Amazing X-Men #2 – Review

By: Jason Aaron (writer), Ed McGuinness (penciler), Dexter Vines (inker), Marte Gracia (colors)

The Story: Iceman finds himself without a snowball’s chance in Hell.

The Review: As Jason Aaron’s Elysian pirate epic rolls on, we find the Amazing team split between Heaven and Hell. If that sounds awesome to you, you’re probably not alone, as, at the least, Aaron seems to be plenty pleased with the sheer scope of his tale.

Fans of Aaron’s work will remember that he previously took Wolverine to Hell in the previous iteration of Logan’s solo series. Despite that rather grim take on Logan, Aaron’s also become known for the madcap, comedic style of Wolverine and the X-Men. Fittingly, this issue demonstrates elements of each of those runs.

The tone is definitely more in line with Aaron’s more recent work, focusing on the madness of the situation rather than the horror; however the narration of the issue makes sure to reinforce the stakes. I expect that this will register differently depending on the reader. Just as some may find the balance refreshing, others may wish that the book would pick a tone and stick with it.

Thunderbolts #167 – Review

By: Jeff Parker (writer), Declan Shalvey (artist), Frank Martin (colorist)

The Story: What a waste of a perfectly good prostitute.

The Review: Ever since both Herc and S.H.I.E.L.D. dropped off my radar, I’ve been scoping around for other Marvel titles to check out and cover.  A couple of you made suggestions, which I appreciate, but most of them turned out to be minis that were already part-way through their run, so those didn’t seem like the best long-term choices.  What I really wanted to find was that great Marvel middleweight—not one of the pop sellers, but an enjoyable title in its own way.

And since I’ve had a hankering for a quality antihero title since the end of Secret Six (which I miss more and more with each passing day, by the way), the Thunderbolts seemed like a natural fit.  Reading through this issue makes it clear this dubious band of individuals don’t have quite the edginess Gail Simone’s smart writing brought to the Six, but the T-bolts have a lively, engaging group dynamic all their own.

For one thing, you have far more than six people bouncing off each other.  All told, you have almost twice that number of members on the team, each with a very distinctive power set, design, and personality.  You’ve got the daughter of Satan, a slightly disturbed psychologist, a half-Asgardian, half-Troll, several geniuses with varying degrees of amorality, and Mr. Hyde.  And that’s before you get to the heroic alignments of the characters, some of whom really seem to be in this for the nobility, and others who can’t care less.

Obviously, with Luke Cage and Brunnhilde (I know she goes by Valkyrie, but her Asgardian name is a lot more fun to say, don’t you think?) around, you have your true-blue heroes, but the rest of the T-bolts are a little harder to pin down.  I’ll say this, though: none of them show as much of an inclination to kill as the most principled of the Secret Six.  Troll expresses remorse (“No…!  Not mean to…”) when she slays the Iceni curse-keeper in this issue, and even Boomerang holds off killing the woman trying to suck his soul until told he’s fated to do so.

As for the plot at hand, time-traveling hijinks are always fun when there are no universe or reality-threatening stakes to them.  Parker seems to be having fun picking and choosing the various periods to send the team, though he makes some fairly obvious choices (here, we go from Industrial Revolution England to Arthurian legend).  But so long as he keeps bringing the creative twists—as it turns out, it’s Jack the Ripper’s victims who are the murderers here—there’s no reason why we shouldn’t enjoy the ride.

Shalvey goes for a simple, sketchy style in the same tradition of Cliff Chiang, but his lines are even thinner and he seems more interested in dynamic movement than drama.  But that works; unlike the Greek tragedy going on over in Wonder Woman, this title is all about action from beginning to end, so Shalvey’s lean, kinetic art (along with some interesting paneling choices, like Satana’s “fiery” recounting of the Iceni legend) fits very well.

Conclusion: Entertaining throughout, Thunderbolts lacks much in the way of depth or complexity, but it delivers a satisfying read nonetheless.

Grade: B

– Minhquan Nguyen

Some Musings: – “A proper room instead o’ the alley?  Fancy!”  I shudder to think of the undoubtedly countless people forced to do the nasty in a pre-Industrial England alley.  Those people can’t be alive now.  As it happens, they aren’t.  So let that be a lesson to you: do it in a room!

– “Never thought my job would require arranging trysts as a pimp.”  None of us ever do.  And I’m a document controller by day, so…

A Second Opinion

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