What I Bought Today – X-Men #1 (WARNING – SPOILERS AND MASSIVE BACK-STORY, LOL)

Say what? It’s Friday? Say what?! I bought a Marvel book?! Well, let’s just go ahead and see exactly…

Before anyone asks why I decided so quickly after my last post to go ahead and buy a Marvel book, I just wanna give the quick answer right now: When someone is willing to go to the trouble of writing a 13 paragraph essay on why I should at least be willing to give Marvel a chance, I really don’t have any other choice but to do just that, so thank you John W. Bruce for making this decision all the easier on me. Speaking of which, note to self: Apparently asking in the title of a blog entry helps to get feedback. lol With that said, let’s take a look at X-Men #1.

Okay, I gotta go over a couple of things for readers of my blog whom I know for a fact may not be all that familiar with recent happenings in the Marvel Universe, particularly involving the X-Men. So, if I may borrow one of Linkara‘s quotes, it’s now…

Back in 2005, an event comic called House of M has Scarlet Witch losing control of her magic, resulting in her de-powering most of the mutant population. The known number of mutants goes from millions to a couple hundred in an instant. Naturally, not everybody exactly handled this all that well. However, last year, Marvel put on an event known as Avengers vs. X-Men. In it, the Phoenix returned, Hope Summers was to be the one it would possess, and Cyclops decided that was a good thing, because the Phoenix’s powers of rebirth might bring back the mutants, even though anyone written with half a brain told him how idiotic a decision due to the number of people the Phoenix has killed whenever it showed up before. This led to the Avengers trying to stop this outcome, which resulted in the I-don’t-even-feel-like-keeping-track’th time Marvel set heroes against each other for the mass crossover event, as the X-Men who were loyal to Cyclops fought against the Avengers, who were merely trying to place Hope in protective custody. I should note for the record that, by the end of this book, Cyclops is very clearly a villain, becoming the Dark Phoenix himself by choice and killing a number of people, including Professor X. The ultimate outcome of Avengers vs. X-Men was that Hope Summers and the Scarlet Witch were able to wish away the Phoenix, Cyclops was arrested but later escaped prison and became a terrorist, the mutant population went back up to how it was previously due to the spell Scarlet Witch previously cast being broken, and Captain America has reformed the Avengers to include a number of X-Men as a gesture to help with mutant rights, because for some reason, the civilians in Marvel are still ignorant and racist dumbasses. This has also led to the start of Marvel NOW, which was originally believed to be a reboot to compete with DC’s New 52, but has actually proven to be more or less just a whole new series of #1 issues, basically re-establishing the events of the modern universe for newcomers while also progressing everyone’s stories.

This is TOO adorable! XD

So, with that said, let’s look at the cast. You got Storm, who in my opinion has ALWAYS been one of the most powerful characters in the Marvel Universe with her ability to manipulate the weather however she sees fit. Then there’s Rachel Summers, AKA Marvel Girl, who is the daughter of Cyclops and Jean Grey, and thus has the same insane levels of telekinetic and telepathic powers her mother did, and then some. Next is Rogue, who can steal powers just by touching someone’s bare skin, and is actually a member of the Uncanny Avengers nowadays, so I guess she’s pulling double duty here. Fourth member of the team is Kitty Pryde, AKA Shadowcat, who is literally untouchable with her ability to phase through solid objects. Next is Psylocke, who is also a telepath/telekinetic, but her preferred ability in combat is to form psychic weapons. And finally, well, now I’m a little confused.

The final member of the group is Jubilee, who WAS a mutant with the ability to shoot…erm, fireworks out of her hands. However, she was among those mutants who were de-powered, and some time afterwards, she was made into a vampire…Yeah, I had no idea that was a thing. I found out last night, and I was like “WHA?!” To keep from losing control of herself, she drinks bottles of Wolverine’s blood (since he has an unlimited amount to spare), which has the added bonus of giving her limited amounts of Logan’s healing powers. All this actually sounds kinda cool…except that they have established she can only handle so much sunlight before it becomes toxic to her, and yet we see her on several occasions in direct sunlight in this comic. Also, there was an image posted a while back of her using her old mutant powers. This has led to a theory that she either was cured of her vampirism, has regained her old powers, and/or has gained increased invulnerability to the sun, possibly all three due to the outcome of Avengers vs. X-Men.

So yeah, that’s the main six protagonists for this book, which brings up a point that everybody online has brought up: This is an X-Men comic with an all-female leading cast. And I gotta say, I love what the book’s writer, Brian Wood, had to say about that…

And I quote…

“I feel like as far as the X-Men go, the women are the X-Men. Cyclops and Wolverine are big names, but taken as a whole, the women kind of rule the franchise. If you look at the entire world as a whole, it’s the females that really dominate and are the most interesting and cool to look at. When you have a great artist drawing them, they look so amazing and always have.” I cannot argue those points, people. But what’s really great about this comic is that it stars a team of women, but it never feels like it’s beating that fact into you. It feels more natural that way.

Anyway, let’s actually get into the story here. It seems that when Sublime, the evil sentient bacteria who is trying to keep mutants from becoming the dominant species (he was created by Grant Morrison, don’t ask questions, lol), arrived on Earth billions of years ago, he had a twin sister named Arkea. The two had a fight over who got to come to Earth, which Sublime won, forcing Arkea to evolve elsewhere while harbouring a deep-rooted need for revenge. Cut to present day, where Jubilee is headed for the Jean Grey School For Higher Learning, along with a baby. No, we’re not in Renesmee territory here, the baby is from a town that got destroyed, supposedly in a terrorist bombing, but some people claimed to have seen a meteorite. She finds she’s being stalked by Sublime and calls the school, which by the way is jam packed with a ton of students, and I pretty much have no idea who the hell ANY of them are. Regardless, Storm, Kitty, and Rogue head out and meet Jubilee on her train, which later has an apparent electrical malfunction that kills the drivers and Rogue has to save everyone on the train.

Meanwhile, Sublime has arrived at the school ahead of Jubilee, and immediately surrenders. He’s not there to start a fight, he’s there for protection. It seems there really WAS a meteorite, and that Arkea was piggybacking on it to get to Earth. So why was he stalking Jubilee earlier? Because apparently, the baby has something of an infection, if you get my drift. Also, Arkea was the one responsible for the train accident, as she can possess machines as Sublime can with people. And it gets better, since Jubilee and the others arrive just as Sublime is explaining the details about his sister, Arkea deciding to send herself in a text message to Hank down in the lab and possess Karima, the Omega Sentinel…Definite pants-to-be-darkened ending.

So, how do I rank this comic? It’s awesome, no doubt. Would I call it the best comic I’ve read this month? No, but it’s pretty high up there. Then again, this is the month where DC gave us this…

And this…

And THIS…

“Bang bang, he shot me down
Bang bang, I hit the ground
Bang bang, that awful sound
Bang bang, my baby shot me down”

…So yeah, that might be influencing me a bit, but honestly, I think I would really like this book regardless, so I will be buying the next issue at the end of June…which means now I gotta re-evaluate my planned pull list for the coming months…dammit. Oh well, at least now I know I CAN enjoy a Marvel comic a lot, and I hope anyone who’s interested will do so too. Ja né!

Related articles

• Meet the new ‘X-Men’ (cnn.com)
• First Look: Brian Wood’s All Female X-MEN #1 (comicvine.com)