Posts Tagged ‘ X-Men ’

Granted, I’m probably late to the party on this but as I’m not picking up X-Men these days I hadn’t paid it too much attention, but I finally nailed why the Schism #1 cover looks so damn familiar.

It’s basically Wolverine playing the Jean Grey role, isn’t it?

Does this mean we can look forward to a The Cross-Dressing Antics of Mr Howlett one-shot? Or perhaps a team-up with Deadpool?

Dare to dream, Marvelites. Dare to dream.

Maybe it’s a case of high expectations, but I felt really let down when I read the first volume of Stuart Moore’s new Namor series.

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I like Namor a lot, always have. Whether it be as a romantic foil for Sue Richards (or, these days, Emma Frost), a respectful comrade in arms of Captain America, or a member of the lamest superhero team this side of the Great Lakes Avengers (the Defenders, in case you were wondering), there’s something about Namor that just works. I think it’s his duality – he’s an arrogant, self-centered, egotistical ass, but he’s also a fiercely loyal, honorable man that stands up for what he believes to be right. It’s hard to go wrong with the character.

And yet the first volume of Namor: The First Mutant is horribly, horribly dull. The series uses Namor’s current membership of the X-Men and their problems with vampires as a launching point but can be read as a stand alone (I haven’t read the X-Men: Curse of the Mutants storyline myself and I followed this fine). Essentially, Namor goes off to recover Dracula’s head from a race of underwater vampires and soon finds that they have ties to his own family history.

The X-Men are largely (and wisely) absent, with only Emma Frost from the core team putting in a brief appearance. Fledgling mutant Loa also shows up as a supporting character, and it looks like she may be sticking around, but other new characters introduced are pretty shallowly portrayed and it’s easy to tell which ones are marked for death.

As I said, the main problem with the book is that it’s just dull. In spite of the apparent enormity of the threat of the underwater vampires, there’s no sense of urgency to the story and it often feels as though it’s swimming in circles. Characters go to a cave. They go back to New Atlantis. They go back to the cave. The threat is contained. And that’s pretty much it.

Perhaps it’s unreasonably high expectations, but there’s little to recommend here – it’s not bad exactly (although it would have been nice if artist Ariel Olivetti had managed to complete the whole arc) but it’s not something that could be described as good. Also somewhat annoying is that the trade is another of Marvel’s increasing number of four issue collections so unless you can get it at a heavy discount, I’d avoid it.

Enormously disappointing.

I hate retcons.

Not all retcons, mind you, just the retcons that reveal ‘events so shattering that when they come to light, EVERYTHING WILL CHANGE!!’. You know the kind I mean. The kind that Marvel often do.

Like Professor X having a whole other team of X-Men that he left for dead, including Cyclops and Havok’s other brother.

Like Wolverine, Sabretooth, Wolfsbane and pretty much every other vaguely feral mutant not actually being a mutant but being part of another race.

Like Nick Fury forming a team of Avengers way back before the actual Avengers first formed, consisting of these guys:

That’s Sabretooth, Kraven, Namora, Dominic Fortune, Ulysses Bloodstone and Dum Dum Dugan, for those keeping score, and they’re showing up on the cover of the upcoming New Avengers #12. It’s not actually a bad team, and one that makes a certain amount of sense.

And to be fair, it’s not like all Marvel’s retcons are bad; Marvel: The Lost Generation may have been ignored by pretty much everybody, but it was a neat idea that accounted for a period of time in the MU that was now hero-less thanks to Marvel’s ever-shifting timeline that keeps the debut of the Fantastic Four and Spidey as being ‘about ten years ago’ (although that may be twelve years now).

Similarly, the 1950s ‘Avengers’ that debuted in a What If..? story have been neatly incorporated into mainstream continuity as the Agents of Atlas – after adding Namora to the roster.

Finally, First Avenger Ulysses Bloodstone showed up as a member of the Monster Hunters for a short run in the fun-while-it-lasted Marvel Universe. In fact, fellow First Avenger and Agent of Atlas Namora was also added to the roster of the Monster Hunters in an issue of Marvel: The Lost Generation.

