back ups now that they have everyone used to the inflated prices. Damned shame (even though I really don’t enjoy the Nomad strip in Cap).
I completely agree about Secret Avengers. It was the most disappointing Brubaker issue I ever read. Next issue doesn’t look more promising.
As for Second Coming, I share your fears about there being no consequence. I think the reason they haven’t moved it back is because they issued a press release declaring July 8th “X-men Day” and telling the stores to have huge launch parties for which they would supply tons of extra promotional material. Lame and pointless.
My one glimmer of hope for the ending of Second Coming comes from the promotion images for UNCANNY X-MEN #526 (the first post-SC issue) featuring a couple of what looks like new mutants. Hum…
Niall, I think it’s even weirder that there’s no mention of the fact that not too long ago there were no vampires in the Marvel Universe at all. Dr. Strange used the Montessi Formula to destroy them all at one point, and though the spell was later undone, I’ve never been clear on how exactly all the vampires came back.
And of course as soon as I post, I read the other comments and see this was already mentioned. Never mind.
I believe there was some story where all vampires that ever existed were ressurected. I’m not sure where though.
“I did read in an interview that X-FORCE #28 was the real ending of the crossover, and that SECOND COMING #2 was an anthology-style epilogue, so I’m not too bothered by the scheduling yet.”
Nope, X-Force ends in a very important cliff-hanger, so I’ve bought a comic (X-Men #1) that I can’t read for a week. Pain in the bum.
Donnacha, I wouldn’t worry too much about Vampire X-Men ruining anything. I get the sense that it’s going to be its own self-contained thing, and not being saying anything about ‘Second Coming’ beyond “The Good Guys Didn’t All Die”, which I think you could probably see coming.
Not too much spoiler in X-men #1, until you get to the trails for the upcoming new releases and we get more information than perhaps we ought… I’d rant, but I’ve just written 1500 words on Superheroes in the Public Domain for Postmodern Idiosyncrasies, and I’m tired.
It’s safe to read X-men #1. It might as well take place before Second Coming as after it.
However, there are apparently some teasers at the back of the issuet that contain spoilers. I didn’t read those.
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