The X-Axis – w/c 30 September 2024
X-MEN: FROM THE ASHES INFINITY COMIC #17. By Alex Paknadel, Phillip Sevy, Michael Bartolo & Clayton Cowles. This is a weird high-concept arc, isn’t it? The Beast, who is actually a clone of the Krakoa-era Beast with some of his memories, is copied by Blankslate, a mutant who’s said to have no innate personality and decides that he wants to be the Beast. All this is apparently meant to riff off the Beast’s fear that he’s innately doomed by his biology to become a villain. I like the idea in theory, since this Beast is himself essentially a copy to start with. I’m not convinced it works in practice, though, since the two Hanks don’t feel like the same personality. I think what the story is trying to go for is that Blankslate’s different history is what drives him to act in a more aggressive way in order to hold on to sense of identity that he likes, even though his innate personality is the same, but I’m not sure that’s really coming across. Or maybe it’s just that there’s something inherently uncanny valley about the whole concept of Blankslate, which makes it difficult to get a hold on him.
X-MEN #5. (Annotations here.) This is a homage to the “psychic rescue” story from New X-Men #121, and that’s always a bold comparison to invite. Perhaps wisely, it doesn’t attempt to track the original story very directly, and Quentin Quire simply refuses to play along with the conceit of not talking. And there is a reason for invoking the original story beyond simple self-indulgence, because the main plot point is to bring Cassandra Nova back into the frame as a major villain, and she was the villain in the New X-Men story as well. Still, it’s a much more straightforward story than the original and probably doesn’t benefit from sending signals that something weirder might be on the way. But there’s plenty in here that I like: there’s an explanation of what actually differentiates two telepaths to justify having them on the same team; Psylocke’s relationship with Greycrow is brought back into the picture; and we establish that it’s Quentin who’s trying to ignore all the things that happened to him towards the end of the Krakoa era, rather than the book itself. Stegman does a really good Sabretooth in that scene, too, and if he has a tendency to draw his characters rather young, it works fine for Quentin.
STORM #1. (Annotations here.) Storm has never sustained a solo title in the past, although you could make a case for X-Men Red coming close at times. But you can see why people want to try – she has the profile, and she has a personal fanbase who can be quite passionate about her. And while marrying her off to the Black Panther for a few years had the unfortunate side effect of turning her into a supporting character, prising her away from the X-Men and giving her an agenda independently of them may well have been for the good in the long run. It’s not too hard to buy the idea that 2024 Storm has goals of her own that aren’t all about the X-Men’s manifesto, and that they can provide a hook for a solo title that might have been tougher to find in earlier years. If I was casting about for an X-Man who could support a solo title (and wasn’t Wolverine), Storm would probably be near the top of my list.
However, this feels like a book that has a good pitch, but doesn’t really work on the page. What actually happens in this issue? Well, Storm deals with a disaster which turns out to have been caused by a mutant whose powers emerged uncontrollably, and after a bit of time, she feels obliged to say so publicly, since innocent people are getting blamed. She’s setting up something called the Storm Sanctuary. And she may have radiation poisoning. And that’s… pretty much it?
The moral dilemma is a perfectly fine idea, but Murewa Ayodele seems to skip too much of the connective tissue. We’ve got a nuclear reactor powered with alien technology – it’s never very clear whether this is something everyone knew about or whether it’s some sort of scandal in its own right. What was a newly emerged mutant doing in a nuclear reactor anyway? Why does nobody think to ask that question, even though Storm apparently spends several days dithering about whether to explain what happened, and hunting for some reason that might get the mutant off the hook? Why doesn’t he get a name? What happens to him after Storm stops him? Does he go to the Storm Sanctuary or to somewhere else? It feels like the writer and all the characters lose interest in him entirely the moment he’s fufilled his plot role of setting up a dilemma.
