Friday, November 30, 2012

All-New X-Men #2

I'm still not convinced that story spooling out in All-New X-Men is a good idea.

Time travel stories are always a tricky thing to manage, and this one seems to break all the rules.

The modern-day Beast is upset by what Cyclops did to Charles Xavier at the end of the Avengers vs. X-Men event (it bothered me, too), so he travels back in time and contacts the earliest version of the X-Men (Cyclops, Marvel Girl, Iceman, Beast and the Angel) and brings them through time to the present - though what exactly he has in mind is difficult to determine.

It breaks all the rules - showing the team their future would put every event that happens in between in danger, which should change the present. So how will they get around it? Mind wipe? Alternate reality? Reboot? Hard to say.

I'll give them this - it's a well-told story so far by writer Brian Bendis, with a great balance between drama, action and humor. And the art by Stuart Immonen and Wade von Grawbadger is outstanding, veering from intense confrontations to comic ones (the scene where Iceman past and present confront each other is a real delight).

I have a lot of faith in Bendis and his ability to make even this improbable story work - but I hope he hasn't painted himself into a corner this time around.

Grade: A-

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2 comments:

El Vox said...

Rip Jagger's Dojo blog does a little mini review of the Joe Kubert Presents comics #2, if interested, sounds like he enjoyed it:
http://ripjaggerdojo.blogspot.com/

Chuck said...

Vox, thanks for the recommendation. I picked up my copy of Joe Kubert Presents yesterday - an outstanding comic!