Wolverine – Page 7 – Now Read This!

July 22, 2012July 22, 2012

Wolverine and the X-Men: Regenesis

By Jason Aaron, Chris Bachalo, Duncan Rouleau, Matteo Scalera, Nick Bradshaw & others (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-513-0

Radical revision – or at least the appearance of such – is a cornerstone of modern comics. There must be a constant changing of the guard, a shifting of scene and milieu and, in latter times, a regular diet of death, resurrection and rebirth. However, with such regular re-fitting, even getting back to basics can be just as new and fresh as completely starting overâ€¦

A case in point is this wonderfully fun and frolicsome return to the old days, set immediately after the catastrophic events of X-Men Schism.

What You’ll Need To Knowâ€¦

When the world’s mutant population was reduced to a couple of hundred desperate souls, most of them banded together in self-imposed exile on Utopia Island in San Francisco Bay, in a defensive enclave led and defended by the X-Men. Although generally welcomed by most of the easygoing residents of the city, tensions were high and leader Cyclops ran the colony in an increasingly draconian and military manner.

His relationship with war-weary second-in-command Wolverine was slowly, inexorably deteriorating as they squabbled over the methods and ideology of the X-nation, each interpreting the idealistic, Cooperative Co-existence dream of Professor Charles Xavier in increasingly different waysâ€¦

Matters came to head after Logan refused to train the latest batch of mutant children as warriors, concerned that they were being cheated of their childhoods. Then 16-year old anarchist telepath Quentin Quire – who called himself Kid Omega – provoked a terrified armed response from humanity by disrupting an arms-limitation conference intended to convince Homo Sapiens to abandon their â€œdefensiveâ€ anti-mutant weapons – giant robotic Sentinels. All hell broke looseâ€¦

With the world once again panicked into insanity and individual nations declaring war on Homo Superior, the assembled mutants and assorted superheroes are kept busy saving humans from their own bellicose paranoid folly, allowing a bunch of very human, sociopathic rich kids to make a lethal power-play against their own parents.

The greedy, remorseless, ambitious and impatient scions of munitions millionaires, human traffickers and deranged scientists had waited too long for what they considered theirs and, after murdering their adult guardians, took over the Hellfire Club to initiate a bold scheme of ruling the Earth before they hit pubertyâ€¦

Their cynical, vicious plan involved using the threat of mutants to stampede humans into buying the Club’s new, outrageously expensive Super-Sentinels, profiting from death and terror as the wisely wealthy always hadâ€¦

In a devastating, if brief, war the embattled Utopians become the unwitting target of increasingly bloody attacks and Cyclops and Wolverine catastrophically clashed over the role of the super-powered children in their care, and although Utopia was ultimately saved in the nick of time, the policy-split led to a sundering of the Mutants as Wolverine took many of the youngest kids and some of Cyclops’ oldest, but most disappointed and disaffected, friends to a place where they could attempt to rekindle Xavier’s first endeavour – a school where mutants could live relatively normal livesâ€¦

The separation hopefully left Utopia Island as the highly visible fortress against and target for human aggression; populated by warriors and militaristic genocide-survivors ready to take the Race – or perhaps more correctly, Species – War to the oppressors, with the kids allowed to grow up in peace and safetyâ€¦

Of course it didn’t work out that wayâ€¦

Following on from the epochal events of X-Men Schism, this utterly engrossing tome (collecting Wolverine and the X-Men #1-7, from 2011) returns to the far lighter, fun-laced thrills of the 1960s Merry Mutants and opens with a 3-part epic in ‘Welcome to the X-Menâ€¦ Now Die!’

Reluctant and decidedly unsure headmaster Wolverine is getting a much needed pep-talk from Professor X as the new Jean Grey School for Higher Learning opens on the site of the old X-Mansionâ€¦

Nervously occupying a daily evolving super-scientific facility, the faculty staff includes the Beast, Iceman, Kitty Pryde, Husk, Cyclops’ telepathic daughter Rachel Grey and other former X-Men, whilst the ever-growing student population comprises a number of earthly mutants old and new and even selected aliens such as a gentle and compassionate Brood and the obnoxious, troublesome, belligerent spoiled-brat heir to the star-spanning Shi’ar.

Admittedly Lord Kubark was only grudgingly accepted in return for past favours and cutting-edge alien techâ€¦

Even as Chief administrator Kitty desperately attempts to convince the local School Board Inspectors that the institution poses no threat to the community or kids, the first crisis erupts as Kade Kilgore, Black King of the pre-pubescent Hellfire Club, launches an attack on the school, which he considers a personal affront to his plans.

Launching an attack by his lab-grown army of Frankenstein’s Monsters, Kade mischievously transforms the inspectors into ravening horrors. With the very land under the establishment turned into a colossal monster determined to eradicate everything above it, things look bleak until Iceman leads the other teachers in a spirited counterattack.

Quire is deemed an â€œOmega-level threatâ€ by the Avengers, so Wolverine’s plans to turn him into a socialised asset are being closely scrutinised by Captain America, but when Rachel – with the unsuspected aid of Kid Omega – divines that the tectonic assault is being perpetrated by a cloned and brainwashed seed of Krakoa the Living Island (see Marvel Masterworks volume 11) the tide begins to turnâ€¦

With a little deft psychic surgery by the arrogant anarchist – for reasons even he can’t really explain – the all-terrain terror becomes the latest addition to the student body and repulses the other attacks after which Wolverine and cameo-star Matt â€œDaredevilâ€ Murdock retaliate in a way little Kade least expectsâ€¦

In a tale delightfully depicted by Nick Bradshaw and with the scene firmly set, the tone switches to raucous, action-packed hilarity as the long-suffering faculty come to grips with the unique daily challenges presented by their charges. The cyborg assassin and guest lecturer Deathlok foreshadows horrors to come when he demonstrates his Tachyon vision on the class. Broodling Broo, Shi’ar Student Prince Kid Gladiator and particularly Genesis (a boyish clone of arch-horror Apocalypse) hear predictions that give everyone cause for concernâ€¦

Meanwhile, another First-Class X-Man returns to the fold; but Warren Worthington is not the Angel of old and gives old friends Iceman and the Beast extreme cause for concernâ€¦

Of course the one with most cause for concern is celibate headmistress Kitty Pryde who went to bed with a headache and woke up eight months pregnantâ€¦

Trouble is mounting and the school is close to bankruptcy. Desperate for funds, Wolverine takes Kid Omega to an alien gambling station in a dubious ploy to win billions through Quire’s psionic abilities, whilst at the school the Beast diagnoses the true cause of Kitty’s condition. Somehow she’s been infected by a horde of microscopic Brood (the real, ghastly, voracious body-stealing, egg-implanting cosmic horror kind utterly unlike the erudite, genteel freak Broo), and after the headstrong Kid Gladiator invades her body via shrinking technology, the Beast has no choice but to follow, leading a determined team of students on a Fantastic Voyage into the Headmistress’ bloodstreamâ€¦