What the hell is the Storm Sanctuary anyway? What does it do? Is it a big flying city where she lives on her own with two hippos and a couple of giraffes? I’ll happily accept “where did it come from” as a mystery for another day. But “what does she intend to do with it” should surely be clear – she’s holding a press conference about it as a centrepiece of the issue and all we get is some hand-waving blether like “a haven in the day of adversity”. Is this a monument to one woman’s ego or does she actually want people to come and live in it? If so, who?
The only other actual characters in this book are Frenzy, Iron Man, and the mutant who doesn’t get a name – does it actually have a regular cast beyond Storm herself? There’s a tone of weirdly dreamy isolation to the whole thing, and I’m not at all convinced it’s intentional.
It looks nice, to be sure. Lucas Werneck does do a good Storm, and this is stronger work than on Fall of the House of X, no doubt with better lead-in times. And Storm’s voice comes across well. But there’s so much here being glossed over that it feels like not enough is left, and the ideas that the book actually cares about are left floating unsupported.
WOLVERINE: DEEP CUT #4. By Chris Claremont, Edgar Salazar, Carlos Lopez & Travis Lanham. Yup, that was a four-issue fight scene. I’m not saying that I want to see Claremont just retread what he did in his prime – which is very hard to do anyway in a miniseries, given how much of his strength was in long-term development – but I doubt many people are itching to see him write a four-issue fight scene. It’s what you might politely call a mystifying project, and let’s leave it at that.
“ she has a personal fanbase who can be quite passionate about her. ”
Boy is this a politely worded understatement.
Since I don’t really engage in X-fandom outside of here, the levels of engagement some have for certain X-characters I’ve seen on Breevort’s blog has been illuminating.
Presumably, they have always been around, but other than a random encounter at a convention, the average person did not have any interaction with them.
It really does feel like the editors and creative team love the idea of a Storm solo title, but not so much that they’ve executed that debut issue well beyond establishing that said solo title exists.
Considering how rare ongoing titles are, and how quickly Marvel will cancel one if sales are dire (5-10 issues), it can be tough to see anything beyond a mini or maxi series in practice. AVENGERS INC. started as an ongoing title, too.
The other problem is STORM is not debuting in a vacuum. PSYLOCKE is about to get her own ongoing. And that is atop the usual series for Wolverine, Deadpool, and a heap of X-Books, not counting crossover mini series. “Flood the zone” was a brilliant strategy 15-20 years ago when comics still cost $1.99 or $2.99, but I am unsure how well it works now.
There just seems to be a lack of focus across the line, which is kind of astounding considering Tom “The Hat” Brevoort is one of the senior most editors in day to day comic operations and is talked up and down as some wise elder master of the industry. And his entire guidance could be replaced by a parrot that says, “AWK, ‘NOTHER X-BOOK! AWK, ‘NOTHER X-BOOK!”
Who would likely be a sibling of the parrot who runs DC Comics and says, “AWK, MORE BATMAN! AWK, MORE BATMAN!”
And I imagine Chris Claremont still gets minis like this because someone crunched the numbers and it was cheaper to do this than simply pay him a generous pension that he deserves for rebuilding the X-Men for them. After a while some of these creators remind me of wrestlers who had a wonderful heyday but should have retired 10-20 years ago but can’t because their industry is exploitative and they’ve nothing to fall back on. And after a while it gets sad to see someone who was a legend in 1991 still grappling people in church basements for $100-$200 a page.
It’s not like anyone edits those past-based minis for continuity errors, anyway.
“After a while some of these creators remind me of wrestlers who had a wonderful heyday but should have retired 10-20 years ago”
Not to suggest that Gail Simone falls into that category, but I’m honestly surprised to see she’s still writing comics. Doesn’t she receive a royalty cheque every time somebody uses the term “fridging?”
@AMRG: I heartily agree that this is a strange approach to an X-relaunch. Besides Storm and Psylocke, there’s also Phoenix, Mystique, Wolverine (Laura Kinney version), Magick, and Rogue: Savage Land. Some (half?) of those are minis, but they all seem destined to have short runs.
