Comic Review: X-Force – Epic Collection: Under the Gun

Published: March 22nd, 2017
Written by: Rob Liefeld, Fabian Nicieza, Todd McFarlane, various
Art by: Rob Liefeld, Greg Capullo, Todd McFarlane, Mike Mignola, Mark Pacella, Darick Robertson, Terry Shoemaker, various 

Marvel Comics, 463 Pages

Review:

Man, oh, f’n man… it’s been ages since I’ve read the Rob Liefeld era of X-Force. When I was a kid, I thought that this was the greatest new series Marvel had but I also think I was convincing myself of that, as Rob Liefeld was a hot commodity and I was also a fan of The New Mutants, which this was born out of. Besides, there was just so much hype at the time and I was at a pretty impressionable age.

Reading this now, I still found it really enjoyable and was surprised that I liked it as much as I did.

However, I also know that the story essentially came from Liefeld like bullet points and then it was handed to ace writer Fabian Nicieza, who actually wrote all the dialogue and massaged Liefeld’s notes into a usable script. After Liefeld left the series to co-found Image Comics, Nicieza stayed on as the writer and worked with other greats like Greg Capullo and Mike Mignola.

Now looking at the other side of this, creatively, the art isn’t great and even if I loved Liefeld when I was in 7th grade, I see the issues with his art much more clearly now. However, I don’t want to shit all over the guy like everyone else has done for years. I just notice the issues he has with anatomy and perspective.

It’s worth mentioning, though, that the art did improve once Liefeld stepped away, which happened about two-thirds into this collection.

As far as the story goes, I really got reinvested in this and want to keep reading it. Possibly beyond where I stopped when I was buying this month-after-month, which was about four or five years into the series.

Additionally, this also reminded me of how much I liked some of the long forgotten characters that were so cool in 1991. Characters like G.W. Bridge, Garrison Kane and the other people associated with them and Cable’s past.

Rating: 7.5/10

Vids I Dig 680: Just Some Guy: Michael Kors Reacts to Marvel’s Hellfire Gala

Comic Review: Uncanny X-Force, Vol. 6 & 7: Final Execution – Books I & II

Published: April 10th, 2013, August 29th, 2013
Written by: Rick Remender
Art by: Mike McKone, Phil Noto, Julian Totino Tedesco, Jerome Opena, David Williams

Marvel Comics, 271 Pages

Review:

Well, I have finally reached the end of Rick Remender’s highly respected Uncanny X-Force run.

I’ve got to say that this end was fairly satisfying and that the series, as a whole, was good. However, I don’t quite feel the same about it as many of the others who hyped it up for me. I mean, I’ve only heard great things about it. But I wouldn’t call it great, I’d just call it good, sometimes solid but sometimes aimless. Or, at least, sometimes it felt aimless.

And I guess that some of what seemed aimless wasn’t but not all of those things were resolved and some of them didn’t really seem to have much of a point when looking at the whole picture.

The series, I thought, ended up putting so much emphasis on Psylocke that this didn’t feel like a team book. It felt like a Psylocke book with recurring side characters. That’s not to say that Wolverine, Archangel, Nightcrawler, Fantomex, Deadpool, etc. weren’t pretty involved in the proceedings but it’s to say that sometimes I forgot they were involved unless I was reminded by them showing up in a panel.

Ultimately, this is a neat series with an ending that tied up the important bits but I don’t feel like it adds much to the X-Men mythos and that it spent more time trying to be edgy and cool than actually trying to better the X-franchise.

Rating: 7.75/10
Pairs well with: the earlier volumes in Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run.

Comic Review: Uncanny X-Force, Vol. 5: Otherworld

Published: November 21st, 2012
Written by: Rick Remender
Art by: Phil Noto, Billy Tan, Greg Tocchini, Dean White

Marvel Comics, 136 Pages

Review:

Coming off of a pretty big epic story that took up two separate trade paperbacks, this chapter in Rick Remender’s X-Force run was still entertaining but also sort of a bridge between the The Dark Angel Saga and the finale (also spread over two TPBs) Final Execution.

This sort of wraps up some of the stuff from the previous saga while building towards a big crescendo.

The bulk of the story takes place in Otherworld where Captain Britain leads his own corps. It pits twin sister, Psylocke, against twin brother, Captain Britain, while also throwing in their older brother Jamie Braddock Jr.

This also further develops Fantomex’s character, as well as his relationship with Psylocke.

If I’m being honest, things happen here to set the stage for the finale but ultimately, this was kind of boring when compared to the previous chapters. It seems to tap into a lot of Excalibur nostalgia. Now I did like that comic series, as well as Captain Britain, but I never read enough of it and it’s been a really long time.

Still, if you’ve made it this far into Remender’s mostly solid run, this is a necessary step on the way to the big, two-part finale.