So perhaps I don’t hate all retcons after all – I’m hoping that this falls into the latter type of retcon rather than the former – the type that adds a fun layer to the history of the MU, rather than the type that becomes some kind of devastating secret that changes a bunch of stuff.

And now that I think about it, I need to go and write a story about Namora being some kind of unstable nexus point in the MU that allows her to show up in every decent retcon going…

A new trailer for Thor has hit, expanding on what we’ve seen before. This time out, we start off more Earth-bound…

For me, this is still the movie to beat this summer. Yes, X-Men First Class looks better than expected, but I still have my doubts about Captain America – and Green Lantern looks like it could be a huge disappointment.

This, though – this I rank highly for three reasons; firstly, Kenneth Branagh can do no wrong in my eyes – none at all; second, Natalie Portman remains one of my favorite actresses dating back to Leon (that’s The Professional to you Yanks) and the hugely underrated Beautiful Girls; and thirdly, I was damn impressed with Chris Hemsworth’s five minutes of screen time at the start of Star Trek – the guy has charisma by the bucketload and I think he really sells me on the part in this trailer.

So yes, the gauntlet – well, hammer – is thrown down. For my money, this is the one to beat.

Marvel’s May 2011 solicits are out, and several of them sport X-Men Evolutions variants, which spotlight characters’ changes through the ages.

Take the Kitty Pryde variant to Invincible Iron Man #504:

The X-moppet’s evolution – from Sprite to Ariel (or it may have been the other way around) to Shadowcat to just plain Kitty Pryde is showcased here. Sadly missing from the line-up, though is Kitty’s short-haired, rebellious, yellow-X-wearing, bone-claw wielding outfit from Chris Claremont’s er, triumphant return to the X-books.

Edited: I found a bigger pic over on the excellent UncannyXMen.net:

Sadly those two covers are the only pics I can find online of her stunning outfit, but The wielding of one of Wolverine’s bone claws (and the short hair) was obviously a precursor of her look in the alternate-continuity X-Men Forever.

I’m not saying that Claremont has a fetish for strong women with sharp sticks or anything, but there’s some connection there.

Also absent?

Her seXy (see what I did there?) schoolchick look while she was at the University of Chicago:

But the less said about that the better…

Edited to add…

Kitty also had a few other looks – notably while she was living in the UK as part of Excalibur. There was the generic blue and yellow jumpsuit during the book’s last few years…

…she preferred the jeans-jacket-T-shirt combo when undercover with her much-older Mary Sue boyfriend…

..her cheerleader outfit when she was at an all-girl’s boarding school (down, Dan)…

…the look she’d have when she occasionally inherited Magik’s Soulsword and shoulder armor…

…and then there was that time that Kitty was a S.H.I.E.L.D. agent and had her own series. No, really:

It was also pointed out (thanks Jason) that I’d missed out another of Kitty’s early costumes – the one she wore in Uncanny X-Men #149. My memory’s hazy on just how much the rest of the team laughed at her, but I think we have to assume that it was a lot; I mean, there’s a reason she was hiding behind everyone on the cover:

It’s what I like to call her ‘Dazzler’s biggest fan’ costume – at least, that’s what I like to call it when I haven’t blocked it from my memory…

Now, when do we get that Kitty Pryde: Fashion Plate mini we’ve always wanted?

After what felt like a long wait on the movie’s facebook page, with plenty of people joining up just to point out they thought the movie would be crap, the first trailer for this year’s X-Men: First Class is now live…

I think it looks promising enough, but there’s not really a lot of substance to the trailer. Nice to weave in a few shots from the first movies though. Call me cautiously optimistic for now.

Wow, X-Men First Class is really ramping up the publicity isn’t it, between the cast picture, the released images and now the teaser poster from AICN:

Again, I like it. A little more of a classic design than the other X-Men movies, but still somehow works.

More X-Men: First Class pics have shown up over at the LA Times along with an interesting article including a great quote from director Matthew Vaughn:

“With ‘Green Lantern,’ I don’t know about that one, I couldn’t get my head around the trailer, to be honest … look, I will say the following: X-Men as a brand is bigger than Captain America, Thor and the Green Lantern, all put together.”