Meanwhile, in space a deadly alien hunter who uses Brood as hunting dogs is hurtling towards Earth and the Schoolâ€¦

On Planet Sin, Wolverine and Quentin are making millions but have underestimated the casino owners’ ingenuity and determination to discourage cheating, whilst within Kitty’s circulatory system, the mutants’ school field trip is slowly eradicating the micro-Brood infestation. However, when full-sized Brood-warriors invade the School, young Broo and Kitty are forced into a deadly game of cat-and-mouse simply to survive before Ã¼ber-alien Xanto Starblood reveals himself as the cause of all their woesâ€¦

An Extreme Xeno-Zoolologist, Starblood’s entire universe-view is offended by the existence of a benign Broodling and he’s taken drastic measures to correct the Cosmos’ mistake, but even as the micro-students finish cleaning up Kitty’s small parasite problem Broo, pushed to far, suddenly proves to the alien academic that he’s not that far removed from his mercilessly marauding forebearsâ€¦

And in deep space, Quire pilots the ship back from Planet Sin. He and Wolverine have escaped the Gambler’s wrathâ€¦ but hardly intactâ€¦

Fast, furious, funny and fulfilling, the whole splendid affair was scripted by the wickedly sharp Jason Aaron, illustrated by Chris Bachalo, Duncan Rouleau, Matteo Scalera and Nick Bradshaw with additional inking from Jaime Mendoza, Tim Townsend, Al Vey, Mark Irwin, Victor Olazaba, Walden Wong, Norman Lee, Jay Leisten & Cam Smith. As always there’s a glorious gallery of covers and variants from the likes of Bachalo, Townsend, Bradshaw, Frank Cho, Ed McGuinness and Mark Brooks.

If you crave full-on, uncomplicated yet witty and rewarding Fights ‘n’ Tights fiction this is another near-perfect one-stop shop for your edification and delectation.

July 12, 2012July 14, 2012

Avengers: X Sanction

By Jeph Loeb, Ed McGuinness & Dexter Vines (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-514-7

As the new Avengers film screens across the world, Marvel has released more books and trade paperback collections to maximise exposure and cater to those movie fans wanting to follow up the cinematic exposure with a comicbook experience.

This particular short and sweet saga from megastar scripter Jeph Loeb & the art team supreme Ed McGuinness & Dexter Vines engagingly entangles two filmic franchises as the World’s Mightiest Superheroes and Marvel’s misunderstood mutants clash in a time-busting tale originally released at the end of 2011 as the 4-part miniseries Avengers: X Sanction.

And that was merely the prologue to a summer-long publishing event which pitted Avengers against X-Men in a catastrophic all-out warâ€¦

Superbly self-contained, this epic encounter opens with Captain America, Iron Man, Red Hulk, Wolverine, Spider-Man and other heroes responding to a mass-escape by super-villains from the Lethal Legion when the Falcon is shot by a hidden sniper and spirited awayâ€¦

Only the Sentinel of Liberty notices something amiss and follows the abductor to a freighter in the harbour, where he finds his friend trapped in a containment tube and wired to a colossal cache of explosives. The sniper is revealed as sometime-ally Nathan Summers AKA Cable, a mutant warrior from the far future possessing awesome psionic abilities yet cursed with an incurable, progressive techno-organic virus which is inexorably consuming his flesh and only held in check by the victim’s indomitable force of willâ€¦

In temporally tantalising forward flashbacks it is revealed that Cable is at last succumbing to his infection. He has a day to live and has travelled back from the end of time to unmake history and save his daughter Hope (destined to prevent the planet’s doom) from being killed. Unfortunately that can only be achieved by murdering the Avengersâ€¦

After a spectacular battle Cable also subdues Captain America just as Iron Man notices his missing comrades and tracks them to the Hudson River. Plagued by half memories and lost moments with Hope, Cable attacks and after a shattering struggle also overwhelms the Armoured Avenger, only to be ambushed by the brutally efficient Red Hulkâ€¦

Wracked by the final stages of his fleshly consumption, Cable is vastly overmatched, even with the timely martial assistance of his future mentor Blaquesmith, but Summers’ handicap becomes an advantage when the techno-organic contagion abandons his dying frame and infects the Crimson Colossusâ€¦

As Cable prepares to execute his targets, X-Men Cyclops and Hope burst in, intent on talking him down. Faced with his father and imminently endangered daughter (an outrageously long and overly-complicated time travel story which isn’t germane or necessary to know here: just Google it afterwards, ok?), Cable falters but can’t be dissuadedâ€¦

Just as he prepares to save the future by killing everyone present, the final players arrive when Spider-Man and Wolverine crash inâ€¦

Unable to stop and mere minutes from his own end, Cable attacks again knowing that no sacrifice is too great to prevent the death of Hope and the salvation of Earthâ€¦

Fast, furious and wickedly compelling, this time-twisting all-action thriller delivers a mighty punch without any real necessity to study beforehand that comics-continuity veterans and film-fed newbies alike will relish.

The comicbooks in this short series also sported a host of variant covers and the extensive gallery at the back includes simply stunning images from McGuinness, Bryan Hitch, Joe Quesada, Carlo Pagulayan, Stephen Platt, Ian Churchill, Steve Skroce and four from Leinil Francis Yu to delight and astound the artistically astute amongst you.

May 28, 2012May 27, 2012

X-Men: Asgardian Wars

By Chris Claremont, Paul Smith, Bob Wiacek, Arthur Adams, Terry Austin,
Alan Gordon & Mike Mignola (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-87135-434-1

In 1963, X-Men #1 introduced Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Marvel Girl and the Beast: very special students of Professor Charles Xavier, a wheelchair-bound telepath dedicated to brokering peace and integration between the masses of humanity and the emergent off-shoot race of mutants dubbed Homo Superior. After years of eccentric and spectacular adventures, the mutant misfits disappeared at the beginning of 1970 during a sustained downturn in costumed hero comics whilst fantasy and supernatural themes once more gripped the world’s entertainment fields.

Although the title was revived at the end of the year as a reprint vehicle, the missing mutants were reduced to guest-stars and bit-players throughout the Marvel universe and the Beast was made over into a monster until in 1975 Len Wein, Chris Claremont & Dave Cockrum revived and reordered the Mutant mystique with a stunning new iteration in Giant Size X-Men #1.

To old foes-turned-friends Banshee and Sunfire was added a one-shot Hulk villain dubbed Wolverine, and all-original creations Kurt Wagner, a demonic German teleporter codenamed Nightcrawler, African weather â€œgoddessâ€ Ororo Monroe AKA Storm, Russian farmboy Peter Rasputin, who transformed at will into a living steel Colossus, and bitter, disillusioned Apache superman John Proudstar who was cajoled into joining the makeshift squad as Thunderbird.

