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Underground > Comic Books >

Astonishing X-Men

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18:50 / 11.03.04

I say I was just looking at the FRAY paperback the other day, and it's good (I read it when it came out in individual issues). It reminded me how good Joss can be when writing comics. And I just got into his sci-fi series FIREFLY on DVD, and that supremely kicks ass. So even though I agree with the many who feel the 2-page script preview is hardly Joss at his best, I really want this to be great and believe it will at least be very good with moments of greatness. How many more months we gotta wait for this? It's out in April?

But the new Cyclops costume does look crappy to me. Why not bring him back to the classic Cockrum/Byrne costume if they want to go all retro/80s?

16:07 / 12.03.04

I agree about Cyke's costume, HunterWolf. Although what bothers me the most are the weird little wristbands he has on - why not just make them gloves? Wolverines color combo of gold and midnight blue looks pretty good - I must admit I was always partial to his gold/black/blue ensemble that went out of style in 1981 or so, but the brown/black combo was cool as well.
I think the X-men in the last decade or so have sported some of the worst para-military " costumes" I have ever seen. As I said, I welcome the return of the costumes to help bring the X-men back into the genre that Stan Lee originally intended for them: Superheroes.

16:16 / 12.03.04

Ladies an' gents, the cover for Astonishing X-Men #002:

Enjoy!!

16:51 / 12.03.04

Now... this looks MUCH better. Visually and thematically.

Seriously, a Frost-Summers relationship is about 10,000 times more interesting than the eternally-dull Summers-Grey-Logan triangle. One thing that Whedon is definitely strong on is light-and-dark; characters struggling with themselves, whether they're losing or winning that struggle. Play this right and he's onto a winner.

Of course, it won't have the metatextual, cod-science opera of Morrison's run - but, as has been said more eloquently, Morrison's run looks increasingly like his attempt at an uber-X-story (every cliche from the last 30 years in one go). Now the decks are clear, maybe Whedon can get moving on creating the new X-mythos. Oh, and isn't that Whedon's other strength - creating over-arching character-based mythos that quite happily marry the ordinary with the extraordinary?

I could be wrong. Time will tell.

17:47 / 12.03.04

Why doesn't the third little "rung" of her right hand (the left from our perspective) show red optic blast glow? It looks a little non-symmetric.

Other than that one seeming incongruity, that's a damn nice cover!!! It hints at Emma still manipulating and 'blinding' Scott as opposed to being the healthy liberating force Grant M. intended her to be, it seems. So I suppose Scott and Emma will be at odds in some way during this first Whedon arc...?

20:47 / 12.03.04

I wouldn't neccessarily say that assupmtion from the cover image is indicative of Whedon's plot, HW.

20:51 / 12.03.04

Oh, I don't mean it MUST be indicative of the plot, but it depicts such a strong theme in the characters' dynamic that I think it's likely that it does, at least on some small level.

20:59 / 12.03.04

True... here's hoping the Emma character established by Morrison is relatively maintained, in either case.

20:59 / 12.03.04

I can't help but thinking this comic is going to fall victim to the classic comics disaster: It will start off with a great writer and decent penciler ( anyone remember the Thunderbolts?) and after a year both will leave, and the new creative team will suck and take the comic in the completely wrong direction ( In this case, the beaten to death " we are so put upon" mutant crap) and it will be cancelled after 50 issues.
That cover is badass though - I went back and looked at the X-men/ Alpha Flight limited series that Cassady pencilled - I think most people will be happy with his work.

21:13 / 12.03.04

Grant's version of Emma really wasnt too far off her original incarnation. Sure, she was fleshed out more, but Emma is Emma, and I'm sure she'll stay that way. However, it is a good point about creative teams. Look at the blows NXM suffered through when Quitely left. But, this cover image is very reminiscent of the Scott and Emma skydiving scene from the Paris arc followup.

Regrettable Juvenilia

19:51 / 14.03.04

Three words about that cover - Oh. My. God.

It doesn't necessarily suggest manipulation - it could mean a kind of teamwork. It's like the fastball special but with a BDSM subtext rather than a homoerotic one.

