(****+ / *****) :: a few stumbles in the early middle aside (the Rogue / Magneto stuff, especially, was pretty eh), this is how you do a revival: faithful yet fearless, unafraid to royally shake things up – but never for the sake of just doing it – and amplifying everything that made the original as special as it was into all that it could be today. Can’t wait for season two.
I still have the scars from that finale. Excited for this one.
Every Wednesday morning, I make a blind pull from Siri's (randomized) choice of one of the 20 alphabetically-organized shortboxes that constitute my comics collection, (re-)read it, write about it, and publish the resultant review / memory / whatever. Earlier installments live here.
(Box20): While my complicated relationship with The X-Men remains so, this bit of '90s 90s-ness wasn't as bad as I feared when I opened my eyes and found it in my hands: Nicieza is nothing if not a reliable teller of quality pulp with a soap opera-y mutant twist (Gambit and Rogue were having problems again) and Andy Kubert art (though Kubert was on breakdowns in this issue, with finishes by Matt Ryan) is always welcome.
Nonetheless, there's something, some mental block that has, even in the '90s heyday of mutantmania and my resultant and impressionable mini-collection thereof, rendered me unable to embrace the X-Men corner of the comics world as I have, say, the Bat-village or the Daredevil-burg. Not sure what it is – a general aversion to team books and preference for solo characters, perhaps (though I have found myself, as I stumble through life, enjoying The Fantastic Four – Alex Ross's FULL CIRCLE being a useful gateway drug to Kirby bombast), but my lack of... anything, really, WRT the X-corner remains, with the exception of the cartoon and LOGAN, resolute. Worth noting that I hold a similar indifference to most team books: all of the Avengers series, the various Justice Leagues (I do, however, find the Justice Society intriguing and Super Friends are Super Friends even though they’re the Justice League and yadda yadda yadda)...
Reminder to self: still want to check out the Jonathan Hickman run. Tried it in digital form and couldn’t get into it, but perhaps a physical visitation will do some good.
An enjoyable enough revisit that's made me question my unwillingness to open up to the X-world but, as has been uttered in more than one congressional hearing, There's no there there.