The revision was an unstoppable hit and soon grew to become the company’s most popular and high quality title. In time Cockrum was succeeded by John Byrne and, as the team roster shifted and changed, the series rose to even greater heights, culminating in the landmark â€œDark Phoenixâ€ storyline which saw the death of (arguably) the series’ most beloved and groundbreaking character.

In the aftermath, team leader Cyclops left and a naive teenaged girl named Kitty Pryde signed up just as Cockrum returned for another spectacular sequence of outrageous adventures.

The franchise inexorably expanded with an ever-changing cast and in 1985 a new slant was added as author Claremont began to forge links between Marvel’s extemporised Norse mythology and the modern mutant mythos through the two series he then scripted.

Released in 1990 as Marvel was tentatively coming to grips with the growing trend for â€œtrade paperbackâ€ collections, this sturdy 224 page full-colour compendium (re-released as a deluxe hardcover in 2010) collects the 1985 two-issue Limited Series X-Men and Alpha Flight, The New Mutants Special Edition and X-Men Annual #9 which, taken together, comprise a vast saga of staggering beauty and epic grandeurâ€¦

Two-part tale ‘The Gift’, illustrated by Paul Smith & Bob Wiacek, saw the retired ScottÂ â€œCyclopsâ€ Summers and his new girlfriend Madelyne Prior ferrying a gaggle of environmental scientists over Alaska in a joint American/Canadian survey mission, only to fall foul of uncanny weather and supernatural interventionâ€¦

When the X-Men receive a vision of Scott’s crashed and burning body they head North and attack Canadian team Alpha Flight under the misapprehension that the state super-squad caused the disaster. Once the confusion has been cleared up and a tenuous truce declared, the united champions realise that mystic avatar Snowbird is dying: a result of some strange force emanating from the Arctic Circleâ€¦

In another time and place the Asgardian god Loki petitions a conclave of enigmatic uber-deities â€œThey Who Sit Above in Shadowâ€ for a boon, but their price is high and almost beyond his understandingâ€¦

When the assembled teams reach the crash site they find not a tangle of wreckage and bodies but a pantheon of new gods dwelling in an earthly paradise, and amongst them Scott and Madelyne, also transformed into perfect beings. These recreated paragons are preparing to abolish illness, want and need throughout the world by raising all humanity to their level and most of the disbelieving heroes are delighted at the prospect of peace on Earth at last.

However Kitty Pryde, Talisman and Rachel Summers (the Phoenix from an alternate future) are deeply suspicious and their investigations uncover the hidden cost of this global transfiguration and, once they convince Wolverine, Loki’s scheme begins to unravel like cobwebs in a storm. Soon all that is left is anger, recrimination and savage, earth-shaking battleâ€¦

Once the God of Mischief’s plan was spoiled the malignant Prince of Asgard plotted dark and subtle revenge which began with ‘Home is Where the Heart is’ (by Claremont, Arthur Adams & Terry Austin in The New Mutants Special Edition) when he recruited the sultry Enchantress to abduct the junior X-Men whilst he turned his attentions to the adult team’s field commander Storm.

Sunspot, Magik, Magma, Mirage, Cannonball, Wolfsbane, Karma, Warlock and Doug Ramsey are dragged to the sorceress’ dungeon in Asgard, but manage to escape through a teleport ring. Unfortunately the process isn’t perfect and the kids are scattered throughout the Eternal Realm; falling to individual perils and influences, ranging from enslavement to adoption, true love to redemption and rededicationâ€¦

Most telling of all, Mirage AKA Danielle Moonstar rescues a flying horse and becomes forever a Valkyrie, shunned by the living as one of the â€œChoosers of the Slainâ€â€¦

With such power at her command Mirage soon gathers her scattered mutant comrades for revenge on the Enchantress before the dramatic conclusion in ‘There’s No Place Like Home’ (X-Men Annual #9, by Claremont, Adams, Alan Gordon & Mike Mignola)â€¦

Loki, who has elevated the ensorcelled Storm to the position of Asgardian Goddess of Thunder, is simultaneously assaulted by a dimension-hopping rescue unit consisting of Cyclops, Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Rogue, Kitty Pryde, Colossus and the future Phoenix as well as the thoroughly â€œin-countryâ€ New Mutants for a spectacular and cosmic clash which, although setting the worlds to rights, ominously promised that the worst was yet to comeâ€¦

This expansive crossover epic proved that, although increasingly known for character driven tales, the X-Franchise could pull out all the stops and embrace its inner blockbuster when necessary, and this yarn opened up a whole sub-universe of action and adventure which fuelled more than a decade of expansion. More than that, though, this is still one of the most entertaining mutant masterpieces of that distant decade.

Compelling, enchanting, moving and oh, so very pretty, The Asgardian Wars is a book no Fights ‘n’ Tights fantasy fan can afford to miss.

May 8, 2012May 8, 2012

Avengers: The Children’s Crusade

By Allan Heinberg, Jim Cheung, Alan Davis, Olivier Coipel & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-485-0

As the new Avengers film screens across the world, Marvel has again released a bunch of tie-in books and trade paperback collections to maximise exposure and cater to those movie fans wanting to follow up the cinematic exposure with a comics experience.

This stunning yarn is every bit as epic as any big screen extravaganza but does depend a bit too much on a thorough grounding in Avengers lore so newbies might struggle a bit with the minutiaeâ€¦

Once upon a time the mutant Scarlet Witch married the android Vision and they had – through the agency of magic and Wanda’s unsuspected ability to reshape reality – twin boys. Over the course of time it was revealed that the boys were not real (for further details see Marvel Platinum: the Definitive Avengers) and as the years passed the tragedy drove the Scarlet Witch to insanity.

When Wanda tipped completely over the edge and destroyed at least three of her team-mates, the â€œWorld’s Mightiest Heroesâ€ were shut down and rebooted in a highly publicised event known as Avengers Disassembled. Of course it was only to replace them with both The New and Young Avengers. The event also spilled over into the regular titles of current team members, and affiliated comic-books such as the Fantastic Four and Spectacular Spider-Man ran parallel but not necessarily interconnected story-arcs to accompany the Big Show.

Said Big Show consisted of the worst day in the team’s history as the Witch manipulated people and events: betraying her oldest, closest friends and causing the destruction of everything they held dear.

In the later company crossover event House of M reality was rewritten (yes, again!) when she had another breakdown and altered Earth continuity so that Magneto’s mutants ruled a society where normal humans (â€œsapiensâ€) were an acknowledged evolutionary dead-end living out their lives and destined for extinction within two generations. It took every hero on Earth and a great deal of luck to put that genie back in a bottle and in the aftermath almost no mutants were left on Earthâ€¦

Needless to say in recent time Wanda Maximoff has not been anybody’s favourite person so it’s perhaps lucky that no one on Earth seems to know her current whereaboutsâ€¦

This compilation collects portions of Uncanny X-Men #526, Avengers: the Children’s Crusade #1-9 and Avengers: the Children’s Crusade – Young Avengers issue #1 (published in comicbook form from October 2011 to March 2012) which comprised the core-story for the latest relaunch of the constantly-changing grim and gritty alternate universe.