I think he may be right, actually, as far as the general public is concerned but it remains to be seen if the

Anyway, pictures!

Swingin’ Sebastian Shaw (Kevin Bacon) and Emma Frost (January Jones) get cosy somewhere which may just be the Hellfire Club:

Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and Erik Lensher (Michael Fassbender) start a chess game that may just last through until they’re old men:

And, finally, Xavier, Lensher and company (including Banshee over on the left and a pre-furry Beast at the back in the form of About A Boy‘s Nicholas Hoult) look all pensive, maybe like they’re eyeing up some property for the location of a future school or something:

In spite of doubts about this I have to admit I’m starting to look forward to it.

A class pic of X-Men: First Class has surfaced in low res on the internet:

(EDITED: Now in Higher res – click on the picture below or here to embiggen it)

I make that as (L-R) Michael Fassbender as Magneto, Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggart, January Jones as Emma Frost, Jason Flemyng as Azazel, Nicholas Hoult as Beast, Lucas Till as Havok, Zoe Kravitz as Angel, Jennifer Lawrence as Mystique, and James McAvoy as Professor Xavier.

What can we take away from this?

First, Beast is blue and angry; Jason Flemyng is red and looks a little bit like the devil (dear lord, please not the ‘actual’ devil like in The Draco); the X-Men used to wear black and yellow just like the original comics X-Men (only the outfits look a little more like the redesigned New X-Men gear); Magneto and Mystique were on the team; Lucas Till’s Havok looks like a douchebag; Michael Fassbender looks like Don Draper; and, oh, yes, January Jones is not an unattractive woman.

I’m sure there’s more to come…

Via

I think I’ve cracked the basis of Marvel’s next big crossover/event/bannering of titles/whatever we’re calling it this week.

I mean I probably haven’t, but there’s nothing wrong with a bit of speculation, right?

There have been two teasers released so far (I expect more this week) – one with Spider-Man and the other Cyclops – both asking ‘What do you fear?’.

Spider-Man, being the worry-wart he is, apparently fears the failing economy, recession and a lack of street-cleaning:

Cyclops, meanwhile, with the weight of the world on his shoulders and obviously feeling the burden of leading mutantkind fears becoming exactly like a man he’s hated most of his adult life – Magneto.

The common thread here is obviously fear. I’d imagine we’re going to get some more – how much do you want to bet that one of them features Iron Man and a bottle of bourbon?

In any case, judging from the ads, the event kicks off in April – the same month, if my calculations are correct, that Secret Warriors will hit issue #27 – the series’ final issue. You know what happened a couple of issues back in Secret Warriors? Ares’s son Phobos was killed by Gorgon.

This all seems unrelated until you consider that Phobos is the God of Fear, and back in Secret Warriors #10 Ares told him he would have to die one day to ascend to true godhood (or something like that).

So – you have a God of Fear who may be reincarnated at full power from a comic series written by one of Marvel’s ‘Architects‘, which happens to end the same month as an event starts highlighting fear as a major factor.

Supposition? Speculation? Hell yes. But you heard it here first!

As a fan of writer Paul Cornell’s amazing work on Captain Britain and MI:13, and of artist Leonard Kirk (who also worked on that title), I was looking forward to reading Dark X-Men.

After all – a team of mutants operating under Norman Osborn’s leadership in the midst of the Dark Reign superarc taking place after Utopia? What could go wrong, especially when that team includes the always-good-value Mystique and Dark Beast, the Mengele-esque alternate world version of our own Beast?

Quite a lot as it turns out.

The series has a number of problems: firstly, it focuses less on the team that makes up the Dark X-Men and more on Osborn and returning mutant Nate Grey. While Grey’s return to the Marvel Universe is welcome enough, Osborn has been the center of so many Dark Reign books that any work done with the character here feels redundant – not to mention that having him outwit Mystique, a character with decades more experience than him, diminishes her somewhat.

