Morrison's X-Men
So I just spreed through Grant Morrison's New X-Men and I'm left with an overwhelming feeling of... huh. His ideas, while interesting and fun, often work against the X-Men mythos, to the point where his run is destructive of the brand. It's easy to see why they decided to retcon and overwrite quite a lot of his Big Ideas, and chose Joss Whedon as his successor. I'm just starting Whedon's run but it's far more in line with the X brand than is Morrison's - it's
very much what the company needed, in order to keep the the property viable.
* And I say this knowing that he brought in new readers. I question whether they were the kind of readers Marvel could milk for 20 years though.
The problem with Morrison's run is that it tried to change the world of the X-Men in a way that was incompatible with the shared Marvel Universe, and that severely limited the kind of day-to-day superheroics that keep a franchise plugging along, decade after decade. Morrison's run was a reinvention, and really freakin' cool reinvention at that, but I quite often got the impression that he didn't really like the X-Men.
Characterization was painfully thin at times, sacrificed in favour of plot, and the run is largely devoid of quiet, team moments. And it's those quiet moments that really make a teambook work - this is a team that can barely stand to be in the same room together for any period of time. Which is fine, in and of itself, but I'm not even talking about the tension between Jean and Emma - Morrison is really focused on one-to-one dynamics, and hardly interested in the group.
So some things that I hated:
1. Charles "To Me My X-Men!" Xavier. Ok seriously - what the fucking fuck? Worst. Line. Ever. And he couldn't stop saying it. Rargh! There are some good Charles moments in this run. His general badassery was great - Charles should be badass. But all two often he was out-witted in frankly silly ways. Damsel in distress!Xavier was just a little tiresome.
2. James "Bub Snikt" Logan. Honestly, I sometimes questioned why he was even in this series. He has like, two important jobs - stabbing things and supporting Jean. That's it. Oh, and he got Scott drunk and dragged him into his Weapon Plus drama, so Scott could have a character building moment. Logan, meanwhile, had a panel of introspection.
3. Emma "Suddenly British and Cattier Than Ever Before" Frost. Morrison's Emma is probably the pettiest, the most shallow of all Emmas. And there's really something revolting about her relationship with 'her girls'.
4. Xorneto. Yeah, I know everyone hates Xorneto. But come on! Even knowing about the plot twist ahead of time, I really saw no foreshadowing for this turn of events. The Xorneto reveal came out of a left field on another planet. It's not that I wanted it spelled out for me, rather I found it cheap.
5. Xorneto killing Phoenix. Whut? Please, if you can, explain how that make any kind of sense.
6. Xorneto taking over Manhattan. Can you tell I really don't like Xorento? But seriously. There was just a dreadful lack of tension in those scenes. The images of twisted up bridges were great and all, but too much happened off-panel, and what was on-panel fell flat. Magneto should have been scary, at least up to the point where it became clear that he was a drug-addled wreck. Instead he was a one-note caricature from start to finish.
7. Scott "Indecisive Whiner" Summers. Lame. And so damn boring, especially with the amount of panel-time he got.
8. Crazy!Lilandra. Does that count as a fridging? She disappears after the Cassandra Nova storyline wraps up, only to reappear much later, for a grand total of three pages, in order to induce yet more angst in Xavier. Sounds like a fridging to me.
8. The future-epilogue with Sublime!Beast. Also lame. Negative two gold stars. To be honest I skimmed it for Jean bits and tried not to let my eyes get burned by Silvestri's hideous penciling. At least Quietly had character. Minus another two points for Logan's Muscleman/Cowboy getup.
Things I liked:
1. The additions to the Phoenix mythos. I'm always up for some cosmic weirdness. I quite like the proviso that Jean has to die before she can Phoenix up, and that Logan, with an attempted mercy kill, was the one to release the Phoenix. I was also pleased with how much the Jean and Charles relationship figured.
2. The special class. So many great characters, and they were just fun. <3 Add to that the daring concept of Xavier's actually being a fully functional school, with a diverse and large student body. I really liked that Morrison looked at the problems of: a) the X-Men as teachers and soldiers; b) teaching children with bizarre and dangerous mutations; c) developing a curriculum for mutants, and the possibility of a mutant-centric curriculum.
3. Xavier and Jean actually trying to change the world.
4. Quietly's art. Yes, he occasionally made the characters hideous, but he did some really imaginative stuff. I particularly liked his objects and backgrounds. It's a good match for Morrison's storytelling.
5. Jimenez's art. Well, it's Jimenez. :D
6. Jean ripping through Emma's memory. (Right up until Scott threw a hissy fit and left). So much raw emotion in that scene. I appreciate that Morrison made Jean genuinely dangerous.
7. Mutant culture. Fashion, arts, science - it's the logical development of the proliferation of mutants, and one that was long overdue.
8. The Cassanda/Charles womb-throwdown. Fetus fighting is clearly the best thing in the history of ever. And generally the whole Cassandra/Mumadrai concept made for a fascinating read. I'm a little troubled by Hank's initial analysis of her DNA structure. There's something really hinky going on there, involving some (il)logical leaps on Morrison's part.
9. Emma/Scott. Yeah, I said it.
The thing is, I don't really know how I feel about this one. I liked the story, but it might work best as a self-enclosed graphic novel series. I think that some of what Morrison did was downright toxic to the X-brand, particularly his overwhelming emphasis on salting the earth of the old generation. His lack of interest in developing the mythos in a way that other writers could build on it, within the MU, was evident.