This gripping but convoluted tale opens with ‘Rebuilding’ (from X-Men #526 by author Allan Heinberg and artists Olivier Coipel & Mark Morales) as the aging Magneto, now loosely aligned with the remaining mutants in the semi-autonomous enclave â€œUtopiaâ€, learns that two members of the teen superhero team Young Avengers bear an impossible similarity to the twins his daughter conjured up years ago.

Moreover, the ultra-swift Speed and sorcerous Wiccan bear an uncanny resemblance to Quicksilver and the Scarlet Witch at the same ageâ€¦

Can these superhero twins possibly be his grandchildren? When he decides to investigate, X-Man and Avenger Wolverine warns the master of Magnetism to leave them aloneâ€¦ or elseâ€¦

The story proper begins with Young Avengers Stature, Vision, Hulkling, Hawkeye, Patriot, Speed and Wiccan battling the racist terrorists Sons of the Serpent just as the elder Avengers arrive. When the child sorcerer displays a terrifying burst of power, alarm bells start ringing for Captain America, Iron Man and Ms. Marvel who have also noticed the startling similarities to their crazed and deadly former memberâ€¦

In a world where the impossible happens every day and twice on Sundays, Wiccan has always suspected that Wanda was his true mother, and as the veteran heroes seek to curb his rapidly developing powers the boy mage convinces his team-mates to accompany him on a search for the missing Scarlet Witch and the true story of how and why she went badâ€¦

Every Young Avenger has a different motive for the quest: for Speed it’s a chance to prove his annoying twin wrong, whilst Hulkling sees a chance to give his boyfriend Wiccan a sense of peace and closure. For Stature it’s the remote possibility of resurrecting the father Wanda murderedâ€¦

As the kids break out of Avenger custody they are joined by Magneto, sparking a clash with Wolverine and the rest of the â€œAâ€ Teamâ€¦

Bloodshed is avoided only by Wiccan transporting his friends and the Mutant Mastermind to the Balkan nation of Transia where Wanda and her brother Pietro grew up. Here they discover that Quicksilver – who blames his father and the Avengers in equal part for his beloved sister’s fate – is waiting.

â€¦And so is Wanda herselfâ€¦

Except that it’s only a carefully constructed android facsimile, but one which takes the reluctant and inimical fellow questers to the door of one the world’s most dangerous men, who has been harbouring the Scarlet Witch ever since the cataclysmic events following her magical decimation of the planet’s mutant populationâ€¦

Meanwhile the Avengers have recruited Wonder Man – who was brought back from the dead by Wanda – but he proves to be an unreliable ally once he realises that the World’s Mightiest Heroes intend to kill the Witch at the first sign of troubleâ€¦

In Avengers: the Children’s Crusade – Young Avengers issue #1, illustrated by Alan Davis & Mark Farmer, founding member Iron Lad returns to finish the mission he gathered the young heroes for.

The futuristic technologist is the teen iteration of Kang the Conqueror and formed the Young Avengers to prevent himself growing into the merciless Master of Time, but as this pithy behind-the-scenes and out of continuity saga shows, history and destiny are not easily cheatedâ€¦

Back in Avengers: the Children’s Crusade #5 the chaos builds and the fabric of reality itself begins to unravel as Wanda and her notional boys are reunited and discover the true nature of her powers.

All Wanda wants to do is make amends whilst the man who claims to have caused all her breakdowns is prepared to keep her at all costs. Just as the Avengers arrive, determined to save the world from their former comrade, all hell breaks loose. When Iron Lad rejoins his team in real time he changes the recent past and the situation escalates to a catastrophic crescendo when the X-Men turn up, seeking justice for all the mutants â€œWandaâ€ destroyed in her crazy daysâ€¦

With the dead rising, history unmaking itself and the true villain seizing control of all creation the stage is set for a truly tragic and spectacular climaxâ€¦

Bombastic and cosmically broad in scope, this impressive tale by Allan (Wonder Woman, JLA, Sex and the City, The O.C., Gilmore Girls, Grey’s Anatomy) Heinberg seeks to undo and reset key milestones of Marvel history with boldness and generally succeeds in all his goals, aided by the impressive art of Jim Cheung and inkers Mark Morales, John Livesay, David Meikis & Dexter Vimes, but although this yarn will delight long-time fans I fear casual and new readers will struggle to pick up the nuances or even follow the plot. Still, the spectacular alternate cover gallery by Cheung, Jelena Kevic-Djurdjevic, Alan Davis & Mark Farmer, Travis Charest and Art Adams will enthrall art fans and the impetus afforded by the film release will certainly draw new followers to this extremely attractive package with many small and big screen connections.

January 31, 2012January 30, 2012

Uncanny X-Men: From the Ashes

By Chris Claremont, Paul Smith, Walt Simonson, John Romita Jr. & Bob Wiacek (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-6155

In 1963 X-Men #1 introduced Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Marvel Girl and the Beast: very special students of Professor Charles Xavier, a wheelchair-bound telepath dedicated to brokering peace and integration between the masses of humanity and the emergent off-shoot race of mutants dubbed Homo Superior. After years of eccentric and spectacular adventures the mutant misfits disappeared at the beginning of 1970 during a sustained downturn in costumed hero comics as supernatural mystery once more gripped the world’s entertainment fields.

Although their title was revived at the end of the year as a cheap reprint vehicle, the missing mutants were reduced to guest-stars and bit-players throughout the Marvel universe and the Beast was made over into a monster until Len Wein, Chris Claremont & Dave Cockrum revived and reordered the Mutant mystique with a brand new team in Giant Size X-Men #1 in 1975.

To old foes-turned-friends Banshee and Sunfire was added a one-shot Hulk villain dubbed Wolverine, and all-original creations Kurt Wagner, a demonic German teleporter codenamed Nightcrawler, African weather â€œgoddessâ€ Ororo Monroe AKA Storm, Russian farmboy Peter Rasputin, who transformed at will into a living steel Colossus and bitter, disillusioned Apache superman John Proudstar who was cajoled into joining the makeshift squad as Thunderbird.

In the aftermath, team leader Cyclops left and a naive teenaged girl named Kitty Pryde signed up just as Cockrum returned for another spectacular sequence of outrageous adventures.

The franchise inexorably expanded and in 1982 a fresh generation of students enrolled in Xavier’s School for Gifted Youngstersâ€¦

Released in 1990, as Marvel was tentatively coming to grips with the growing trend for â€œtrade paperbackâ€ collections, this sturdy 228 page full-colour compendium collects a supremely impressive run of issues of the Uncanny X-Men (#168-172, from April-December 1983) which perfectly encapsulated everything that made the outrageous outcasts such an unalloyed triumph and touchstone of youthful alienation.