The second problem is that the other members of the Dark X-Men team are just plain dull; Weapon Omega, born of Bendis’ New Avengers ‘The Collective‘ arc and late of Omega Flight, has been characterized differently in every series he’s shown up in. Here, he’s addicted to the power that Osborn feeds him by throwing other mutants into a big machine that siphons off their power. He’s essentially an addled near-vampiric character with little willpower.

Also on the team is Mimic, a character who has been around since the sixties but rarely gets any facetime, mainly because he’s simply not that interesting – and that doesn’t change here. There’s a hint that he knows he’s due to die at some point in the future and that explains his nihilism but its never really expanded on.

As I mentioned above, Mystique being manipulated by Osborn devalues her character, so thank the heavens for Dark Beast, gleefully vivisecting and experimenting away.

Overall, I was very disappointed, especially as I like the creators. The series doesn’t pick up any plot strands from Utopia and doesn’t really have any impact on anything else going on aside from Nate Grey’s return – and honestly, who missed him anyway?

Look, you know me. I’m a sucker for a good crossover and all that it entails including tie-ins. Tie-in issues that happen between the panels of the ‘main event’, or tie-ins that barely qualify to have the trade dress on the cover (AKA red sky tie-ins) – they’re all okay by me. Hell, the much-reviled Secret Wars II got me into Marvel Comics, and I’ve picked up the Inferno Omnibus and the Inferno Crossovers Omnibus in spite of having all the original issues because I love the story so much, and the fact that it reached out and touched so much of the Marvel Universe.

So picking up this was a no-brainer, wasn’t it? I hadn’t picked up the original Dark Wolverine tie-in issues and despite being irritated at Marvel’s shrinking trade sizes, I decided to pick this up – especially as I got it 50% off through Midtown Comics.

Collecting Dark Wolverine #82-84 (a whole three issues!), New Mutants #11 (also collected in the Siege: Thor trade, and New Mutants Vol 2) and the Siege: Storming Asgard – Heroes and Villains one-shot (which I’ll get to later), the book clocks in at a lightweight 128 pages.

Even so, 128 pages of good comics is 128 pages of good comics so for $10 I was willing to give it a shot.

Unfortunately, the main event here – the Dark Wolverine issues – can’t remotely be described as ‘good comics’. Daken – the son of Wolverine, for those not in the know – was introduced in Daniel Way’s Wolverine: Origins series before graduating to a starring role in the Dark Avengers and taking over one of his father’s other ongoing series. A bisexual, amoral, scheming, pheromone-emitting killer, Daken attracts the attention of virtually everyone he comes into contact with and always has a hidden agenda – even while he’s working alongside Norman Osborn’s Avengers.

In the three issues presented here, he heads to Asgard along with the rest of the team as Osborn – falling apart – has decided to take the battle to the Norse gods at Loki’s urging. Once there, Daken attracts the attentions of the Fates who consider him vitally important and go about showing him what consequences his decisions have.

You realize at the end of the first issue when Daken kills Norman Osborn what consequences these decisions will have for the reader: none. Everything that Daken does ends badly when he chooses to follow his instincts, so the Fates keep rewinding and giving him the opportunity to make different choices.

That’s right, it’s the comic-book equivalent of ‘and it was all a dream!‘.

Not only that, but this happens in every single issue. I counted three resets at the hands of the Fates, and each time Daken snarls a bit and begrudgingly chooses another path. The art is passable, the dialog readable, but the story here is so repetitive and pointless that it gives crossovers a bad name, because quite simply: nothing happens.

At the end of the three issues, we’re not far off where we started: Daken is in Asgard doing Osborn’s dirty work. I’ll say it again: nothing of note has really happened and – worse – it’s been boring while that nothing has not been happening. These are three dull, dull, dull issues.

Now I grant you, it’s possible – possible – that if I were a regular reader of Daken’s own book I might find the issues enjoyable, and see that he’s a changed man following the Fates’ intervention but – and this is crucial – I’m not a regular reader. And if these are any example of what I can expect when I pick it up, I never will be.

Unforgivably bad.

As far as the additional material goes, New Mutants #11 is good enough but available elsewhere, and the handbook-style issue makes the tragic error of not containing any handbook-style information. Call me old-fashioned, but when I read a handbook I like to read up on the past of a character or team, not get fictional characters’ opinions of them.

