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I liked this a lot, and I think it sets out what Joss wants to do with the title a lot better than #1, although that's possibly because the whole costume issue isn't really mentioned this time. Unfortunately Ord is extremely dull, I expect his last name is 'inary', but does seem to have a vague similarity to the little girl's dream, so it may be that when she was cured she wasn't really etc etc.
I like Joss' use of continuity, which is quite risky as the target audience that Marvel would ideally like to catch weren't even born when Kitty first appeared. It does have it's drawbacks though, Scott for example organised and led the second wave of the X-Men and X-Factor, he even spent some forty years in the future at one point, so I've always had a slight problem with both Grant and now Joss' interpretation of him as a stilted and emotionally blocked character in terms of the forty odd years of X-Men continuity, outside of that though its okay. Whilst he's obviously mourning the loss of Jean, I hope Joss plans for him to be more than just the same as the Morrison version of Cyclops just without bringing up En Sabur fuckin' Neh all the time. His wish for Professor Xavier to be there, while it works/doesn't work for me as I mentioned above, is interesting. I can see Joss using to give an excuse to the fans who are pissed off at the retreat from the Morrison era, yes the costume change IS silly, but that's because Cyclops is making mistakes in leading the team. Even if Joss never brings it up, I'm going to use that as the reason for bringing the costumes back in so I can relax.
The Emma-Kitty confrontation comes under similar considerations, in continuity it's clearly daft, yes that was what happened, but Joss apparently chooses to forget the time when (IIRC) Kitty and the New Mutants were brainwashed by Emma to join her Hellions. Or that she's been on the vaguely straight and narrow for the last ten years. But apart from that, a nicely written scene.
With regards to the Beast and Wolverine's reactions to the mutant 'cure'. Forty years of continuity should have taught Beast that nothing good was likely to come of trying to change what nature had done to him. He's not only a mutant but a mutate, so a mutant cure that works is unlikely to work properly on him. I would have to say I don't think you can read Morrison's Beast as one that wants to undo what's happened to him, but you can extrapolate to it, along the lines of the emotional fluctuations the Beast had which in the first year at least seemed to be a bit manic-depressive. In desperation at the school breaking apart the Beast took Kick and became Sublime, I think that with a crisis to push him he could investigate a cure. Of course, that's assuming he wants to use it on himself? What if he's concerned about it being used against the X-Men as a weapon, or is interested in using it himself as a weapon against Evil Mutants, or what if in this new timeline he's taken Kick again? I really hope this isn't going to undo the secondary mutation thing.
Wolverine's reaction was interesting. I wonder if Joss was referencing Barry Windsor-Smith's excellent 'Experiment X' about Logan's capture and transformation in the Weapon X program? That was the only time I've seen Logan show any self-hatred/agitation about his mutant status("To Mum, the secret's out, signed your son with the big hairy claws!") But maybe he's just angry at the idea of mutants being considered sick.
The scene when the X-Men face the media and try to be heroes was nice. I suppose that, as it was yet another thing that Morrison had no interest in showing, that we have to assume that the progression that Jean Grey made in the first year of Grant's run as acting headmistress in terms of the X-Men's relationship to the outside world was undone by the riot at Xaviers and 'Xorneto's conquering of New York.
Joss needs to come up with some villains that aren't shit dull one-dimensional characters but otherwise, if his writing stays at this quality then I'll keep reading the X-Men while he keeps writing it. |
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))!!