The action opens as Kitty Pryde reacts badly to the news that she is being transferred to the student team of New Mutantsâ€¦ or as she calls them, â€œX-Babiesâ€â€¦

‘Professor Xavier is a Jerk!’, by Chris Claremont, new star art-find Paul Smith and inker Bob Wiacek, related the battled-hardened Pryde’s reaction to the arbitrary declaration as the team enjoyed a little downtime following a stupendous battle in space against the ghastly alien body-stealers The Brood. The sulking quickly escalated into a cataclysmic life-or-death struggle as Pryde and her little space-dragon Lockheed accidentally uncovered an infestation of alien predators which had remained undiscovered in the depths of the X-Mansion for monthsâ€¦

Meanwhile, original X-Man Cyclops had left the team again to catch up with rebound girlfriend Lee Forrester but discovered a new woman who was the exact duplicate of his dead one-and-only Jean Greyâ€¦

‘Catacombs’ plunged head-on into a new crisis as the team are called in when the Angel is abducted by a hitherto undiscovered enclave of outcast mutants dwelling beneath the streets of New York. With Kitty as part of the rescue team the X-Men descended into the tunnels and battled the horrific Morlocks and their charismatic leader Callisto.

Easily outmatched and overpowered the heroes were helpless until Storm took a radical, irreversible step: defeating Callisto in a death-duel and becoming the new ruler and protector of the subterranean deviants in ‘Dancin’ in the Dark’. Above their heads in the halls of the wealthy and powerful, the Hellfire Club was under sustained attack by a telepath of incredible power and spiteful intensity whilst in Alaska Scott Summers had fallen deeply in love with disturbing doppelganger Madelyne Pryor despite fearing she might be some new aspect of the immortal cosmic Phoenixâ€¦

Pencilled by Walt Simonson, issue 171 saw a major new player join the misunderstood mutants when ‘Rogue’ – a powers and memory leeching teen who had nearly murdered Carol Danvers – knocked on the mansion door begging for sanctuary and medical help.

It seemed her uncontrollable ability was afflicting her with stolen personalities and slowly driving her crazy. When the former Ms. Marvel, now a cosmic powered entity dubbed Binary, saw the girl who had stolen her life become a guest of the X-Men, sparks and fists inevitably flewâ€¦

Wolverine had been absent for weeks on a personal quest to Japan (see Marvel Platinum – the Definitive Wolverine or any number of collected editions of the first Wolvie miniseries by Claremont & Frank Miller), which culminated with the announcement of his impending marriage to Japanese aristocrat Mariko Yashida.

‘Scarlet in Glory’ found the rest of the team in Japan for the impending nuptials and poisoned by vengeful villains leaving Logan and Rogue – whom he deeply distrusted – to seek out an antidote. At the same time the transformation of Storm from nature goddess to grim-and-gritty bad-ass was completed by the mercenary maniac Yukio as the last X-Men raced their fast-approaching toxic deadlineâ€¦

The result was sheer carnage as the feral Wolverine went wild. With desperate-to-please Rogue in tow Wolverine carved a bloody trail to Yakuza mercenary (and Mariko’s rival for the rule of Clan Yashida) Silver Samurai and psychopathic mastermind Viper in ‘To Have and Have Not’…

Although the bold champions were eventually triumphant, the victory came at great cost. Wolverine returned to America alone and unwedâ€¦ and all the while, the long-hidden presence manipulating events had jockeyed for position, pushing the globally scattered heroes to one inescapable conclusionâ€¦

‘Romances’ opened with Binary choosing to leave Earth with the swashbuckling Starjammers and ended with Scott returning to the X-Men to announce his own imminent marriage to Madelyne. This calm before the storm led into the spectacular issue #175 with the revelation that one of the X-Men’s oldest enemies had returned to unleash the ultimate destructive force, culminating in the end of the world and the seeming ultimate revenge of ‘Phoenix!’ (with additional art from John Romita Jr.).

The issue also saw Scott and Madelyne tie the knot before slipping away for a honeymoon from hell in the concluding episode ‘Decisions’.

Setting the scene for upcoming epics, there was a final meeting between Logan and Mariko, the US Government sought new and permanent ways to curb mutant power and Callisto returned to the Morlocks but the main focus was the newlyweds’ crash-landing in monster-plagued seasâ€¦

These character driven tales proved conclusively that the X-Men phenomenon was bigger than any single creator and that the series was capable of infinitely renewing itself. The stories here opened up a whole sub-universe of action and adventure that fuelled more than a decade of expansion and are still some of the best comics of that distant decade.

Compelling, effective, moving and oh, so pretty, From the Ashes is a book no Fights ‘n’ Tights fan can do without.
Â© 1983, 1990 Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

January 10, 2012January 10, 2012

X-Men: Schism

By Jason Aaron, Kieron Gillen, Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel AcuÃ±a, Alan Davis, Adam Kubert, Tim Seeley, Billy Tan & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-502-4

Radical change – or at least the appearance of such – is a cornerstone of modern comics. There must be a constant changing of the guard, a shifting of scene and milieu and, in latter times, a regular diet of death, resurrection and rebirth.

A case in point is this rather impressive restating of the Mutant paradigm from Marvel wherein the latest status quo gets the boot and a new beginning equates with a return to the old daysâ€¦

Most people who read comics have a passing familiarity with Marvel’s ever-changing X-Men franchise and newcomers or occasional consumers won’t have too much trouble following the backstory so let’s plunge in as the hostile world once more kicks sand in the faces of the planet’s most dangerous and reviled minorityâ€¦

This utterly engrossing tome (collecting X-Men Schism #1-5, Generation Hope #10-11 and X-Men ReGenesis) finds the world’s mutant population reduced to a couple of hundred desperate souls living in self-imposed exile on an island dubbed â€œUtopiaâ€ located in San Francisco Bay.

Although generally welcomed by most of the easygoing residents of the city, tensions are high and with X-Men team-leader Cyclops running the colony in an increasingly draconian manner, his relationship with war-weary second-in-command Wolverine is slowly, inexorably deterioratingâ€¦

Matters come to head when Logan refuses to train the latest batch of kids in combat techniques, concerned that these newest mutants are being cheated of their childhoods, after which Quentin Quire, a 16-year old anarchist telepath provokes an frantic armed response from human world leaders at an arms limitation conference intended to convince humanity to abandon their â€œdefensiveâ€ anti-mutant weapons; which generally equates to giant robotic Sentinels of various vintagesâ€¦

With the world once again on alert against â€œHomo Superiorâ€ attacks, every nation is frantically rearming, but the robots have all degenerated into rampaging menaces attacking their owners – if they work at all – and the assembled mutants and assorted superheroes are kept busy saving humans from their own bellicose paranoid follyâ€¦

Meanwhile a bunch of very human rich kids make a move of their own. The greedy, remorseless and ambitious scions of munitions millionaires, human traffickers and deranged scientists have waited long enough for what’s theirs and, after murdering their parents and guardians, take over the Hellfire Club to initiate their scheme of ruling the Earth before they hit pubertyâ€¦

