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New X-Men #117

 
  

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bio k9
00:26 / 22.09.01
"New X Men comes out next week, right?"

"Yeah but I've got the preview copy back here if you want it."

"Sweet!"

Spoilers.
You have been warned.

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Spoilers.
You have been warned twice.

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Ok, then.
First off, Ethen VanSciver will remind you just how good Quitely is. The school is bursting with students and I couldn't help but think of how cool some of them would have looked if Frank had drawn them (particularly the skeleton/jelly body guy). The art wasn't bad but it wasn't as good as the last three issues and if VanSciver and Quitely have their work collected in the same trade someone is going to look bad.


I don't want to give too much away but:

Nice to see Morrison made use of the beastiality issue between Trish and Hank.

Dr. McCoy gets fucked this issue.

The Charles/Cassandra connection was revealed much sooner than I thought it would be.

And the Shi'ar flagship shows up.

Second favorite line: "You're a devolver."

Favorite line: this one would give something away so I'll wait till next week.
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
01:04 / 22.09.01
I am very jealous of you.

Damn, I need my Grant X-fix...
 
 
Seth
16:20 / 22.09.01
Yay! Next week! Honey... can I have my pocket money?

Snapping Turtle: Only if you don't buy too many CDs...

Yay! X-Men, X-Men, X-Men!

Anyone know when the final Invisibles trade is coming out?
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
16:53 / 23.09.01
I inadvertantly got my little brother into New X-Men by leaving my issues around my parents house while I've been gone - he's just as psyched as I am to find out what's going to happen next..

He digs Ultimate X-Men and X-Force too...

ah, the M renaissance - Morrison, Millar, and Milligan...
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
14:24 / 25.09.01
Argh! I can't wait any longer! Just whack a huge spoiler warning up and tell us what happens!!
 
 
Jamieon
14:26 / 25.09.01
Come on boy, hold out!

Only two days to go.

Urrghh, it's like being constipated: you're desperate for it to happen, but it's making you wait.

I wish I was some kind of anal retentive who enjoyed delaying pleasure.
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
15:55 / 26.09.01
Jesus Christ!

It just gets better and better!


SPOILERS!!!!]

SPOILERS!!!!


SPOILERS!!!!

SPOILERS!!!!!!


This issue reminded me quite a bit of the issue of Doom Patrol when Niles kills Josh, and then tells Cliff about the REAL history of the Doom Patrol... the mental torture that Cassandra Xavier (you read that right) puts Henry through was just cruel and terrible...and then to bring in the Shi'Ar.... oh man.

So it turns out that Charles and Cassandra are twins, and he apparently tried to kill her when they were young, so she now seeks to have revenge by crushing his dream from within his body, forcing him to watch it all fall down. She reveals this to Henry when he confronts him, asking why Cassandra has the same DNA that he does. Cassandra then savagely attacks Henry with insults, Henry tries to fight back, but is instead bludgeoned (to death?) by an Xavier Institute student wielding a baseball bat.

Cassandra then leaves the earth on the Shi'Ar mothership in the guise of Charles, thinking to herself about the possibility for destruction she can wield with the Shi'Ar...

best line: How does it feel to have someone throw up on your soul?

Ethan VanSciver's art is kinda bland, it reminds me a lot of Phil Jiminez. It's alright, at least it's not crappy retro-90s or manga-style art.

[ 26-09-2001: Message edited by: Flux = Rad ]
 
 
tracypanzer
17:32 / 26.09.01
I don't know. Long lost twin? Mind control? This has all been done before. And this sort of major revelation-type stuff was done better in Doom Patrol when Caulder stepped out of his wheelchair, like Flux said. I wish Morrison would have dragged it out for at least a few issues, to see Nova fuck w/ their heads some. Who knows, maybe he will since he set up that Beak person to take the fall for attacking Beast.

Maybe it's because there's such a long wait in between issues, I have higher expectations of it or something, I want it to be more than a comic book. OK, I'll read it a couple more times and shut up and enjoy it like everyone else now.
 
 
bio k9
11:15 / 27.09.01
My favorite line:

"...take out your diploma and use it to clean yourself from now on. Prove to me that you understand the basics of life as a domestic pet..."

That bitch is fucking evil.
 
 
Chuckling Duck
13:26 / 27.09.01
quote:Originally posted by Aaron:
I don't know. Long lost twin? Mind control? This has all been done before.


