Monday, July 30, 2007

Uncanny X-Periment # 115: "Schisms and New Mutants"

X-Treme X-Men: X-Pose # 1-2, X-Treme X-Men # 20-24, New Mutants (volume 2) # 1-6

Note: My apologies on the lateness of this blog entry. School had to take the priority for the past few weeks, meaning that this all got pushed back. So, without further ado . . .

In the first of three stories, we have the news magazine program "Spotlight" wanting to do a piece of Mutants and the X-Men. Manoli and Conan (from "Fall of the Mutants," remember?) are there to cover it all. However, as they explore Mutant culture and talk with various X-Men members, they find their producer is looking to create the most negative image of the X-Men. Eventually, Archangel's company has the production shut down.

After that, we're served with a rather complex story. Basically, a kid named Jeffery Garret accidently kills his family when they and their guests are threatened by the mind-controlling telepathic Bogan. Except, nobody knows that. While the X-Men grant Garret amnesty and allow him to come to the school, the X-Treme X-Men are trying to bring him to justice. In the end, they discover it's Bogan that did it, but it forms a rift between the two teams.

Then Cannonball - after helping to clean up the Chunnel - joins the X-Treme X-Men team.

I'm going to breeze (heh) through this last one. Dani Moonstar brings a young wind-manipulator named Sofia out of her poor family situation and to the school. While Professor X tries to talk Dani into staying, Sofia becomes friends with Laurie, a phermone controler - and meets with resident jerk, Julian Keller. In due time, Karma and her siblings join, along with a boy named David who pulls information from anyone standing around him. There's also Kevin Ford - who can't touch anything that's not synthetic without it decaying.

Eventually, the whole group ends up facing off against Donald Pierce and the new Reavers (a street gang), and bringing in a new recruit, a healer named Josh. Pierce goes off to fight another day while Kevin leaves.

The X-Treme X-Men stories are the best and are probably among the best that Claremont has written since his return to the X-Men in 2000. He does a great job tackling Mutant culture and putting the X-Men in a place where they've never been. You see, the X-Men have always been Mutants and always stood for Mutant rights, but when was the last time we just saw them interacting with other Mutant groups without fighting them. It's great spotlight and it's about time it's been shined.

The Garret story is overly-complicated, but it's still pretty good. I like seeing the two teams at odds with each other. Adds a nice sense of tension and drama to the overall X-Men dynamic.

The New New Mutants (not a typo) is . . . okay. Simplistic, and the characters are a little bland at first. The art is terrible and just doesn't fit the book. But it's not bad. I've certainly read worse.

~W~

No comments: