The Beginning

“The Beginning”
X-Men #21
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Nick Dragotta, Russel Dauterman, Lucas Werneck, and Sara Pichelli
Color art by Frank Martin, Matthew Wilson, Sunny Gho, and Nolan Woodard

• This issue marks the end of Jonathan Hickman’s run on this particular title, though not the end of his X-Men run – his Inferno miniseries will launch in September and pick up on the Mystique/Moira and Orchis threads of the previous issue, and I strongly suspect there’s another thing coming before year’s end that won’t be announced until after next week’s Planet Size X-Men special. A new X-Men series by Gerry Duggan and Pepe Larraz starring the team introduced in this issue will launch next month, and I haven’t decided whether or not I will cover that on an issue-to-issue basis or simply write about it in chunks as I do all the non-Hickman titles. 

• At this point I’m inclined to think that Hickman’s story isn’t following a standard three act structure as much as it’s working on a more musical logic – House of X/Powers of X is an overture establishing themes, and this issue is the end of a movement that began with the first issue of this series but also included his New Mutants issues, the Giant Size specials, and the entirety of X of Swords. 

The overall structure of this phase includes motifs and story sequences that recur like melodies, in this issue we get an echo of the opening of X-Men #1 in which Cyclops recalls how Xavier saved him as a child in the form of Cyclops explaining to, uhhhh… MCU head honcho Kevin Feige… why Xavier’s dream continues to motivate him. It highlights the earnestness of the character, and effectively ends his arc as the central protagonist of this particular series. Cyclops is a true believer who finds his purpose in being an X-Man, and in a new society where there was no longer a formal X-Men team, he just kept making new X-Men groups until finally deciding to formally recreate and reinvent the X-Men. There’s an innocence and optimism to what he and Jean Grey are doing now that was notably missing from the start of this phase, and regaining that spirit is the triumph at the end of this arc. 

• The rest of the issue mostly nods cryptically in the direction of plot threads unlikely to feature in Inferno – whatever is going to happen with Mars, Emma Frost seeking some resource from a hidden society in an unnamed city that I’m reasonably certain are being introduced in this issue, and a selection of Sinister Secrets that hint at new developments for Cypher and Sinister, upcoming changes in the membership of the Quiet Council, and “an unknown material of immeasurable worth” in Otherworld. It seems like a lot of plot threads going forward will involve precious resources and competition between various societies, which makes sense as the Reign of X phase is above all else about “expansion,” as Emma puts it in her speech at the Gala. 

• The opening scene with Namor, Magneto, and Xavier is a delight, but of course it is – it’s four pages of Namor dialogue written by Jonathan Hickman, the definitive Namor writer. Namor’s presence is mainly to deflate the two heads of state at their own self-congratulatory party, though if it turns out that the mutants do in fact terraform and colonize Mars his boast about controlling 70% of the planet might end up looking like less of a brutal own on them. But the crux of the scene is Xavier not shrinking from Namor asking him “How goes the empire building?” “Well, I think.” The hubris sets in…but an Inferno awaits. 

• The issue is broken into four scenes by four artists – longtime Hickman collaborator Nick Dragotta very much at home in a Namor scene that plays to his East of West strengths, the X-Men membership reveal sequence by the slick but somewhat sterile Russell Dauterman, some pages by Lucas Werneck that nicely convey the social dynamic of the Gala, and Sara Pichelli shifting her usual style a bit for the last few pages with Emma Frost at her most theatrical. The shifts in style work this issue – different moods for different parts of the party. 

• I don’t love the celebrity cameos, not because they’re celebrity cameos per se, but rather that if you’re doing a big Gala like this it is pretty laughable for it to be mostly unglamorous comedians and older rappers rather than… you know, anyone who you’d actually expect to show up to something along the lines of the Met Gala. You expect Rihanna and Lady Gaga and A$AP Rocky, you get Marc Maron and Patton Oswalt and George R.R. Martin. 

