{"id":587,"date":"2010-11-07T22:46:48","date_gmt":"2010-11-07T22:46:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=587"},"modified":"2010-11-07T22:46:48","modified_gmt":"2010-11-07T22:46:48","slug":"the-x-axis-7-november-2010","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/?p=587","title":{"rendered":"The X-Axis – 7 November 2010"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s getting late, there’s a lot to review, let’s get down to it. \u00a0This week’s X-books include the first issues of Generation Hope<\/em> and X-Men: To Serve and Protect<\/em>, plus Wolverine<\/em> #3 and, if you squint a bit, Namor<\/em> #3. \u00a0But first…<\/p>\n

Amazing Spider-Man<\/em> #647<\/strong> – This is a triple-sized anthology issue, wrapping up the “Brand New Day” period, and so the five dollar price tag is pretty reasonable. \u00a0Well, I say the “Brand New Day” period. \u00a0They actually stopped using that tag months ago, and there’s something a bit contrived about dusting it off now. \u00a0But this issue does mark the end of the thrice-monthly format and the team of writers, so there’s some legitimacy when it plays the “end of an era” card. \u00a0In plot terms, this is a mixture of epilogue and tying up of loose ends, with a couple of throwaway elements to set up future stories. \u00a0So we’ve got Vin Gonzales getting out of jail, Harry Osborn moving on, and Mary Jane showing up again to give her blessing to Carlie Cooper as the new love interest. \u00a0Which some people won’t much care for, and in a sense, the fact that the creators still feel the need to do it can be seen as a demonstration that the reboot failed to extricate Peter from his marriage effectively.<\/p>\n

But while the purists may hate it, I kind of like Carlie, and to be honest, I’d rather read about her than yet another trudge round the Peter\/MJ stuff, so it’s all fine by me. \u00a0Cycling the B-list supporting characters is one of the ways you can keep a long-running franchise fresh, after all. \u00a0Fred Van Lente and Max Fiumara’s lead story focusses on the Carlie, Vin and Norman subplots – which are the important bits – before everyone settles down to having a last fling with Spider-Man. \u00a0Actually, Zeb Wells’ contribution is a Harry\/Vin short which seems to be setting up a future story direction (and quite effectively too), but Bob Gale comes back for a straightforward if implausible Spider-Man-vs-City Hall story, while Joe Kelly brings along his I Kill Giants<\/em> collaborator JM Ken Niimura to say a heartfelt goodbye to his pet supporting character Norah Winter. \u00a0Marc Guggenheim and Graham Nolan’s Flash Thompson short is maybe a little too earnest for its own good but has a nice central idea and draws a line under another minor subplot. \u00a0Finally, Dan Slott and Fred Van Lente do a fun piece about a ridiculously minor background character from 101 issues ago, and editor Steven Wacker nobly devotes a fair chunk of the letters page to readers confirming that, yes, they still think the whole Brand New Day thing was a mistake. \u00a0Frankly, while I”m on Wacker’s side and I think the quality of stories has shot up under his control, it’s still a pleasant change to see a Marvel editor taking complaints head on and acting like a grown-up. \u00a0Overall, a pretty solid package, and a worthwhile ending to a phase of the title’s history which, overall, deserves to be judged a success.<\/p>\n

Generation Hope<\/em> #1<\/strong> – Kieron Gillen and Salvador Espin launch the newest X-book – but while most ongoing titles seem to be more or less thrown out there, this one has been launched the old-fashioned way. \u00a0It’s had a storyline in Uncanny<\/em> to springboard from; in Hope, it’s got a long-time supporting player graduating to a lead role at last; and as a book about the first new mutants to come along in years, it’s theoretically central to the overall direction of the line. \u00a0So aside from all the hype, Marvel have made a persuasive case for thinking that this is an important series because of the story content<\/em>, and I’ll be interested to see whether it does any better than other recent spin-off titles as a result.<\/p>\n