Whedon's such a fucking pervert. Like all the good X-Men writers...

14:05 / 15.03.04

It's nice to hear some optmism on this book. Seriously this will probably be the only one worth a god damn. Whedon has several strengths over any of the other X-Books in reload...

1) His characters to mature and grow. They never remain stagnant.

2) He is good at writing opposites attracting. (Xander/Cordelia, Buffy/Spike)

3) He can write entertaining dialouge.

4) He loves story archs and chances are this one will have that.

5) He is good at twist.

6) Usually his characters progress very logically

My only concern is if this book will be on time.

15:21 / 15.03.04

It hints at Emma still manipulating and 'blinding' Scott as opposed to being the healthy liberating force Grant M. intended her to be, it seems.

really? the first thing i thought about that cover was how astonishly* intimate it looked, like a shared secret and a gesture of protection. Emma's hands are like their bedroom door, so to speak.

well, actually the first thing i thought was *jaw drops*. but that was the second.

in any case, the third thing i thought of was the classic old-school X-Men scene of Scott and Jean-as-Phoenix on a mesa or something somewhere, and Jean telling Scott that it was OK to open his eyes because she was telekinetically keeping his optic blasts in check. that kind of trust and the ability to lower his guard marked a significant deepening point in Scott's love for Jean, and this suggests to me that kind of depth.

god, that's a fucking incredible cover.

* no pun intended. no, really.

23:27 / 15.03.04

Hey HW -
Just in response to your comment about Emma's hand being asymmetrical? I am a penciler and have done some professional work, and I think from an artists perspective Cassady would say perfect symmetry is unnatural, and having the slight variation in her hand lends realism to her stance.

I think it is awesome that Kitty is in this comic, she is one of Claremont's best creations. On the subject of threads, my favorite Kitty costume was the green " Ariel" outfit she wore in '83 - '84 or so. That was always very sexy on her " A" cups!

00:22 / 16.03.04

Yeah, Scott's deadly eyes have always seemed to me like something he's ashamed of, something he's afraid of... I mean, we never see him without eyewear. He's always covered bt. The fact that he's naked and Emma's touching him, holding back his destructive side. Is kind of nice and intimate. I like this cover. I didn't pick up on the manipulation thing at all.

Imaginary Mongoose Solutions

03:34 / 16.03.04

That's dead fucking sexy. Wow.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

11:48 / 16.03.04

I keep looking at this, and all I can think of is WANK FUCKING COSTUMES...

"See me for what I am, OK?"

18:59 / 16.03.04

You do what you want with those pictures, mate. The rest of us will just read the comic.

NOTE: This post is a joke, and is not intended to cause any offence to anyone.

19:05 / 16.03.04

Wow. It's almost as if she's about to open her hands any minute. God I love that Scott is with Emma now! I have a feeling he's going to be her most prized student yet.

19:14 / 16.03.04

I have a feeling he's going to be her most prized student yet.

ooh, baby! i'm sure Scotty's got a special present for the teacher!

19:46 / 16.03.04

Yeah, this cover I like - it's kinky, and it promotes all sorts of speculation. Hell, it's actually got me excited about this book - good job Cassaday!

02:44 / 17.03.04

Very Sexy. Reminds me of that famous ROLLING STONE magazine cover, with some dude's hands covering some chick's breasts. Nice...

20:01 / 17.03.04

I must say, i'm slightly more impressed with this than that first ish cover. One thing i think Whedon should be fairly competent at is the development of the relationship between Cyke and the White Queen. Who doesn't appreciate what he did with that whole "love and loathing" thing with Buffy and Spike? This man might still be able to pull it off.

And besides, it's always cool to see such a geek like Cyclops scoring the hot and sexy badass chick. It's a formula thats tried and true.

I'm Rick Jones, bitch

05:39 / 18.03.04

Buffy and Spike was shit. Buffy after the major arc was shit. I doubt Wedon has it in him to write well any more. Fucking white elephant, man.

