Three issues in, and District X continues to impress. A gang war is brewing, a new drug on the streets turns out to have unforeseen side effects and the mutant/human cop incident that started the whole thing off isn't going to quietly go away either. Hine's story is a multi-layered piece, an exploration of the realistic politics of cops, racism and crime as well as the unrealistic element of mutants and superpowers thrown into the mix. And Yardin and Sicat continue to bring Mutant Town to life, showing off the dichotomy between rich and poor and making the bad guys and good guys look cool without popping them into spandex to do it.
One of the things I really love about District X is that this isn't the "Bishop book." Marvel's got all kinds of mutant spinoffs coming up, most of them taking an X-Man who really shouldn't be solo and putting them on the path to investigate horror of some kind. District X has Bishop in it, and he's good here, but this is not Bishop's book. If anything, it's a book that takes Mutant Town as its main character, and that means it's got a big ensemble cast. Hine has created quite the ensemble too, with two crime lords with interesting mutant abilities, a likable lead cop with a likable family (and more than one secret), a fun little drug-dealing sleazeball and an enigmatic mutant whose goals and operations seem to be outside the law but on the side of doing what's right. And that's just the basics, there are plenty of other characters, some of whom are just in for one or two issue "guest spots."
While District X is definitely not your stereotypical action book, neither is it entirely a talky piece. Hine and Yardin open up with a fast-paced and exceptionally well-staged action sequence as one of the crime lords makes a big move. Yardin's storytelling is fantastic, and he's up to guys firing away with machine-guns as much as he is to the more subtle stuff, such as the creepy relief that the Toad-boy's mother gets when she finally sees him or the familial happiness that we see in Ortega's home life.
If this book belongs to anyone, it's Ortega, who is a fascinating character in his own right. He's got the idealistic young cop archetype down cold, but Hine doesn't leave it that simple. He's clearly feeling guilt over protecting his partner, even though he doesn't seem likely to waver from that loyalty any time soon. And the presentation of his home life that we get is a nice break from the stereotypical divorced or broken home that a lot of fictional cops seem to get. Not that Bishop plays a chump in his own book, mind you... the way he takes charge of a crime scene, or talks like a federal officer instead of a superhero, makes him come off like a tough and smart character. In addition, Bishop's comparison of mutant relations to race relations is a fascinating insight from Hine, and another clever way in which District X melds the real with the unreal to good effect.
As this issue winds down, I could see where the story was going, as a pair of humans sneak their way into the mutant club and find their way to the "toad juice" that has been drugging up all the mutant kids. While Yardin, Sicat and Troy are giving a real sense of the nightclub "Daniel's Inferno," Hine is building up the suspense of what's going to happen when a human indulges in a mutant drug, and the notion of this whole thing crossing over and becoming much bigger than a gang war in Mutant Town that most of the NYPD can safely ignore seems pretty likely at this point.