The “Five Lights” arc in Uncanny<\/em> introduced four of the new mutants, and this issue picks up with the group arriving in Japan to complete the set. \u00a0Obviously that would be a bit too straightforward, and so Kenji Uedo turns out to be a bad guy. \u00a0Or, to be fair, possibly just driven mad by his powers emerging – we’ll have to see. \u00a0My main reservation about “Five Lights” was that (Teon aside) the characters got introduced as panicky screamy types, and their individual personalities didn’t come across very strongly. \u00a0As I’d hoped, Gillen sorts that out pretty quickly, giving each character a few pages to narrate so that they can be sketched out a little more fully. \u00a0Teon just gets a page, but it only takes a few fight\/flight captions to get the point. Laurie’s the diligent middle class student yanked out of her comfort zone; Gabriel’s trying to stay upbeat even though he has a nasty feeling his powers come with a crippling downside; Idie is a bit like Rahne Sinclair in her early appearances; and Hope… well, Hope is\u00a0busy growing into her messiah role and telling everyone what to do, so she’s the only main character who doesn’t get her own monologue, which surely isn’t coincidence. \u00a0(Even Kenji gets one, and he’s the bad guy.)<\/p>\n

Hitherto, the big problem with Hope has been the gulf between her rather generic “plucky young girl” personality and her theoretically enormous importance to the plot. \u00a0 Over the last few months, other writers seem to have \u00a0been trying to turn that to their advantage by playing up the idea that Hope \u00a0feels dwarfed by the expectations everyone has for her, and building around that. \u00a0Gillen seems to be taking a different tack here, with Hope as a soldier who’s just found her mission – an interesting idea, since it suggests she sees the rest of the group as something that gives her own life meaning, and might not be entirely open to any other interpretations. \u00a0I can’t say it reads quite like other versions of the character, but I can see potential there.<\/p>\n

As a story, it’s a fairly straightforward “heroes investigate a thingy and it all goes wrong” affair, but that’s fine, because it’s being used as a backdrop to introduce the characters – and the characters seem interesting enough so far. \u00a0There are issues; some of the monologues feel like they’re reaching a bit to link in with the “light” theme, and I still can’t help feeling that none of the characters seem to be expressing even basic concern for poor Teon, who they surely ought to be treating as somebody in need of major psychiatric help. \u00a0And to be honest, I’m still a bit vague about what Laurie and Teon’s powers actually are. \u00a0Still, lots of interesting ideas here, and Salvador Espin’s artwork keeps up a pretty high standard (though his Wolverine seems a bit tentative to me). \u00a0A promising start.<\/p>\n

Namor: the First Mutant<\/em> #3<\/strong> – Another “Curse of the Mutants” tie-in, though it’s more or less abandoned that story in favour of a more or less unrelated war between Atlanteans and underwater vampires. \u00a0Incidentally, the recap page could really have done with some proof-reading. \u00a0Not only does it mis-spell the name “Aqueos” twice, it has Namor sitting on a “thrown”. \u00a0Anyway, Namor leads his plucky band of warriors into the vampire city to perform the arbitrary ritual that will destroy them all. \u00a0You know the sort of thing. \u00a0There’s a flashback near the beginning of the issue drawn by a fill-in artist, Fernando Blanco, and I’m afraid it only serves to emphasise the leaden qualities of the rest of the book. \u00a0Blanco’s at least going for a sense of submersion and his pages remember to include some backgrounds; for much of the rest of the time, we’re back to puffy figures floating in space, sometimes swimming, sometimes just deciding to stand around for no reason. \u00a0The art is really a major problem for me with this book. \u00a0As for the story – it holds together adequately, but it often feels forced when random magical requirements are dictating the plot, and if you can’t figure out how Namor’s going to get around the “blood of a king” requirement, you’re really not trying very hard.<\/p>\n

Scarlet<\/em> #3<\/strong> – In which Scarlet takes her “war on corruption” to the police… without much subtlety. \u00a0With this book, much depends on how far you take it at face value. \u00a0If you do, it has a lot of problems – a lead character with a bizarre crusade, who apparently has no friends of her own to turn to, and instead opts for her dead ex-boyfriend’s best mate. \u00a0The other interpretation, of course, is that Scarlet is insane and somewhere in the future the unreliable narrator card will be played in a big way. \u00a0I still tend to suspect it’s the latter and so I’m giving Bendis the benefit of the doubt that the things which don’t entirely make sense weren’t supposed to make sense. \u00a0Alex Maleev’s art is, for the most part, visually arresting stuff – though there are a couple of exterior scenes where the source material comes through awkwardly – pages 5 and 6 give the unfortunate impression of a 1980s photo-comic shoved through a Photoshop filter, but that’s a lapse. \u00a0An interesting book – and the plot does advance in a major way in this issue – but it’s still hard to be sure whether we’re reading a well thought out story or a train wreck in waiting.<\/p>\n