06:06 / 18.03.04

His eyes are about repression, right? I mean in psychoanalysis the eyes are very phallic - looking and scopophilia are thrusting sexual acts, which couldn't be more obvious in Cyclop's case. Moreover, the way that when he look at things destroys them always felt to me like he was ashamed of his own sexual fantasies and compelled to stop that stuff from erupting out into the world at all. It's like he's the archetype of the traumatised teenage boy who idolises women but can't stand them to be sexualised, so expresses it in violence - ie. that sexualised women are somehow dirty (because they make him feel dirty). That's how I've understood Grant's Cyclops anyway - that his lack of control over his power and his uptightness were one and the same thing and that if he got comfortable with sex and/or had a relationship that wasn't about archetypical perfect women that he might actually be more able to control his destructive penetrative sex vision. Basically I think he's totally S&M and can't admit it.

08:04 / 18.03.04

Why the fuck is she wearing a fucking granma cape? They better not have her back in that whole corset/thigh-high fuck-me boots ensemble. In regards to the whole "is she manipulating him/is she just cuddling" debacle, I personally think she's blinding him from the truth. Josh is gonna go a Jade-alike, villain-in-our-midst kinda thing. He's been a fan of the X-Men since Kitty joined and that's also around the time when Emma was at the height of her villainy. The cover says it all. He's in her shadow. Her face is hidden behind his, only showing her scowling eyes. And if she's holding his power back then why aren't her hands cupped? He looks like he's entirely at her mercy.

08:22 / 18.03.04

Two preview pages up at CBR...

Personally I hate it. Ugly, ugly, ugly... except Emma. And not ugly in a FQ way (which I liked).

Regrettable Juvenilia

08:23 / 18.03.04

He looks like he's entirely at her mercy.

Which is always a bad thing, isn't it?

Tsk. Kids these days.

Tom on the money, yes indeed.

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

09:11 / 18.03.04

I gotta say, man. I like the looks of this.

That panel with Kitty raising her hand? That's pretty adorable. Hank looks good. I mean, this is John Cassaday. He's like super talented.

11:39 / 18.03.04

heh. kitty pryde always used to be older than me, know for the first time i notice she's clearly a lot younger. never really been confronted with the 'time is different there' aspect of the marvel u so blatantly. shame really, my interest in her character is diminshing as i type, as it would if someone you knew as a ninja superhero switched careers to kids tv presenter. paradoxically, a younger ultimate kitty pryde makes sense to me, i found her quite appealing. has bendis done much with her?

13:41 / 18.03.04

oh, god, this looks like shit.

fat Scott and way-too-young Kitty are the worst, but really, the rest aren't looking too good.

and the dialogue is awful. i'm very unhappy.

Yotsuba & Benjamin!

13:50 / 18.03.04

Wow, it's like I've stumbled into a time machine, stranding me on an X-Fan board when the first Quitely New X-Men art dropped!

Spooky!

14:15 / 18.03.04

Hellllooooooooooo!

Kitty Pryde was like 14 when she was first introduced ... in 1982.

She celebrated her 16th birthday during the first Claremont Excalibur run, meaning ca. 1991.

Scott was 17 years old when he was first introduced in (later "Uncanny") X-Men #1 ... in 1963.

Boy, I wish he looked like he was pushing 60. Go verisimilitude.

I remember when I was 11 - the same age as Jack Power. Then I graduated high school and noticed that Jack was still a kid.

Cassaday's art looks alright. I'll definitely look at the trade, especially if they put all 12 issues out in one volume.

Will this title be continuing past the Whedon/Cass run or is it a limited series?

14:17 / 18.03.04

I suck. Kitty was introduced in 1980.

I always think it's 1982 because the Marvel UK reprint of 'Mind Out Of Time' (my first Claremont X-issue ever) updated the date so that it would be current.

Kitty should be 38 this year.

14:32 / 18.03.04

aaargh - i'm crushed

characters mature and change, and age (summers is now meant to be in his mid-thirties no?), even in comics. for them to get younger feels, to me, particularly in this case, a retrograde step. i'm not asking for verisimilitude, just memory.

my comments were a bit 'personal response' admittedly, apologies if they pissed you off.

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