As their cynical, vicious plan unfolds, the embattled Utopians become the unwitting target of increasingly bloody attacks and Cyclops and Wolverine catastrophically clash over the role of the super-powered children in their care, almost oblivious of the launch of the new super-Sentinel devised by the impatient new Hellfire kidsâ€¦

Although Utopia is saved in the nick of time, the policy-split leads to a sundering of the Mutants as Wolverine leads many of the youngest kids and some of Cyclops’ oldest, but most disappointed and disaffected, friends to a place where they can attempt a different way of living, leaving the island as a highly visible fortress against and target of human aggression; populated by warriors and militaristic genocide-survivors ready to take the Race – or perhaps more correctly, Species – War to their oppressorsâ€¦

The core miniseries was scripted by Jason Aaron and illustrated by Carlos Pacheco, Frank Cho, Daniel AcuÃ±a, Alan Davis, Adam Kubert, Cam Smith, Mark Farmer & Mark Roslan with Kieron Gillen writing the intersecting chapters from Generation Hope and the epilogue X-Men ReGenesis drawn by Tim Seeley and Billy Tan, respectively.

If you crave fast, furious and fulfilling Fights ‘n’ Tights fiction this is a nearly perfect one-shop stop for your edification and delectation.

X-Men Schism is scheduled for release on January 19^th 2012.

â„¢ & Â© 2012 Marvel & Subs. Licensed by Marvel Characters B.V. through Panini S.p.A. Italy. A British Edition by Panini UK Ltd. â„¢ and Â© 2012 Marvel Entertainment LCC and its subsidiaries. All rights reserved. A British edition released by Panini UK Ltd.

October 23, 2011October 23, 2011

Hulk volume 4: Hulk Vs. X-Force

By Jeph Loeb, Ian Churchill, Whilce Portacio & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 978-0-7851-4053-5

Bruce Banner was a military scientist who was accidentally caught in a gamma bomb blast of his own devising. As a result stress and other factors caused him to transform into a giant green monster of unstoppable strength and fury. As both occasional hero and mindless monster he rampaged across the Marvel Universe for decades, finally finding his size 700 feet and a format that worked, swiftly becoming one of young Marvel’s most popular features.

An incredibly popular character both in comics and more global media beyond, he has often undergone radical changes in scope and format to keep his stories fresh and his exploits explosively compellingâ€¦

In recent years the number of Gamma-mutated monsters rampaging across the Marvel landscape has proliferated to inconceivable proportions. The days of Bruce Banner getting angry and going Green are long gone, so anybody taking their cues from the TV or movie incarnations will be wise to assume a level of unavoidable confusion. There are now numerous assorted Hulks, She-Hulks, Abominations and all kinds of ancillary atomic berserkers roaming the planet, so be prepared to experience a little confusion if you’re coming to this particular character told. Nevertheless these always epic stories are generally worth the effort so persist if you can.

Even if you are familiar with Hulk history ancient and modern, you might be forgiven for foundering on the odd point of narrative, so this book, collecting a more-or-less self-contained episode of gamma-generated chaos and calamity (originally published in the latter part of 2009 as ‘Code Red’ in Hulk #14-18) provides a cathartic dose of destructive diversion with a minimum of head-hurting continuity conundrums.

What you need to know: a new, intelligent, ruthless and awesomely efficient Red Hulk has been operating in America, clearly not Banner but nevertheless quite to able to hold his own against such powerhouses as The Abomination and even Thor. His origins and intentions are unknown and he guards his human identity with terrifying ferocityâ€¦

This is all part of an overlong, ongoing plot by the world’s wickedest brain trust to conquer everything (as would be later seen in the epic Fall of the Hulks) but here the action is immediate and starts in ‘Eyewitness’ (by Loeb, Ian Churchill & Mark Farmer) when mutant bounty hunter Domino accidentally sees the Red Hulk transform and flees for her life, knowing the Crimson Colossus will stop at nothing to protect his secretâ€¦

The Bloody Behemoth, who has unspecified shady links to Gamma-endowed metahuman psychiatrist Doctor Leonard Samson and professional Hulk-hunter General â€œThunderboltâ€ Ross, gives chase, but soon loses the luck-warping mutant and so recruits a team of ruthless trackers comprising Deadpool, the Punisher, Crimson Dynamo, Thundra and Elektra with orders to silence her at all costsâ€¦

However Domino has friends of her own and in ‘Collision’ seeks help from Wolverine’s ultra-covert mutant wet-works squad which includes X-23, Archangel and Warpath: a lethal X-Force prepared to do whatever’s necessary to protect one of their ownâ€¦

After a blockbusting battle the mutants seem to be gaining the upper hand until a new wild card emergesâ€¦ a brutal Red She-Hulk who changes the game and demands the death of erstwhile ally Elektra in returnâ€¦

‘She’ reveals plots within ploys inside schemes as the Scarlet Juggernaut betrays both sides for her hidden masters, culminating with all-out carnage in the concluding episode ‘Man in the Mirror’ as a few apparent coincidences are revealed as part of a engrossing master-planâ€¦

With his complicity exposed Doc Samson takes centre-stage for the epilogue ‘Delilah’ (illustrated by Whilce Portacio & Danny Miki): a fascinating psycho-drama revealing the origins, motivations and hidden edges to the shrink all the heroes once trusted with their darkest, deepest secretsâ€¦

This bracing, bombastic battlebook also includes a 17 page cover gallery by Churchill, Farmer, Peter Steigerwald, Ed McGuiness, Dexter Vines, Chris Sotomayor, Dave Stewart and Jason Keith plus sketchbook/interview features with Churchill and Portacio with lots of pencil art and comedy strip bonus features ‘Hulk Gym’, ‘Hulk Movie’, ‘Hulk Date’, ‘Hulk Tonsils’ and ‘Hulk Dentist’ by Audrey Loeb, Carlos Silva & Dario Brizuela.

Whenever staggering, monumental Fights ‘n’ Tights turmoil is your fancy, the Hulk is always going to be at the top of every thrill-seekers hit listâ€¦

October 2, 2011September 30, 2011

Marvel Masterworks volume 11: Giant-Size X-Men #1 and X-Men 94-100

By Len Wein, Chris Claremont, Dave Cockrum & various (Marvel)
ISBN: 0-87135-597-3

The X-Men #1 introduced Cyclops, Iceman, Angel, Marvel Girl and the Beast: very special students of Professor Charles Xavier, a wheelchair-bound telepath dedicated to brokering peace and integration between the masses of humanity and the emergent off-shoot race of mutants dubbed Homo Superior. After years of eccentric and spectacular adventures the mutant misfits disappeared at the beginning of 1970 (issue #66 cover-dated March) during a sustained downturn in costumed hero comics as mystery and all things supernatural once more gripped the world’s entertainment fields.