Assuming we believe anything that Cassandra said to Beast, and we have reasons not to.

First off, she’s not mind controlling Charles. She switched minds with him. She lied to Beast because so long as the X-Men think Charles is trapped in his own mind, they’ll be reluctant to hurt him. But really, Charles was in Cassandra’s body when it was killed. Of course, the astral forms of powerful psychics in the Marvel Universe can survive their physical death, so maybe Charles is still hovering around somewhere like Farouk, the fat Turkish telepath Charles killed.

Obviously Cassandra is not Charles’ identical twin, since she’s a she and has mutant powers he doesn’t. She could be his fraternal twin, but I doubt they were raised together or that he tried to murder her when they were children, since continuity has established that Farouk and the young Ororo were the first two mutants Charles ever met other than himself.

But I like the idea that she’s Professor X’s twin. The idea of the doppleganger, the dark other self, has been done many times before in fiction, but it’s still compelling.

I suspect the major revelations are going to be the real connections between the two. Charles DID recognize her, I swear . . .
 
 
AilleCat
15:39 / 27.09.01
quote:Originally posted by Bio K-9, the Judgmental Jigger:
My favorite line:

"...take out your diploma and use it to clean yourself from now on. Prove to me that you understand the basics of life as a domestic pet..."

That bitch is fucking evil.



And here's where we really see Grant's influence on the X-Men, he's not afraid to create truly evil characters, along with the bite and twisted natures of people like that.

We saw alot of it in The Invisibles, with the psychological mindplay, and now we see elements of it in Cassandra Nova (Xavier?), getting s glimpse of the "Bug Room" in 116, then how she treats Henry this issue.

As an X-Men fan since I was 11, I can say that this is the *best* its *ever* been since then, Claremont doesn't hold a candle to Grant.

-Trish
 
 
Elijah, Freelance Rabbi
16:02 / 27.09.01
Henry tries to fight back, but is instead bludgeoned (to death?) by an Xavier Institute student wielding a baseball bat.


nah not to death, he clocked Beak when he was gettin beat down
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
16:11 / 27.09.01
quote:Originally posted by Elijah Non Grata:



nah not to death, he clocked Beak when he was gettin beat down

Well, maybe not to death, but I just flipped through the comic and didn't see Beast hit Beak once during the beat down...

[ 27-09-2001: Message edited by: Flux = Rad ]
 
 
Seth
09:57 / 28.09.01
Beast doesn't hit him: I think it was the dodgy foreshortening in the panel. Ropey, ropey art. Beak is on his knees, screaming mute at the heavens in a very Claremontesque pose. Beast's arm just happens to be extended towards him.

Blinding issue. Heartbreaking for Beast. Loved it.

I want the rest of the Periodic Table song.
 
 
CameronStewart
09:57 / 28.09.01
The bad first: I'm not keen on the art - I know Quitely can't manage a monthly schedule but I'd prefer bi-monthly Quitely over Van Sciver filling in for a few issues every few months. Alas, tis not to be.

And I kind of wish that Nova's hijacking of Xavier's brain wasn't revealed so quickly - I was expecting a half-dozen or more issues to go by with no mention, maybe to the point where we all decided to dismiss the idea as foolishly premature speculation, before - BAM - hitting us with it. Gotta stop reading the internet discussions, though - it would have been way more of a surprise...

The good: The story itself was great - some brilliant eeeeevil dialogue that really made me loathe Nova, and a wonderfully sinister final line. This comic makes me all tingly when I read it, which is so rare a thing these days.

One concern, though - I thought part of Morrison's plan was to make the book accessible to the average person who's only had the film to brief them, and sever the ties with volumes of useless continuity. Aren't the Shi'Ar, and that group of blokeys in the blue spotlight at the end, going to be meaningless (and possibly nonsensical) to said readers?

(I always thought all the outer-space Shi'Ar stuff was kind of straying from the fundamental premise of the X-Men - kind of like Batman fighting alien criminals on the moon).

[ 28-09-2001: Message edited by: CameronStewart ]
 
 
Seth
09:57 / 28.09.01
It wasn't just the Shi'ar. Remember all the weird demonic stuff around the Fall of the Mutants period?

I really liked the inclusion of the Shi'ar. I know it's a bit geeky and fannish, but I had the same teary feeling I got when I watched the film and saw that Brian Singer had kept the Blackbird. Of all the dumb comics ideas that shouldn't work, he'd kept the stealth bomber!