Anyway, I'm thumbs up and thumbs down on this one.
very much what the company needed, in order to keep the the property viable.
* And I say this knowing that he brought in new readers. I question whether they were the kind of readers Marvel could milk for 20 years though.
The problem with Morrison's run is that it tried to change the world of the X-Men in a way that was incompatible with the shared Marvel Universe, and that severely limited the kind of day-to-day superheroics that keep a franchise plugging along, decade after decade. Morrison's run was a reinvention, and really freakin' cool reinvention at that, but I quite often got the impression that he didn't really like the X-Men.
Characterization was painfully thin at times, sacrificed in favour of plot, and the run is largely devoid of quiet, team moments. And it's those quiet moments that really make a teambook work - this is a team that can barely stand to be in the same room together for any period of time. Which is fine, in and of itself, but I'm not even talking about the tension between Jean and Emma - Morrison is really focused on one-to-one dynamics, and hardly interested in the group.
So some things that I hated:
1. Charles "To Me My X-Men!" Xavier. Ok seriously - what the fucking fuck? Worst. Line. Ever. And he couldn't stop saying it. Rargh! There are some good Charles moments in this run. His general badassery was great - Charles should be badass. But all two often he was out-witted in frankly silly ways. Damsel in distress!Xavier was just a little tiresome.
2. James "Bub Snikt" Logan. Honestly, I sometimes questioned why he was even in this series. He has like, two important jobs - stabbing things and supporting Jean. That's it. Oh, and he got Scott drunk and dragged him into his Weapon Plus drama, so Scott could have a character building moment. Logan, meanwhile, had a panel of introspection.
3. Emma "Suddenly British and Cattier Than Ever Before" Frost. Morrison's Emma is probably the pettiest, the most shallow of all Emmas. And there's really something revolting about her relationship with 'her girls'.
4. Xorneto. Yeah, I know everyone hates Xorneto. But come on! Even knowing about the plot twist ahead of time, I really saw no foreshadowing for this turn of events. The Xorneto reveal came out of a left field on another planet. It's not that I wanted it spelled out for me, rather I found it cheap.
5. Xorneto killing Phoenix. Whut? Please, if you can, explain how that make any kind of sense.
6. Xorneto taking over Manhattan. Can you tell I really don't like Xorento? But seriously. There was just a dreadful lack of tension in those scenes. The images of twisted up bridges were great and all, but too much happened off-panel, and what was on-panel fell flat. Magneto should have been scary, at least up to the point where it became clear that he was a drug-addled wreck. Instead he was a one-note caricature from start to finish.
7. Scott "Indecisive Whiner" Summers. Lame. And so damn boring, especially with the amount of panel-time he got.
8. Crazy!Lilandra. Does that count as a fridging? She disappears after the Cassandra Nova storyline wraps up, only to reappear much later, for a grand total of three pages, in order to induce yet more angst in Xavier. Sounds like a fridging to me.
8. The future-epilogue with Sublime!Beast. Also lame. Negative two gold stars. To be honest I skimmed it for Jean bits and tried not to let my eyes get burned by Silvestri's hideous penciling. At least Quietly had character. Minus another two points for Logan's Muscleman/Cowboy getup.
Things I liked:
1. The additions to the Phoenix mythos. I'm always up for some cosmic weirdness. I quite like the proviso that Jean has to die before she can Phoenix up, and that Logan, with an attempted mercy kill, was the one to release the Phoenix. I was also pleased with how much the Jean and Charles relationship figured.
2. The special class. So many great characters, and they were just fun. <3 Add to that the daring concept of Xavier's actually being a fully functional school, with a diverse and large student body. I really liked that Morrison looked at the problems of: a) the X-Men as teachers and soldiers; b) teaching children with bizarre and dangerous mutations; c) developing a curriculum for mutants, and the possibility of a mutant-centric curriculum.
3. Xavier and Jean actually trying to change the world.
4. Quietly's art. Yes, he occasionally made the characters hideous, but he did some really imaginative stuff. I particularly liked his objects and backgrounds. It's a good match for Morrison's storytelling.
5. Jimenez's art. Well, it's Jimenez. :D
6. Jean ripping through Emma's memory. (Right up until Scott threw a hissy fit and left). So much raw emotion in that scene. I appreciate that Morrison made Jean genuinely dangerous.
7. Mutant culture. Fashion, arts, science - it's the logical development of the proliferation of mutants, and one that was long overdue.
8. The Cassanda/Charles womb-throwdown. Fetus fighting is clearly the best thing in the history of ever. And generally the whole Cassandra/Mumadrai concept made for a fascinating read. I'm a little troubled by Hank's initial analysis of her DNA structure. There's something really hinky going on there, involving some (il)logical leaps on Morrison's part.
9. Emma/Scott. Yeah, I said it.
The thing is, I don't really know how I feel about this one. I liked the story, but it might work best as a self-enclosed graphic novel series. I think that some of what Morrison did was downright toxic to the X-brand, particularly his overwhelming emphasis on salting the earth of the old generation. His lack of interest in developing the mythos in a way that other writers could build on it, within the MU, was evident.
Anyway, I'm thumbs up and thumbs down on this one.