Wait And See

“Wait and See”
Giant Size X-Men: Magneto
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by Ramón Pérez
Color art by David Curiel

It’s been a bit difficult to find the appropriate level of expectation for the Giant Size X-Men issues. Each of the three published so far has felt less substantial than any of the regular issues of X-Men written by Jonathan Hickman, and have done more to gesture in the direction of future stories than deliver something more satisfying in the moment. The comics have all delivered in terms of serving as showcases for talented artists, and with this Magneto issue the Canadian illustrator Ramón Pérez– mostly known for his indie and web comics – gets to show off his considerable craft on a very mainstream title. Hickman’s primary interest here seems to be in letting the artist flex, and in laying in plot details for later on. The former is a great idea when working as a writer in a visual medium, the latter goal is fine in the abstract but in the case of this issue it mostly just undermines a story that presents itself as a quiet character study. 

The plot of the issue is basically that Emma Frost has asked Magneto to acquire an island for her, and he accomplishes that with the help of her profoundly arrogant ex Namor, the mutant monarch of the seas. At the end of the issue we see Magneto assemble a tower with a Sentinel head built into the side for Frost, and well, that’s that. We’ll find out what Emma is going to do with this island some other time. It looks cool, so there’s that. There’s some bits of deep sea adventure in the middle of the story with Namor, but in narrative terms that’s what happens in 30 pages.

The meat of the story is mostly in observing Magneto at this moment of his life. He’s typically a character defined by his unrelenting ideology and antagonistic relationship with humans, but in this issue we see him rather contented by the founding of Krakoa and his station as one of the fledgling mutant nation’s leaders. Magneto has been a steady presence in Hickman’s story thus far, but his most memorable scenes have involved him making grand and unapologetically arrogant speeches to human leaders. This facet of Magneto is not on display in this issue. Instead we him willing to wait patiently for Namor among a bunch of puffins on a small island, and dining with Emma Frost, a woman he clearly recognizes as both a peer and a friend. The latter is notable – even though these characters have a good amount of history as colleagues, it’s actually pretty rare to see Magneto engage with someone besides Charles Xavier or Rogue as either a respected friend or confidant. His tendency is to be alone, and to project a superior aloofness.

Magneto, Emma Frost, and Namor are all characters with major superiority complexes and a flippant contempt for humans. In contrasting today’s Magneto with two characters he has so much in common with, we see how much he’s changed in the recent past. His rage has subsided upon the realization of his lifelong dream of a mutant nation, we see him as magnanimous and respectful - not just of Emma and Namor, but of the human man living on the island. The entire story is him doing a favor for Emma, whereas Magneto’s role since the start of House of X has largely involved him sending other mutants out to do his bidding. I get the sense that in the long run of Hickman’s story, this will be understood as a glimpse of Magneto at a good moment in his life. This state cannot last for him, and that’s his tragedy. 

The matter of Emma’s island tower is intriguing but makes the issue feel unresolved and incomplete, and since the issue ends on an inert “that’s it?” moment it undermines the understated character development that was the actual focus of the issue. It may have landed better if the issue ended on another quiet Magneto moment, or if Perez’s last page didn’t feel like such an abrupt ending. But I think Hickman is more to blame here – whereas the previous Giant Size issues have advanced an ongoing mystery with Cypher and presented a cliffhanger with Storm, both of which are tied to macro plots introduced in House of X/Powers of X, it’s hard to get a sense of how significant this story development is when all Emma says in the end is that she intends to…invite people to this island. Uh, sure? I trust Hickman enough to pay off on this in some way, but this could just as well be an entire issue about Emma Frost needing a place to hold off-site meetings. 

Unlike the other issues of Giant Size X-Men, this one was not conceived with the artist in mind. The issue was originally meant to be drawn by Ben Oliver, and Ramón Pérez stepped in when Oliver had to bow out of the commitment. He did a good job with it, particularly in drawing the most uneventful pages where it’s really just Magneto hanging out on an island and looking off into the distance. He presents Magneto as a powerful but unknowable figure, but also someone with an obvious soulful interiority. His ability to convey this is crucial to the successes of this issue, since Hickman really went “show, not tell” in this story. 