Superboy<\/em> #1<\/strong> – I don’t really have much interest in Superboy, but I was curious to see what Jeff Lemire would do with the character, since he seemed an unlikely choice for any superhero book. \u00a0It turns out he’s perfectly at home; the book manages to strike a balance between driving the plot forward and holding on to a sense of laid-back space. \u00a0Okay, there’s a page with a really weird circular panel layout that doesn’t work at all, and even readers inured to Clark Kent’s glasses could be forgiven for wondering how “wearing a different T-shirt” can possibly constitute a secret identity, even for the ever-slow people of Smallville. But on the whole, it’s a well paced, enjoyable story. \u00a0I might give it another couple of issues.<\/p>\n

Wolverine<\/em> #3<\/strong> – Wolverine is still in hell, and the Devil is still trying to break his spirit. \u00a0Meanwhile, on Earth, the demon possessing his body is causing more trouble, and his girlfriend has teamed up with Mystique, Hellstorm and the Ghost Rider to get him back. \u00a0It should go without saying that this is all terribly silly, but that’s been part of the appeal of Jason Aaron’s stories for the character – a willingness to push things to the point of ridiculousness while playing them dead straight, and an ability to somehow hold on to a core of genuine drama at the same time. \u00a0This is a story that sounds like it shouldn’t work at all, yet somehow Aaron is getting away with it. \u00a0The back-up strip – which is really a device to advance a subplot without cutting away from the main action – has some lovely art by Michael Gaydos, and sets up a nicely melodramatic villain behind it all.<\/p>\n

X-Men: To Serve and Protect<\/em> #1<\/strong> – Another anthology title, this one led by a Rockslide & Anole serial by Chris Yost and Derec Donovan in which the odd couple decide to have a go at being proper superheroes and… well, wandering around San Francisco at night hoping to stumble upon muggers, basically. \u00a0It’s a simple idea, but there’s a nice chemistry between the two of them, and it’s good to see something being done with Rockslide, a hugely entertaining character who seems to have entered limbo when Young X-Men<\/em> got axed. \u00a0The execution could be subtler, but hey, it’s Rockslide. \u00a0James Asmus and Jon Buran’s “Creature Comforts” is an 8-page short with Emma Frost taking on the Mandrill, which doesn’t really do a great deal for me. \u00a0I’ve never much cared for the Mandrill, a villain firmly in the “What were they thinking?” file, but if you play him dead straight I suppose he’s potentially somewhat creepy. \u00a0Asmus more or less treats him as a throwaway comedy villain (dubious, when you’re dealing with a character who’s basically a rapist) and seems to think he’s making some sort of point about body image, and, er, no. \u00a0Brian Reed and Pepe Larraz deliver a Cypher short which tries to follow Zeb Wells’ take on the character but strains the “everything is a language” idea a bit far for my tastes; there’s something in the idea that the city “speaks” through its traffic patterns and so forth, but this doesn’t really get to grips with that idea well enough to sell it. \u00a0Finally, Joshua Hale and James Harren offer an orgy of terribly French accents as Fantomex takes on Batroc the Leaper – cheerfully ridiculous, and it works. \u00a0Hit and miss, then, which is par for the course with these anthologies.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s getting late, there’s a lot to review, let’s get down to it. \u00a0This week’s X-books include the first issues of Generation Hope and X-Men: To Serve and Protect, plus Wolverine #3 and, if you squint a bit, Namor #3. \u00a0But first… Amazing Spider-Man #647 – This is a triple-sized anthology issue, wrapping up the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-587","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-x-axis"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=587"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":588,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/587\/revisions\/588"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=587"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=587"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.housetoastonish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=587"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}