Avoid this trade. Avoid it like the plague.

Siege: X-Men is available on Amazon and elsewhere but I wouldn’t get it if I were you…

Marvel’s released a new teaser:

Seems pretty obvious that this is a team of dead X-Men, presumably as part of the Chaos War event (where we’re also getting a Dead Avengers mini I neglected to blog about). Or I suppose it could be a left over from that whole X-Necrosha thing – after all, they do all have glowing eyes.

That looks like John Proudstar (Thunderbird, died Uncanny X-Men #95), Sean Cassidy (Banshee, died X-Men: Deadly Genesis #5, I think), the two dead Stepford Cuckoos (Sophie, died New X-Men #137 and Esme, died New X-Men #150).

Then there’s Madrox. The version of him in the trenchcoat is presumably the dupe who died in the current X-Factor #27, during the Messiah Complex event. The version with the X on the head is probably the dupe who died from the Legacy Virus in the original X-Factor #100. He’s had other dupes die, including one being shot by another, villainous dupe, but they’re the most obvious two.

Sadly missing from the team: Jean Grey (who probably doesn’t count), Changeling, Petra, Sway, Nightcrawler, Forge, Revanche, Joseph, Cable, Stacy X, Sabretooth, Sunder, Sunpyre, Wolfcub, Caliban, Feral, Bedlam, Skids*, Rusty, Skin, Synch, Mondo and Maggot. And anyone else who ever wore an X but didn’t make it out alive.

Maggot never gets any love.

*thanks for the correction, @madmarvelgirl!

It seems that Alice Eve is out of the upcoming X-Men First Class just weeks after I looked at some pictures and decided that yes, she’d make a pretty good Emma Frost.

So, goodbye Alice…but hello the really rather spectacular January Jones!

I’m surprised that Jones landed the role if only because she seems to be keeping a low profile during Mad Men‘s run – but in all honesty I consider this an upgrade in the acting department (not that I have much to judge Eve’s acting on…)

And let’s face it, in looks alone Jones matches Frost’s porcelain blonde perfectly.

Also on the cast list – Zoe Kravitz as Angel (presumably Angel Salvadore) who, according to google, dated Ben Foster, the other Angel from X-Men: The Last Stand. Spooky.

Between Jones, Oliver Platt, James McAvoy and Kevin Bacon, I’m starting to get the feeling this could actually be rather good…

Oh yes I have.

It’s been revealed that Edi Gathegi has been cast as Darwin in the upcoming X-Men First Class movie.

Darwin, of course, was a member of the ‘lost’ team of X-Men revealed to have been put together by Xavier to rescue his original team in the continuity-busting X-Men: Deadly Genesis.

The villain of that piece?

Vulcan, Cyclops and Havok’s mysterious third brother, Vulcan. Kevin Bacon has been cast as an unnamed villain.

So…

Wait, that’s not what I meant to say.

What I meant to say was that the ‘lost’ X-Men team actually was assembled to fight Krakoa, the Living Island.

So my real pick is this:

Because who doesn’t want to see Kevin Bacon as a giant living plant island?

Kevin Bacon has been cast in X-Men First Class, opposite James McAvoy, Michael Fassbender, Alice Eve, Jennifer Lawrence, Nicholas Hoult, Caleb Landry Jones and Lucas Til.

So far, what his actual role is hasn’t been confirmed but consensus seems to be that he’s the villain and the best bet seems to be that he’ll be pasty, bendy, Victorian geneticist turned lackey-of-Apocalypse Mr Sinister, who also happened to spend some time conducting experiments in Nazi concentration camps, so there would certainly be some friction between him and Magneto.

But who else could he be, if we’re plumbing the depths of villains that the young Charlie and Erik could face?

1 – Lucifer

Not to be confused with you-know-who (that’s the Devil, not Voldemort), Lucifer was an alien Quist an advance agent for his race. When the invasion of Earth was foiled by a young Professor X, he dropped a concrete block on him, breaking his back and landing him in a wheelchair. Vindictive bastard.