For The Children

“For the Children”
Powers of X #5 (2019)
Written by Jonathan Hickman
Art by R.B. Silva
Color art by Marte Gracia

It’s a bit strange to slow narrative momentum to a crawl in the final third of a 12-issue story, but here we are with a 10th issue that feels like an epilogue following the double climaxes in the middle of the story and the previous issue’s triumphs and revelations. “For the Children” is a series of four conversations that mostly fill in details and set up plot to come, mostly with regards to establishing the new purpose of the Hellfire Club and setting up the premise of Gerry Duggan’s Marauders spin-off. There’s some light intrigue in terms of teasing out the membership of the Quiet Council of Krakoa, but it would seem that question was mostly answered by this bit of promotional art by Mike Deodato from a few months ago. 

The plot is inert, but the exposition is necessary and gives Jonathan Hickman some space for pleasing character moments. It’s nice to see the often marginalized Forge take on a big role as Cypher has in previous issues, though it’s hardly surprising given Hickman’s consistent interest in scientists and engineers through his body of work. It’s fun to see Hickman revisit Namor, the prickly and extraordinarily arrogant anti-hero of his New Avengers run. The extended sequence in which Xavier and Magneto recruit Emma Frost into their grand scheme fills in some crucial information about the X-Men’s pharmaceutical business that has been simmering in the background since House of X #1, and provides a crucial beat in which a very intelligent character voices skepticism of their master plan with a nod towards previous disastrous iterations of the “mutant island nation” notion on Genosha and Utopia. 

The final sequence in the distant future offers some plot movement, but the acceptance of Nimrod’s mutant archive into the Phalanx galactic hive mind is rendered with about as much drama as someone swiping a debit card and waiting a few moments for approval while having a vague concern about their checking account getting overdrawn.  Nimrod the Greater provides a huge amount of exposition regarding the evolution of machines and societies. There’s a few lines that nudge the reader to notice the parallels with the main plot about the establishment of the Krakoan nation-state – “a society so advanced that it collapsed in on itself,” “we asked for sovereignty, but with it came an unexpected price” – but it’s all just setting us up for the reveal of what happens when mutation and mutant culture is absorbed and assimilated into the Phalanx. It’s interesting, but not particularly exciting. 

R.B. Silva shows some signs in this issue of strain in keeping up the demanding schedule of producing six consecutive issues of Powers of X in what seems like a relatively tight window of time. His work is still quite good, but you can observe some cut corners – copy/pasted panels, more panels without backgrounds. I suppose some of this comes down to the extremely talky nature of Hickman’s script, and in fairness, Silva goes to town on drawing the holographic sea life of Forge’s home in Dallas. There is a slight blunder in that Silva draws Forge in his Jim Lee-era costume despite this sequence with him and Xavier apparently taking place long ago – this error seems to be addressed by blacking out his X belt buckle, though it’s still a generic X-Men uniform years before he’s a member. It’s no big deal, though.

Notes and observations:

• Magneto really hitting that “grow to an inferno” line hard, just in case the reader didn’t quite pick up on how aggressively Hickman was laying down the notion of an “Inferno” sequel in POX #4. 

• The covers for POX #4 and #5 are reversed in terms of their relationship to actual plot developments in each issue, but I figure this was done to throw off reader speculation. It worked on me! 

• The Forge/Xavier discussion about building Cerebro is the first scene of the series that perhaps didn’t really need to be dramatized, where all the information could’ve been conveyed in a text page. Still, it’s nice to get a moment with Forge and to observe Xavier as he advances his ambitions. And of course, we get a reminder that Xavier has off-world connections to the Shi’ar empire, and possesses something called “logic diamonds.” Surely all very useful information for later. 

• Emma Frost, Xavier, and Magneto meet at the Louvre by the Nike of Samothrace, a surviving masterpiece of Hellenistic sculpture depicting the Greek goddess of Victory. The statue, which is believed to be created to commemorate a victory of the navy, would seem to foreshadow Frost’s forthcoming nautical adventures in Marauders in which the Hellfire Club will become, as she puts it in this issue, “the East India trading company of mutantdom.” 

• So Moira X has a No-Place, eh? I’m just dying to see what she’s been up to in the present day.