Madame Xanadu Vol. 1: Disenchanted – Review

by Matt Wagner (writer), Amy Reeder Hadlery (art), Richard Friend (inks), Guy Major (colors), and Jared K. Fletcher (letters)

The Story: Madame Xanadu tries to do what little good she can, from Camelot, to the court of Kublai Khan, to revolutionary France, to 1880s London, to 1920s New York; but it always comes with mixed results.  And there’s always that pesky Phantom Stranger to deal with….

The Good: Wow, what a trade.  Ten issues long, this is a big book that’s ‘s really a series of two-issue arcs (each in a different time period) that end in a massive change in the series’ status quo; and it feels nothing short of epic.  Not a single page is wasted, either.  There isn’t any treading of water and Wagner’s jumping from time period to time period with equal amounts of ease (and no doubt a gratuitous amount of research) is truly impressive, essentially making this a series of period pieces in the DC Universe that effortlessly incorporates a bevy of historical figures.  Any one of the five time periods here could’ve been the basis for an entire ongoing series.  The scope of the book comes to enormous, but never overwhelming thanks to the cycle of repetition that Wagner shows Xanadu and the Stranger to be hopelessly locked in.  Best of all, the ending of the trade feels natural, grand, and conclusive, which is what you want out of a trade’s ending, not a cliffhanger.

The relationship between Xanadu and the Stranger really is the meat of the book. It’s a highly complex relationship that evolves from lover, to enemy, to source of tragedy. Yet despite this fluidity, the beauty is that much like Xanadu and the Stranger’s existences, the relationship is really just a cycle that continually repeats the same pattern.  A tremendously pained yet beautiful relationship, it’s one of the best in comics.  Best of all is the difference in morality that comes to seperate the two; it’s just so damned hard to side with either one, as neither is wholly right or wrong.  At the very least, the reader will oscillate between Xanadu and the Stranger. I myself spent much of the book on Xanadu’s side, but ended the book on that of the Stranger.

Lastly, Amy Reeder Hadley’s art is fantastic and the woman deserves every Eisner nomination she’s had tossed her way. It’s vibrant, joyful, and full of life. Hadley’s style manages to successfully make use of a Japanese influence, but while that anime/manga feel is definitely there, it’s never overwhelming. Rather, Hadley takes elements of it to create a unique art style, rather than just whole-hog draw a manga. What comes out is not a Japanese-styled book, but rather a look that is all her own.

What’s Not So Good: I don’t say this often, but while this trade was fantastic, I did get the feeling that the series works better in single issue format. Jumping from time period to time period, it just feels a little too compressed when it’s all between the same two covers. This somewhat hampers the Phantom Stranger appearances; it becomes much more obvious that he’s showing up in every single issue when you’re not having to wait a month between Xanadu fixes. As a result, the Stranger’s appearances almost feel too frequent.

Conclusion: A tremendous value for your dollar, fantastic art, and an epic feel make this a trade, and a series, worth checking out.

Grade: B+

-Alex Evans