It brings a warm feeling to this tired ol' heart.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:57 / 28.09.01
I think the way to look at the Shi'ar is to think how exactly someone unfamiliar with the concept would see them: we're told in this issue that Xavier's ex runs a huge alien empire, and really in a way that's all we need to know. I'm not sure it matters if you don't recognise the figures in the spotlight at the end (and I don't, really): they just look like weird, cool aliens.

As far as the pacing goes: it did surprise me that we found out the truth about what happened last issue so early - but then, I think that's why it works, why it is a shock: Grant may be fucking around with expected story structures deliberately (especially in a comic famous for such long delays before things are revealed). There are also some big questions still to be answered - like, is Charles still stuck in his Cassandra-possessed body? The evidence seems contradictory. I also have this theory about how there's a weird overlap between some of Xavier's behaviour before and after he gets possessed (what were his new ways to encourage humans to trust mutants, if it wasn't "coming out" like that? is he partly responsible for his own fate, by not telling his X-Men about his past?).

I also really love the way this issue sheds light on the previous one in light of Grant's recent comments about it being a "pacifist" comic - rather than Xavier's shooting Cassandra being a way of making the book more "edgy" or "dark", what we're actually being told is that no, shooting people is bad, and that Charles' original code of conduct is the admirable one...

I'm also amazed that he's made me care about these characters - the ones that I'd always thought were boring as hell, and neither the movie nor any other version could make me like, but Grant has: Jean Grey, Cyclops... Jean in particular - he's using her very sparingly so far, but I reckon she's being held back for something big - and in fact that undersestimating her may be Cassandra Nova's big mistake.

And I hope Beast isn't dead. I doubt he is.

Creepy, creepy issue. Nightmarish, in fact. And Grant does have a way with closing lines: "Imagine that in the wrong hands..."

Brrr.
 
 
rizla mission
09:57 / 28.09.01
poor beast.

he's my favourite.

kind of a nasty issue. Gave me a feeling like my cat had just died. In a good way.
 
 
Ellis
09:57 / 28.09.01
Right... I'm going to find me a comic shop...
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
09:57 / 28.09.01
comments:

The idea of the pacifist superhero comic is starting to manifest itself, and I really like it... it couldn't have come at a better time, could it? talk about zeitgeist... I appreciate that only two of the X-Men are used in an offensive manner (Cyclops and Wolverine - who are essentially playing 'good cop/bad cop'), and even still, they are used in a reactive way as opposed to seeking out the 'bad guys'...

I think the Shi'Ar Empire was a pretty obvious target for Grant to go after, and the context he's using is great. I think he's already using the Shi'Ar in a way that makes it unnecessary for people with no knowledge of continuity to grasp...I mean, EVERYBODY can handle the concept of high tech aliens, and when the connection that their empress is Charles' ex-girlfriend is made, what's to not get? At least he's not bringing back the fucking Brood or something...

I would guess that Charles is stuck in Cassandra's body, as the solicitation for 121 has Emma and Jean entering Charles mind in a comatose state, which is what Cassandra's body is in...and the cover has his head trapped inside hers, so you know...
I would guess that the storyline that begins after that issue would be the Cassandra vs. Xavier one...


About having the revelations come so quickly: I think it is to make the comic move faster and make it more accessable. In the past 20 years of X-Men comics, they would have dragged this out over a few years of stories, Grant defies that tradition by moving subplots along at lightspeed...it's a way of him saying to us "you know, I've got so many ideas, this isn't even the biggest one..."

VanSciver's art is pretty inappropriate, if just because the contrast with Frank is so great...would it kill them to find a fill-in who can at least draw something like him?

Like, say......Cameron Stewart?
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:57 / 28.09.01
So am I the only one who quite liked Ethan Van Schiver's art? Although I thought it looked better in the black and white previews...
 
 
Ronald Thomas Clontle
10:02 / 28.09.01
I think VanSciver is decent...he's a bit of a George Perez/Phil Jiminez clone, and I've never really been a big fan of that style, and there's just a little bit of that Image thing mixed in, which makes it look a bit awkward... there's a hardness to VanSciver's lines that just looks weird contrasted with the softness of Frank Quitely's lines...it'll look bizarre when the volumes are collected.

They could have found someone far worse...at least he's got the ability to draw detailed backgrounds... I just really hate the way he draws Scott, and his page layout is very sloppy and asymetrical..he needs to work on basic graphic design and composition skills...
 