2 – Sebastian Shaw

Not to be confused with the second guy to play Darth Vader, Shaw was Black King of the Hellfire Club to Emma Frost’s White Queen back when they were more of a threat and less of a mutant brothel – his inclusion would make sense if Alice Eve’s Frost is going to be introduced via the Hellfire Club. In a corset. … …. Anyway, a mutant himself, Shaw absorbs and redirects kinetic energy, which means if you punch him in the face really hard, he can punch you back even harder.

3 – Amahl Farouk

Amahl Farouk was a Sidney Greenstreet-esque predatory psychic mutant that Xavier faced early in his career whilst traveling in Egypt who ran a gang of street urchin thieves (including a young Storm), much like Oliver Twist’s Fagan but presumably with less singing. When Xavier killed him, he lived on in the psychic plane as the Shadow King and he later took over Karma’s body and ate a lot.

Eventually, the Shadow King’s history was retconned so that he was a psychic monster from the dawn of time, and Farouk was merely a host for his essence. But forget that, I just want to see Kevin Bacon in a fez.

4 – Steven Lang

A bit boring, Lang was creator of the Sentinel program and obsessed with mutants. So kind of like X-Men 2‘s Brian Cox, but less Scottish. On the bright side, if Bacon was Lang, we might see actual Sentinels in an X-Men movie instead of just this.

5 – Apocalypse

Ol’ blue lips himself, Apocalypse is a 5,000 year old mutant who also augmented himself with alien technology, presumably because being immortal wasn’t enough fun for him. A bit of a bastard, his main problem is that he tends to posture a lot and his evil plots are almost always along the lines of vague ‘survival of the fittest’ kind of things. Also, he’s scared of babies. Specifically mutant glowy-eyed babies. True story.

6 – Moses Magnum

Just because.

Not exactly breaking news, but Jennifer Lawrence has been cast as Mystique in the upcoming X-Men First Class, alongside Kevin Bacon who’s going to be the subject of another post entirely.

For now, though: Jennifer Lawrence, before she gets all blue and scaly just like Rebecca Romijin…

Yes, alright then.

More casting for X-Men First Class has been mostly confirmed following on from Alice Eve’s confirmation as Emma Frost.

About A Boy‘s Nicholas Hoult – who I wanted for the new Peter Parker a few months back – has been cast as a young (and presumably at this point not blue and hairy) Hank McCoy, aka Beast.

Caleb Landry Jones, an actor who’s basically only appeared in bit parts (including in the ever-excellent Friday Night Lights and critically acclaimed but fatally flawed No Country for Old Men) and that it’s damn near impossible to find a recent photo of, has been cast as Sean Cassidy – Banshee.

There’s been some scuttlebutt around Kick-Ass‘s Aaron Johnson being cast as Cyclops, but that has apparently been denied. Lucas Till, however, has allegedly been cast as Cyclops’ brother, Alex Summers – Havok.

No word on who’ll be playing Jean Grey yet.

Let’s run a picture of Alice Eve with James McAvoy – Charles Xavier – shall we?

Following the end of Second Coming, the Uncanny X-Men‘s next storyline is called Five Lights, and Marvel have been releasing teasers along these lines…

It looks to me like the conclusion of Second Coming may result in Hope somehow making it possible for new mutants (not to be confused with New Mutants) to start appearing again…

And a familiar-looking font on the word ‘Generation’…

And, oh look, something’s popped up in Amazon’s pre-orders for December release…

I think there’s another title relaunch on the horizon…

Of course, it would help if the vast majority of the characters involved in the team weren’t dead or depowered.

…probably, at least according to several online sources.

Then again a few weeks ago word on the street (I live in a world where this kind of information is passed along by seedy informants lurking in alleys looking for their next fix) was that Rosamund Pike would be trying to fill Emma’s corset, although she’s now linked with Moira MacTaggert.

I have to say, though, that Ms Eve would seem to fill out that corset a little better…

And yes, there is an argument that this post was just a blatant excuse for pictures of Alice Eve in her scanties.

And I’m okay with that.