It's ironic, perhaps, that a first issue from this creative team doesn't feel as fresh as issue #116 of a past series did. But while X-Statix is a fresh start, marketing-wise, for this team, creatively it's business as usual, and while the book is as entertaining as ever, the first issue of X-Statix suffers a little from reiterating a lot of what continuing readers will know. That said, the distinctive and entertaining art style is still there, and so is the wonderfully cynical, almost fourth-wall breaking, take on pop culture and super-heroics that made X-Force popular enough to relaunch as X-Statix in the first place.
While there are some overly familiar elements of the story as Milligan reiterates the characters and their particular subplots, plenty of attention is given to moving plots forward or creating new ones as well. Guy's conflict over replacing Edie is a driving force of this issue, and it's another twist in the strange psyche of Guy that has been at the forefront of the book since his introduction. Also growing in the background is a Twilight Zone-esque story of an Edie fan (stalker, almost) whose comments work both on a meta-level and also to foreshadow a potentially dangerous foe for the team in the future. In addition, the introduction of O-Force, an even more empty hype version of X-Force than X-Statix, is a clever nod at the way reality programming and boy bands exploded once one of them was a hit. X-Force was the next big thing, and the one important aspect to remember about that is that there will always be another next big thing to replace them.
The pop culture references don't stop there, though. The backup feature is a dead-on Blair Witch riff that serves as something of a Doop spotlight. Or at least, as much of a spotlight as you can have for a character with basically no personality who speaks in a nonsense language. Much as I enjoy Doop, throughout this issue and in the backup, I was starting to wonder if the gag was running a bit thin. Or maybe it just shouldn't be given such prominence, as it's a cute background gag but really doesn't need to be pushed to the forefront so we can see how thin it really is.
X-Statix remains as sharp in terms of art as it has been from the beginning, and actually in some regards it has gotten better. The slick and bright colors, and the retro style artwork, serve as a perfect contrast to the dark tone of the series. Allred also has a great and distinctive set of visual design, from the redesigned and spiffy new uniforms of the X-Statix to the look of the O-Force that calls to mind the redesigned X-Force uniforms. And Darwyn Cooke is an ideal match for that style as well, although in all honesty his backup work here wasn't as strong as his solo issue or much of the other work I've seen from him.
It's funny, when X-Force was first relaunched, I found myself complaining that it was a good book, but one that probably should have been relaunched with a different name and new number one to get it more attention. Now that this is actually being done, I find that I miss the book being X-Force, as this particular relaunch seems like little more than a marketing gimmick, given that the actual content of the book hasn't changed a bit.