Although their title was revived at the end of the year as a cheap reprint vehicle, the missing mutants were reduced to guest-stars and bit-players throughout the Marvel universe and the Beast was transformed into a monster to cash in on the horror boom, until Marvel editor-in-chief Roy Thomas green-lighted a bold one-shot in 1975 as part of the company’s line of Giant-Sized specials.

This magnificent deluxe hardcover compendium recaptures the sun-bright excitement of those exuberant and pivotal early stories from Giant Size X-Men #1 and issues #94-100 of the definitely â€œAll-New, All-Differentâ€ X-Men from May 1975, through to August 1976 when the merry mutants were still, young, fresh and delightfully under-exposed and opens with a classic mystery monster mash in ‘Second Genesis!’ as Len Wein & Dave Cockrum (the latter hot from a stint reviving DC’s equally eclectic super-team The Legion of Super-Heroes) detailed how the classic team had been lost in action, leaving Charles Xavier to scour the Earth and the Marvel Universe for a replacement team.

To old foes-turned-friends Banshee and Sunfire was added a one-shot Hulk villain dubbed the Wolverine, but most time and attention was paid to new creations Kurt Wagner, a demonic German teleporter who would be codenamed Nightcrawler, African weather â€œgoddessâ€ Ororo Monroe AKA Storm, Russian farmboy Peter Rasputin, who could transform into a living steel Colossus and bitter, disillusioned Apache superman John Proudstar who was cajoled into joining the makeshift squad as Thunderbird.

The second chapter of the epic introductory adventure ‘â€¦And When There Was One!’ reintroduced the wounded team leader Cyclops who swiftly trained the team before leading them into primordial danger against the monolithic threat of ‘Krakoaâ€¦ the Island That Walks Like a Man!’

Overcoming the phenomenal terror of the living mutant eco-system and rescuing the original team should have led to the next quarterly issue, but so great was the groundswell of support that the follow-up adventure was reworked into a two part for in the rapidly reconfigured reprint monthly which became a bimonthly home to the team and began the mutant madness we’re still experiencing today.

X-Men #94 (August 1975) presented ‘The Doomsmith Scenario!’, plotted by Editor Wein, scripted by Chris Claremont and with Bob McLeod inking the man-on-fire Dave Cockrum, in a canny Armageddon-countdown shocker as the newly pared-down strike-squad (minus Sunfire and recovering mutants Marvel Girl, Angel, Iceman, Havok and Lorna Dane) were dispatched by The Beast – then serving as a full-time Avenger – to stop criminal terrorist Count Nefaria from starting an atomic war.

The insidious mastermind had invaded America’s Norad citadel with a gang of artificial superhumans and accidentally turned a nuclear blackmail scheme into an inescapable holocaust before the new mutants stormed in to save the world in the epic conclusion ‘Warhunt! (inked by Sam Grainger).

However one of the valiant neophytes didn’t make it backâ€¦

X-Men #96 saw Claremont take full control of the team’s writing (albeit with some plotting input from Bill Mantlo) in ‘Night of the Demon!’ as a guilt-wracked Cyclops, blaming himself for the loss of a team-mate, accidentally unleashed a demonic antediluvian horror from earth’s dimmest prehistory for the heroes-in-training to thrash. The infernal Nagarai would return over and again to bedevil mankind, but the biggest innovation in this issue was the introduction of gun-toting biologist/housekeeper Moira MacTaggert and the first inklings of the return of implacable old adversariesâ€¦

Issue #97 began a long-running, intergalactically-widescreen plotline with ‘My Brother, My Enemy!’ as Xavier, plagued by visions of interstellar wars, tried to take a vacation, just as Havok and Lorna Dane (finally settling on the superhero nom de guerre Polaris) attacked the team, seemingly willing servants of a mysterious madman using Cyclops’ old alter ego Eric the Red.

The devastating conflict segued into a spectacular, three-part saga as the pitiless robotic Sentinels returned under the hate-filled auspices of mutantophobic Steven Lang and his mysterious backers of Project Armageddon. The action began with #98’s ‘Merry Christmas, X-Menâ€¦the Sentinels Have Returned!’ with coordinated attacks successfully capturing the semi-retired Marvel Girl, Wolverine, Banshee and Xavier, compelling Cyclops and the remaining heroes to co-opt a space shuttle and storm Lang’s orbital HQ to rescue them in ‘Deathstar Rising!‘ (inks by Frank Chiaremonte) – another phenomenal all-action episode.

After a magical pinup of the extended team by Arthur Adams (the cover of Classic X-Men #1 from 1986 if you were wondering) this first stellar, deluxe hardcover compilation concludes on an agonising cliffhanger with the 100^th issue anniversary classic ‘Greater Love Hath no X-Manâ€¦’ (with Cockrum inking his own pencils) wherein the new X-Men apparently battled the original team before overturning Lang’s monstrous schemes forever.

However, their catastrophic clash had destroyed their only means of escape and, as a colossal solar flare threatened to eradicate the entire satellite, the only chance to survive meant certain death for another X-Manâ€¦

With even greater excitement and innovation to follow in succeeding issues, these superb comics thrillers revolutionised a moribund genre and led directly to today’s ubiquitous popular cultural landscape where superheroes are as common as cops, cowboys, monsters or rom-com romeos.

The immortal epics compiled here are available in numerous formats (including softcover editions of the luxurious and enticing hardback under review here), but for a selection that will survive the continual re-readings of the serious, incurable fan there’s nothing to beat the sturdy and substantial full-colour feel of these Marvellous Masterwork editions.
Â© 1975, 1976, 1989 Marvel Entertainment Group, Inc/Marvel Characters, Inc. All rights reserved.

September 24, 2011September 24, 2011

Astonishing Spider-Man & Wolverine

By Jason Aaron, Adam Kubert & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-476-8

Remember when comic stories were fun, thrilling and, best of all, joyously uncomplicated? Clearly a few people at Marvel still do if the six issue miniseries collected here as Astonishing Spider-Man & Wolverine is anything to go byâ€¦

Eschewing mind-boggling continuity-links and crossover overload, writer Jason Aaron and artist Adam Kubert, with the impressive support of inkers Mark Morales, Dexter Vines & Mark Roslan (as well as colourist Justin Ponsor and letterer Rob Steen) simply set out to craft a well-told, action-packed and even poignant time-travel fun-fest that does everything rightâ€¦ and superbly succeed.

Without giving away too much delicious detail – trust me you’ll be grateful once you read the full epic adventure – sixty-five million years ago, as a giant asteroid hurtles towards Earth and an impact which will wipe out the dinosaurs and at least two emergent species of proto-hominid, a warring couple of marooned superheroes from the 21^st century sadly make peace with their fate if not each other.

Lost in time for months through the most ridiculous of circumstances, Wolverine and Peter Parker are ready to die. The feral mutant has become leader of the smart but diminutive Small People, leading them to salvation from the predations of their giant evolutionary rivals the Kill People and all other threats, whilst the erstwhile Spider-Man has isolated himself from all contact, terrified of rewriting the future even if he is no longer part of it.

Moreover, Parker’s dreams are haunted by a woman he doesn’t know, but who has become the only thing he cares forâ€¦

At a most precipitous moment the pair are snatched from their time zone and returned to what appears to be an utterly devastated present. The Small People have survived humanity’s fall and are new rulers of a shattered society, but now are at risk of losing their own shot as overlords of Earth. A fresh Armageddon from leftover human technology, a time-travelling z-list villain and a terrifying sentient planet with the ghost consciousness of Doctor Doom appears to be about to end civilisation one more time…

After Wolverine saves the day and is brought back from beyond death by Parker, they are separated in time and dumped at significant and harrowing moments of each other’s early life; but all the while sinister forces wielded by a hidden cosmic mastermind are manipulating not just the heroes but time itself…

After literally saving the world and perhaps the universe, the heroes are still hunted and continually assaulted by Temporal Gangstas The Czar and Big Murder, until Spider-Man and Wolverine finally strike back and seemingly triumph, only to be stranded in the American west for years.

At least this time Peter is happily united with the mysterious girl of his dreams.

However the epic is far from finished and heartbreak is just around the chronal cornerâ€¦

Fast-paced, spectacular, incredibly ingenious and uproariously witty, this tale is a sparkling timeless gem and the perfect antidote for over-angsty costumed drama overload.

August 11, 2011August 13, 2011

X-Men: Age of X

By Mike Carey, Simon Spurrier, Clay Mann, Steve Kurth, Paul Davidson & various (Marvel/Panini UK)
ISBN: 978-1-84653-490-4

Most people who read comics have a passing familiarity with Marvel’s ever-changing X-Men franchise and most of us have seen alternate world stories so this intriguing and highly entertaining package seems pretty easy to pigeonholeâ€¦ but appearances can be deceiving.

With a property as valuable as these massed mutants, change is a necessarily good thing, even if you sometimes need a scorecard to keep up. This utterly engrossing tome (collecting Age of X Alpha, X-Men Legacy #245-247, New Mutants volume 3 #22-24 and Age of X Universe #1 and 2) keeps the backstory baggage to the barest minimum for newbies and non-addicts; concentrating instead on building an â€œend-of-daysâ€ tension in a brutally harsh last stand scenario – although the pacing is a little hard to grasp in places.

This Marvel publishing event, which ran from January to April 2011, is a tribute to the Age of Apocalypse mega-crossover of 1995, with an introductory Alpha issue, dedicated stories in X-men core titles and a pair of â€œUniverseâ€ compilations focusing on the non-mutant heroes of the altered continuity.

Written by Mike Carey and illustrated by Mirco Pierfederici, Gabriel Hernandez Walta, Carlo Barberi, Walden Wong, Paco Diaz and Paul Davidson, the initial instalment describes a very different world where all-out species war is being waged between humans and homo superior. Anti-mutant statutes by the Human Coalition have all but eradicated mutantkind and any ordinary mortal who might carry the hated genes to make them.

Three years of inspired atrocity later, the stories of those last remnants of the variant species are examined in telling vignettes: Scott Summers was forced to execute his fellow inmates at a mutant Alcatraz before spectacularly escaping, Sam Guthrie survived the extermination of his entire family, super-powered or not, and Wolverine lost all his abilities destroying a pathogen designed to wipe out all genetic aberrations.

During the darkest moment of this man-made Extinction Event Magneto rescued the last remnants of meta-humanity and created a monumental Fortress X from the ruins of a devastated city. Here the remaining mutants hold out in a desperate all-or-nothing holding actionâ€¦

After 1000 days of dire and valiant resistance a kind of last ditch dÃ©tente persists. The humans keep attacking and the mutants perpetually narrowly beat them off. In this world where there are no telepaths and there has never been a Professor X, every day is one more precious moment of defiant unity in the face of imminent doom.

The stalemate continues in X-Men Legacy #245 (Carey, Clay Mann & Jay Leisten) as the resistors continue to defy the human world’s technology and soldiery. Especially vital are the contributions of the Force Warriors: energy-casting mutants whose powers maintain an impenetrable energy-shield around Fortress X. They are led by the charismatic Legion – son of Dr. Moira MacTaggert and an unknown fatherâ€¦

The most tragic hero is Legacy, whose touch can steal memories and abilities. She is not allowed to fight but is tasked with preserving forever the dying memories of mutants who fall in battle.

A few resisters are troubled by more than just the state of the world: something is imperceptibly wrong with reality itself. Metal-morph Madison Jeffries discovers there is something amiss with the stars in the sky; Summers, dubbed the Basilisk, realises that he’s killed some humans more than once and some defenders question why so many mutants are mysteriously imprisoned in the citadel’s dungeons.

Moreover, the enigmatic â€œXâ€ who runs the fortress seems more concerned with containing them than defeating the human attackers. Even Magneto feels something is being kept from him – and he’s in chargeâ€¦

When immaterial internee Kitty Pryde escapes the Brig and penetrates the forcefield she discovers something fantastic and X orders her silenced at all costs, precipitating traitorous action from Legacy, Cajun thief Gambit and even Magneto himselfâ€¦

The New Mutants chapters are illustrated by Steve Kurth & Alex Martinez and follow Basilisk, Legacy and the liberated Pryde as they begin unpicking the darkly credible but ferociously flawed universe they inhabit. A turning point comes when the fugitive fighters free an imposing bald man named Xavier who claims to be a telepathâ€¦

Cunningly tapping into the brooding pressure and extreme vivacity of life during wartime and wonderfully reminiscent of William Hope Hodgson’s macabre 1912 classic The Night Land (an absolute â€œmust-readâ€ for all fantasy fans) this is an effective thriller and just a little different from your standard â€œunite and save the universeâ€ crossover-events with a superb and spectacular surprise climax that will delight regulars and visiting readers alike.

And that’s the only real problem here: because after that satisfactory ending the Age of X Universe stories (written by Simon Spurrier, Jim McCann & Chuck Kim, illustrated by Khoi Pham, Tom Palmer, Paul Davidson & Gabriel Hernandez Walta) follow, totally killing the mood and the flow despite all being extremely well-produced revelatory side-bars and effective character-pieces.

Viewed on their own merits the stories of Spider-Man’s ultimate sacrifice, the brutal and tragic career of Humanity’s Avengers (Captain America, Invisible Woman, Iron Man, Ghost Rider, the arachnoid Redback plus the most disturbing Hulk ever) and hidden secrets of the Mutant-hunting Dr. Strange are extremely impressive. If they’d been disclosed before the big reveal, surprise ending they would have been valuable elements in the greater narrative but chucked in after the fact they just detract from a really impressive story-ending.

This action-packed, compulsive and otherwise excellent volume also includes variant covers by Olivier Coipel and Clayton Mann.

If you want fast, furious and fulfilling Fights ‘n’ Tights magic this is a nearly perfect one-shop stop for your edification and delectation – just make sure you read the last bit after the first bit and before the middle bit…

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: