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UNCANNY X-MEN #444
"The End of History 1 of 4"
Recommended (7/10)
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Marvel Comics
Writer: Chris Claremont
Pencils: Alan Davis
Inks: Mark Farmer
Colors: Frank D'Armata
Letters: Chris Eliopoulos
Editor: Mike Marts
Price: $2.25 US/$3.25 CAN |
Chris Claremont is a conundrum. He has written both the most acclaimed (Dark Phoenix saga) and the most reviled (The Neo) stories in X-Men history. Along with John Byrne, he is generally regarded as the writer of the best X-Men stories, the ones that laid the foundation for the entire multi-million dollar franchise, even moreso than its creators Stan Lee and Jack Kirby. And yet, when he came back to Marvel after a bitter separation in the mid-'90s, his work was no better, and in some ways appreciably worse, than the much-loathed (at least among much of the X-faithful) work of Scott Lobdell. It's a little odd that, in the wake of a successful revamp of the titles that included Grant Morrison's shiny New X-Men, Marvel has decided to regress and once again hand the keys to the X-car to Chris Claremont, along with one of his occasional art partners Alan Davis. Was it a mistake of grandiose proportions? Or was it a genius bit of creative casting? Well, it's too early to judge, but if I had to guess from this first issue, it's neither... it's simply a way for the X-Men to return to a level of safe, average storytelling that will appease many, but will probably see a departure en masse from those who came aboard for Morrison's run.
I have to admit, Claremont won half the battle with me by starting the issue with an old X-Men standard, the baseball game between the teammates. I used to love seeing the powers used in a setting other than combat, and in seeing these unusual characters doing something as mundane and human as playing an outdoor sport on a nice warm summer's day. It's the difference between the overly-angsty X-Men of the '90s and the classic X-Men of the '70s and '80s whose angst came from being human and having to deal with problems, rather than from increasingly soap operatic plots that when examined closely, made no sense. Now, starting with a baseball game doesn't mean Claremont has gotten away from the soap opera stuff, which I think is impossible at this point, but it at least throws in something a little lighter, and that makes a big difference.
The other thing that I really enjoyed from this issue was the role of some of the X-Men as members of the newly-chartered XSE. Traditionally, government-affiliated teams have been your Avengers or your JLA, not mutants, and I really like the idea of Claremont bringing in an element of Bishop's future and turning some of the X-Men into federal agents responsible for mutant affairs. It's a shift in the way the X-Men traditionally do things, and there's something kind of cool about being an X-Man and having what is essentially a marshal's badge... it's a nice confluence of two heroic traditions.
Unfortunately, while there was a lot to like in this issue, there are also a few stumbling blocks. One is Claremont's difficulty these days in setting up a halfway decent villain, whether it's the promising but ultimately empty Elias Bogan from X-Treme X-Men (who was, sadly, the best villain to come out of that title's generally lackluster rogues gallery) or the new, completely generic Weaponeers introduced in this issue. And then there's the dialogue. Stylized dialogue is just something you have to accept from Claremont, but I can't decide what I like best: Is it the amount of dialogue, which makes it look like he's being paid by the word? Is it the dead-on accurate British dialogue of Emma Frost ("I heard that, you sodding incredible cow!") or the culturally sensitive portrayal of an arabic villain ("We claim this land, and the lives of all who live here, in the name of our master, Achmed Al-Khalad!")? None of these lines, or others like them, are deal-killers, but it is a shame that Claremont's dialogue is so often hokey and overwritten. Stylized dialogue is fine, in fact guys like Aaron Sorkin or Astonishing X-Men writer Joss Whedon make unreal dialogue sound more real by the way they write, but Claremont needs to dial it down a notch or two.
Then there's the artwork, and what is there to say about Alan Davis and Mark Farmer? These guys have been working together a long time, and in that time, they've never turned in a bad art job. I was a little wary of the '70s style costumes that Davis has created, but while I still think the majority of them look dated and ugly as sin, I was surprised at how well they worked in motion. Wolverine still looks more goofy than intimidating, but otherwise these new costumes look solid enough when the X-Men are in action, even if I would rather have the black leather (or even the classic costumes) back instead. Where the artists really stand out, though, is in the area of storytelling and detail. Anything from a raid on a desert fortress to a game of baseball to a Danger Room session against Sentinels is called for here, and Davis and Farmer deliver everything in fine style.
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