Meanwhile, the team books are on a slow burn. Maybe they’re trying to recapture the ’80s and ’90s vibe, but with even more titles? Unclear.
“And I imagine Chris Claremont still gets minis like this because someone crunched the numbers and it was cheaper to do this than simply pay him a generous pension that he deserves for rebuilding the X-Men for them.”
I’m not sure if this is the case anymore, but Claremont was on retainer at least for a while. It wasn’t a pension, exactly, but he was getting paid by Marvel whether he wrote for them or not. And he couldn’t write for anyone else. Kind of like a more generous exclusive contract.
Ayodele has claimed that the kid was in the nuclear plant because he was the son of one of the employees.
Some people were surprised when Blankslate mentioned Scott leaving Maddie and Nathan because Beast is from before X-Factor 1 but someone could have filled Beast in on that by now. and Blankslate absorbs all of his target’s memories.
Wolverine: Deep Cut 4 raises some continuity issues. First, the story ends with Wolverine returning to the X-Men, leading into X-Men 251. But Wolverine 17-23, where Wolverine rescues Roughhouse, published back in 1990, also ended with Wolverine returning to the X-Men, leading into X-Men 251. So are we to believe that Wolverine first fought the Marauders, and then went to rescue Roughhouse, and the scenes in Wolverine 23 and Deep Cut 4 interweave? (He couldn’t have gone to rescue Roughhouse and then fought the Marauders because Psylocke tries to contact him just before the X-Men leave for their final mission while he’s trying to rescue Roughhouse.)
Next, the series ends with Logan encountering a clone of Sinister and concluding the real Sinister is alive. But Scott, Alex and Xavier are surprised to learn Sinister is alive in X-Factor 77-78. Did Wolverine not bother to tell them this?
@Thom H- you forgot Hellverine and Deadpool & Wolverine. 🙂
@AMRG- Breevort claims all the new X-Men titles will last at least 10 issues.
Breevort also had a habit as Avengers editor of trying to create solo titles for characters that didn’t traditionally have one, often with less than successful results.
Of course, the other X-Man who could manage a long-running series was Cable but his last two minis sold horribly, so he’s been relegated to a mini and not an ongoing.
Even back in the early-‘90s when comics were far cheaper and considered one of the hottest items in pop culture, the editors were smart enough not to throw out every X-book at once simply so that there would be a ton of X-books on the shelves every month.
It seemed as if some planning went into the idea of pushing out as much material back then.
Compare that to “From the Ashes” whose planning is throw out all the new titles within a four month period. Marvel is basically making the X-books compete with each other.
@Michael- Breevort may have had orders from above to launch a bunch of Avengers solo books for all we know. I can tell you that back when Busiek was still writing Avengers, one of the most frequent requests from readers was for a WCA revival, to which Breevort always said the same thing:
“No. We don’t want there to be another Avengers title because having two would dilute the appeal of the one.”
Several years later, Breevort had his name attached to New Avengers, Mighty Avengers, Secret Avengers, Dark Avengers, etc, etc.
I doubt he felt any differently, but creative sensibility and corporate responsibility don’t always meet eye to eye. Avengers was hot, Marvel wanted to publish more Avengers stuff and Breevort, I assume, wanted to keep his job.
I am curious what chunk of the comics revenue comes from unlimited. There might be enough demand for new content to keep people subscribed every month
I like that Unlimited now has a consistent writer. Not every arc is a winner, but it’s much better overall.
Although Brevoort claimed that ‘every book with X-Men in the name is treated as the main book’ and if that were the case, Exceptional and Uncanny would be getting Unlimited back ups, so…
On a slightly unrelated note, I’m in London right now and it was the first chance for me to browse the new DC Compact line. And it’s great. A cheap(er) way to read some absolute bangers (and Azzarello’s Joker). The smaller size hurts some artists (I love that Far Sector is treated by DC as a modern classic and is constantly reprinted – it deserves it – but that art was meant for bigger pages), but as a way to get those stories to more people – it’s great. Marvel should absolutely follow suit. (They did have a pocket size line some time ago, didn’t they? I think I saw a tiny Dark Phoenix Saga once).
I bought Trail of Catwoman – Darwyn Cooke’s art fits the smaller format really well, doesn’t lose anything.
Marvel did have their Marvel Digest line which sought to sell some comics in a smaller and cheaper format in the 2000s. It was most famous for getting a second volume of Runaways produced because the digests for the first sold very well, and actually reached their target audience in that format. Marvel also reprinted a lot of kiddie books in digest form as well as some MC2 content (especially Spider-Girl) and some others, like the original SENTINEL series.
But, like many ideas Marvel has, it accidentally worked too well, so they abandoned it, never to return. Much like their Essentials collections. Yes, they were B&W and had pages as thin as looseleaf, but it was a very cheap and efficient way to sell old reprints. So of course they eventually abandoned it, though it took 10-15 years.
Marvel is interested in selling as many comics as possible for as high a price as possible. They are not interested in cutting fans deals beyond Unlimited subscriptions. That was likely the biggest problem with digests. Heaven forbid readers get a complete arc for ten bucks, they’ll go bankrupt again.
For a couple of years they allowed Archie, which has a competent digest program, to sell some digests of older reprint material (i.e. Silver and Bronze age collections) more recently, but I think that has stopped.
DC, at least thanks to relying on evergreen sellers from Vertigo and the 80s, may better understand the value of trades and digests, though they also have their own problems and incompetence in some areas. Having a slew of editors get sacked in WB layoffs didn’t help.
@Krysziek- I think part of the issue is that MacKay didn’t have enough space to have Magneto and Beast deal with the changes they’ve been through (Magneto losing his powers and getting stuck in a wheelchair, the whole Beast mess). So that got shunted off to the Unlimited.
Part of the issue is that most of MacKay’s cast went through a lot between the last Hellfire Gala and the first issue of his X-Men- Scott was tortured, Quentin was beheaded and after he came back to life Phoebe turned into an Evil Dominatrix and broke up with him,. Magneto lost his powers and got stuck in a wheelchair and of course the whole Beast mess. And MacKay didn’t want to have them deal with it in his first issues.
Marvel also reprinted the entirety of their Vampire Tales magazine from the 1970s in a digest format. That was a pleasant surprise at the time.
I have the Robert Kirkman Irredeemable Ant-Man series in a digest format also.
Don’t forget that DC had their Showcase Presents line at the same time as Marvel had their Essentials, and DC Showcase Presents is also long gone. DC had a lot more material they could have reprinted in that format, while Marvel was pretty thorough with their Essentials line reprinting their Silver/Bronze Age back-catalogue while it lasted.
I bought so many of the DC Showcase Presents volumns.
I still love my DC Digests from the 70s and 80s.
I have a hunch that this current batch of X-Books is meant primarily as market research to inform the next few years of MCU series and movies. Launching solo books of Mystique, X-23, Psylocke, Storm, Rogue, Jean and Rogue may be a fairly cost-effective and low-risk way of gauging current levels of fan interest in each of those characters, which will be useful in determining how to use them in the years to come where the real money exists.
Tom Brevoort spoke against multiple Avengers books, yes… but that was before 2007 IIRC. A lot has changed in the market itself since, not least the Avengers movies and the wide adoption of digital media for comicbooks from Marvel and DC.
I disagree with Paul regarding Storm; I think that having roles outside of the X-Sphere raised her profile considerably, perhaps even too much. She has on average been more of a mover and shaker outside the X-books than within them. Then again, I am the one saying that Al Ewing damaged the character with her starring role in X-Men Red. I have little idea of who Storm is these days, and I hope this current batch of books attempts to clarify that and restore some measure of viability to the character.
You do wonder if Disney now sees Marvel comics as a loss leader and IP farm for the Movies and TV MCU. They might as well use the books as market research. You just need one mini series to present a new take on a character and if it clicks, it makes its money back X times over if they end up in a movie or TV show.