X-Men Legacy 24, X-Force 1

X-Men Legacy 24
Spurrier (w) and Huat and Yeung (a) and Villarrubia (c)

My plan, right, was to lead Wednesday off with AVENGERS and SECRET AVENGERS, as I tend to put Avengers titles out first if I have them. Scheduling forced my hand, though, and had me lead with X-MEN LEGACY, the end of my favorite book of the year, and X-FORCE, the start of what I hope will be a favorite (I'm writing this before I read that one). I think, given the impact of these two stories (and particularly this one), it's the right call to highlight these books as early as I am, middle of the day on a release day, but it also makes me more wary of spoilers. I've toyed, going back and forth, with having reviews that wholly summarize the book and having reviews that vaguely point at things and reviews that are more log lines with analysis of something I refuse to define. I've more or less settled on fully summarization, leaving out some of the finer details to allow potential readers the chance to find those out for themselves.

There's no room for that here.

This book is not only totally spoiler-laden, it's maybe the most incredible story I've read in comics since Gillen's JOURNEY INTO MYSTERY or the Winter Soldier creation. It's meaningful, it's wonderful, and it, above all else, knows exactly what it is. I refuse to spoil it here and I refuse especially to do so on a Wednesday, when plenty of people won't even have a chance to get to it. All I'll do is advise you to go out, buy this book, buy any copy of X-MEN LEGACY you can find, and absorb it all. Drink it all in. As Spurrier says in the traditional final letter to the audience, the book is "a title, a character, a creative team and above all a vibe so bloodymindedly unlike its fellows." If it's not for you, it's not for you. But it's absolutely been for me and it's absolutely been something to watch. It's an incredible departure from any other superhero comic in the way that YOUNG AVENGERS played with the medium and the art form as a whole or the way HAWKEYE insists on not being about superheroes. It's something worth seeing even if it's not what you're looking for. Please take note of it. I'll end this not-quite-review with more of Spurrier's words:

There will be some, I think, angered by these last few pages, on the grounds that a tale's "importance" can only be weighed according to some grand impact on its Universe. I understand but disagree with that view. Instead I wouldn't have chosen quite such a perversely bittersweet ending if I didn't think it the best way to emphasize a very important point: even when nothing else has changed, when all the explodo and punching seems to have been for nothing, it's the lesson learnt - even the merest echo of it - that renders the journey valuable. Our memories remain.

X-Force 1
Spurrier (w) and R. Kim (a and c)

Cable has assembled Psylocke and formerly-powered Marrow to be a part of his new mutant strike team, a "dirty tricks crew" for mutant nation. The reasoning behind this one is more firm than the reasoning behind the most recent couple of X-Force teams, one brought together by threat and one brought together to prevent disasters Cable foresaw. This one is here to do a little bit of everything, including making sure mutants don't get dealt out of the world-building hand. After an attack in Alexandria (which may be linked to why Hope is suddenly strapped up to machines with Doctor Nemesis claiming that she's "theoretically alive") took over three thousand lives with a mutant square in the center of it, Cable wants to figure out what the mutant's tie was to the explosion, hoping to keep people from getting more mad at mutants, and to recover whatever the weapon was, hoping to arm up the mutants. His "broadly trustworthy" informant has discovered that the cyber-weapon that shut down communications in Alexandria was also used in various other countries at various other strikes to gain data. Now this informant is being held by the Chinese and the team needs to get him out before they can advance to the next stage. Of course, to Psylocke's dismay, the informant is Fantomex. Fantomex reports that the weapon is being carried by a plane always airborne over Antarctica (international air) and it's only susceptible to attack when it's being refueled. He also happens to know the refueling schedule. The team dispatches in EVA to attack the refueling plane, hijacking it to allow the formerly-depowered Marrow to hurl herself at the plane with a Doc Nemesis concocted timefreeze grenade, allowing her 30 seconds of unfettered access. She shatters the engine of the plane before sticking a parachute on the weapon container and launching it and herself out of the wreckage in that 30 seconds (real time a few tenths of a second) before the plane blows. Inside the weapon's container is, as Cable suspected, a new mutant.

Very interesting first issue and one that makes completely clear that these characters will all very much have their own distinct personalities and uses. I talked a little bit in my pre-game this week about the upside to having a team that's a little smaller than the recent X-FORCE teams (and really than most teams in general) and, after reading this issue, I have to emphasize again how neat it is. Four people on the team (plus unofficial member Doctor Nemesis) means we get ample time to check in with each character and get a feel for everyone, even in just the first issue. Marrow, the biggest question mark of the roster, handles narration duty and it gives us a look into an adrenaline junkie's mind, one that we can also see through her action and her dialogue. The narration colors her as something more than just a deranged thrill-seeker, which her dialogue may not have done so well. Cable, of course, is the terse general, always plotting and always leading. Psylocke is the most complicated and perhaps the least fleshed out here, though not because Spurrier does a bad job with her. She's probably the most prevalent character in the wider universe from this team right now so there's less need to really get too far into her character but it still sticks the landing (OLYMPICS) by showing her as the uber-powerful and lethal telepath with a complex history and a vow to stop killing. Fantomex gets perhaps the biggest makeover with Spurrier really relishing the dive into his over-the-top personality and his French aspects. Fantomex sometimes confounds writers thanks to his strange origins. He chose to be French when he was raised as part of the Weapon Plus program and it's something that writers don't tend to bring out too much (even Remender didn't focus on it besides a word here or there and Wolverine's insistence that his nickname be "Le Pew," a nickname which Wolvy would be pleased to know carries over here). Spurrier sees it as a key character point and I can't help but agree. The man chose to be French, of course he's going to embrace it. It also gives him the unerring air of smugness and irritation so points to that as well. Really fun first issue, looking forward to this one as it continues and as we start to go deeper into the story and the people.