Rating: 6.75/10
Pairs well with: the rest of Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run.

Comic Review: Uncanny X-Force, Vol. 3 & 4: The Dark Angel Saga – Books I & II

Published: May 23rd, 2012 (Vol. 3), August 15th, 2012 (Vol. 4)
Written by: Rick Remender
Art by: Rich Elson, Billy Tan, Mark Brooks, Scot Eaton, Andrew Currie, Andrew Hennessy, Jerome Opena, Robbi Rodriguez, Dean White

Marvel Comics, 274 Pages (total)

Review:

This is the big story arc where this highly regarded comic series really came together for me. I was patient, I liked the build of the two volumes before this and I was happy to discover that this was going somewhere solid.

The Dark Angel Saga is broken out into two volumes but I’m reviewing it as one body of work because that’s the best way to talk about it and because these Uncanny X-Force TPBs are too short.

Overall, the story reminds me of the late ’80s/early ’90s X-Men crossover events. This is actually smaller in scale and didn’t crossover with multiple books but it just had that feel, as the story itself is pretty grandiose. And frankly, I’m surprised it was contained in just one comic.

Rick Remender had a vision for this title and this is where that truly becomes clear.

This is a team made up of several characters I love, as well as Fantomex, who I didn’t know before this but have grown to like over the course of this comic.

The focus of the story is on the continued inner turmoil of Angel/Archangel. Now that Apocalypse is dead, his body and mind are slipping into darkness, as he is supposed to evolve into the next Apocalypse.

The story also takes us into the dimension from the Age of Apocalypse epic. Our X-Force team finds allies in the X-Men team of that dimension, which adds some really cool subplots to the story, as characters are reunited and some are very different than their regular versions.

The Dark Angel Saga is well choreographed and written, balancing a ton of characters, introducing new ones but still giving us something pretty focused that tells its story well and isn’t bogged down by a large ensemble and the problems that come with that.

Rating: 8.5/10
Pairs well with: the rest of Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run.

Comic Review: X-Men: Mutant Genesis

Published: 1991
Written by: Chris Claremont, Jim Lee, Fabian Nicieza, Whilce Portacio, Peter David, Len Kaminski
Art by: Jim Lee, Whilce Portacio, Kirk Jarvinen, Tom Raney, Terry Shoemaker, Paul Smith, Andy Kubert, Jerry DeCaire, Ernie Stiner, Steven Butler, Art Thibert

Marvel Comics, 437 Pages

Review:

I’m pretty excited for the current Jonathan Hickman run on the X-Men titles. I haven’t started reading them because the two miniseries that are coming out are doing so just about weekly. So I want to wait to have all twelve issues before giving it a read. But from what I’ve heard, it’s absolutely solid and quite refreshing.

However, before getting into the new stuff, I wanted to travel back to the height of my time reading and buying X-books: 1991.

The reason I wanted to go back there was because it was a transitional period, as the original X-Factor team came to an end, the New Mutants became X-Force and two new X-Men teams formed, each with their own ongoing monthly series. It was also a transition from the Chris Claremont era into the era of Jim Lee.

This thick trade paperback collects multiple story arcs but all of the arcs are unified in their purpose, which was to end an era and to create a new one.

Here we have the final stories of the first X-Factor team, as well as stories involving the newly formed X-Force and New Warriors, Freedom Force and the X-Men team as it existed when Claremont moved on from the series.

This almost feels like an omnibus.

It also features a lot of great creatives on the writing side and art side.

Ultimately, this was a hell of a fun read that flew by despite its meaty 437 pages.

We get dozens of heroes and a whole slew of major X-villains like Magneto, Apocalypse, the Shadow King, Proteus and Fabian Cortez, just to name a few.

While a lot of the ’90s comics I go back to don’t have the same effect on me as they did when I was twelve, this is a solid f’n read. Seriously.

And what’s really surprising is that it has all these creatives working on it and it still turned out to be a really well managed and fully realized vision that brought an era to its end, quite epically, and generated real excitement and enthusiasm for what was to come.

Rating: 10/10
Pairs well with: other major X-Men crossover events from the era: X-Tinction Agenda, X-Cutioner’s Song, etc.

Comic Review: Uncanny X-Force, Vol. 2: Deathlok Nation

Published: February 15th, 2012
Written by: Rick Remender
Art by: Rafael Albuquerque, Esad Ribic

Marvel Comics, 103 Pages

Review:

I have a problem with this series, at least how it is collected. The trade paperbacks are just too short and they don’t give you enough story. But I’m sticking with this because I’ve heard great things about Rick Remender’s run on X-Force from several sources.

And I do like this book, as it advances the plot a bit, brings in Deathlok and a new threat associated with him. But I just wanted there to be more and this ends pretty abruptly.

What I’ve read within this run has intrigued me so far. This feels like something fresh and new for both the X-Force and X-Men titles. Plus, I really like the art.

I think that if you are going to give this series a shot, you’d be better off reading the thicker omnibus collections, as opposed to the seven thinner volumes.

Rating: 7.5/10
Pairs well with: the rest of Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run.

Vids I Dig 072: Comic Tropes: X-Statix: Superhero Celebrity Satire

From Comic Tropes’ YouTube description: In 2001, writer Peter Milligan and artist Mike Allred teamed up with a completely new take on X-Force which would go on to be retitled X-Statix. It was a look at a team of mutants who were also celebrities. This episode looks at how that works and some of the common techniques of Milligan and Allred.

Comic Review: Uncanny X-Force, Vol. 1: The Apocalypse Solution

Published: September 28th, 2011
Written by: Rick Remender
Art by: Leonardo Manco, Jerome Opena

Marvel Comics, 108 Pages

Review:

I’ve wanted to pick up Rick Remender’s run on X-Force for a long time. But there are so many comics I want to read that the mountain is always growing. I finally got around to this one though, the first of seven volumes and a good setup for the series.

If you’ve read the X-Force series where the team becomes a black ops squad for Cyclops, handling the really dark shit that the X-Men can’t, then you should know what you’re getting into here. This picks up after that run but Remender shuffles the group’s members and makes things more interesting.

Where I’ve been critical of Deadpool in the past, these are the types of stories that he tends to flourish in. He is still comedic and has his quips but it works better having him lighten the dark mood than just starring in his own comic and giving us straight comedy or superhero parody.

I really like the duality that is explored here with Warren Worthington, as he phases between his Angel and Archangel personas and because of that, has real trust issues in his relationship with Psylocke.

This team also features Wolverine in a leadership role, as well as Fantomex, who I honestly don’t know. But he seems like an interesting enough character and I’m looking forward to learning more about him.

The threat in this story sees the emergence of a new Four Horsemen of the Apoclypse, as X-Men baddie Apocalypse has returned in an interesting form.

Where this is going is hard to tell and this volume doesn’t work as its own story. It reads like the first chapter to a much larger book. And while that may irritate some people that want a resolution within the covers of their trade paperbacks, I’m committed to seeing this whole series through.

That being said, this lays the groundwork without giving you too much of an idea as to what’s on the horizon. I hope the surprise is a pleasant one.

Rating: 7.5/10
Pairs well with: the rest of Rick Remender’s Uncanny X-Force run.

Comic Review: X-Men ’92

Published: 2016-2017
Written by: Chad Bowers, Chris Sims
Art by: Mirati Firmansyah, Coby Hamscher, David Nakayama (cover)
Based on: the X-Men animated series by Fox Kids

Marvel Comics, 240 Pages

Review:

If you were a kid in the ’90s, you probably watched the X-Men cartoon that used to be on Fox on Saturday mornings. It was solid, did a pretty good job of adapting some of the comic book’s big storylines and introduced a lot of non-comic reading kids to the X-Men franchise.

It ended after a few seasons and never really had a proper follow up. Well, that is until recently, as the show moved into the medium it was born out of: comic books.

Maybe this took its cues from DC Comics and how they came out with Batman ’66, a comic book series that revisited the 1960s Adam West Batman TV series. But one can’t deny that Batman ’66 was a cool comic, a great idea and with that, should have inspired other comic books that continued the stories of comic book characters as they were presented in other mediums. Hell, I’m still waiting for that Batman ’89 comic that was once teased and then had those teases retracted.

But this is about X-Men ’92, which was a decent follow up to the animated series.

Overall, this was a fun read but it didn’t wow me in the same way that Batman ’66 did. Where that Batman comic felt tonally right and as if it was a true continuation of the series, X-Men ’92 throws some weird curveballs and also tries to force in way too many characters just for the sake of the creators trying to give you the animated series’ versions of these characters.

Maybe they knew this series would be short lived and therefore, they wanted to wedge in every character they could but it really becomes too much to process in the second half of this series. Also, I wasn’t a fan of devoting so much time to a Dracula/vampire story. None of that was central to the core of the cartoon and it shouldn’t have been central to the core of this comic.

Also, this feels like it is just borrowing the visual style of the TV show but it doesn’t seem to understand the tone or the spirit of it.

It’s still entertaining for fans of the source material but I wouldn’t call it a must read or all that necessary. Die hards should check it out but I can see why this didn’t make it a year where Batman ’66 has still been hanging on for quite awhile with a long running series and several crossovers.

Rating: 6.75/10
Pairs well with: the animated series it’s based on, as well as ’90s X-Men comics and various spinoffs.