 
CameronStewart
12:52 / 28.09.01
>>>.would it kill them to find a fill-in who can at least draw something like him?

Like, say......Cameron Stewart? <<<

I'm working on it, I'm working on it...
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
13:01 / 28.09.01
In the meantime, what's all this about a Glasgow-only comic strip you're doing with the baldy man?
 
 
rizla mission
13:08 / 28.09.01
gosh!

Glasgow only? you what?
 
 
CameronStewart
16:01 / 28.09.01
Grant and I are doing a short four page comic that's going in the programme of The Scottish Opera Company's production of Mozart's opera "Cosi Fan Tutti." It's a goofy little strip designed to help the audience understand the plot of the opera. Available only to Scottish opera patrons.

I'll check on the copyright stuff once it's complete and see if I can post any of it online.

[ 01-10-2001: Message edited by: CameronStewart ]
 
 
Yotsuba & Benjamin!
18:08 / 28.09.01
Yeah, the most problems I had with the art was just the panels. I've been flipping through Grant's ouvre and there's hardly any moments that involve that sort of crookeredry, and it just does not fit in New X-Men. Nitpicky, probably, but there you have it. One thing that was really fabulous was one particular panel of beast screeching in horror and clutching his head. I forget which page, but you probably know the one I mean. It's really well done. You absolutely hear the pain and terror. As for everything else, it has its good and bad moments. More admirable than the fill-in and regular work on uncanny, simply because he's not really aping anyone outright, but it's just a shame that he's got to bat after quitely. tough job.

and, yeah (i say that a lot in these posts don't i?), fuck internet gossip. first episode one, now this. i could've rightly had my nuts blown off, if it wasn't for my rampant curiosity.

Finally got Arcadia by the way, on a completely unrelated topic. Meaning i finally got a grasp on it. It's all about the head and what's inside it. reading it out loud with different voices really helps.

Benjamin.
 
 
The Knowledge +1
11:13 / 29.09.01
I thought Vansciver was alright. His evil Xavier rocked. I reckon his art on the characters will get better over the next few months.

This issue:

Jean snogs Wolvie again.

Kitty litter for Beast. He's not dead but I wouldn't be surprised if he can't remember a damn thing next iss. That's no doubt why beak pulled all his feathers out - because he can't beleive what he's done!

"Charles' brain was designed by nature to control the brains of others." I figure that he and Cassandra were experimental twins made in a lab somewhere.

[ 29-09-2001: Message edited by: The Knowledge +1 ]
 
 
Our Lady of The Two Towers
13:47 / 29.09.01
But she can't be both Xavier's twin and the next stage of evolution.

And for that matter, how could Beast last issue identify her as being the next stage? No two mutants are the same, so how can they all be the same genetically speaking for him to classify her as the next stage on? I remember finding it interesting that they were all treating Cassie Nova as a thing and not a person, feeling as threateed by this next evolutionary stage as humans are by them?
 
 
CameronStewart
14:05 / 29.09.01
>>>"Charles' brain was designed by nature to control the brains of others." I figure that he and Cassandra were experimental twins made in a lab somewhere.<<<

If that's the case, wouldn't she say, "Charles' brain was designed by science"?

[ 29-09-2001: Message edited by: CameronStewart ]
 
 
sleazenation
14:30 / 29.09.01
well, if we want to get pedantic *nothing* is designed by natureā€¦
 
 
The Natural Way
12:06 / 30.09.01
Loz! Stop it! Stop doing this to yourself!

And maybe Charles *is* the next stage in mutant evolution........

Yeah, the evidence seems pretty strong in favour of Charles being trapped in Cassandra's body. For a start, there's the "Emma, I'm Charles! No!" thing, which could be read as "Emma, I'm Charles now". But that would be stupid: what kind of baddie attempts to foil their own evil designs by explaining to the goodies exactly what their doing? And there's the rumour that Cassandra's gonna return to fuck everything with a Shi'ar mothership, which seems one step closer to bearing fruit. And, as Flux points out, Charles IS described, in the solicitation for 121, as being in a "coma", mirroring the comatose state of Cassandra's body, perfectly preserved in cryogenic storage. And, finally, all this fits with the image on the cover.....

Now, knowing that Sublime and the U-Men are going to turn up in the next story arc, I can't help wondering when the events in the annual take place. The events of 117 seem to occur a few days after the the events depicted in 118. Wolverine's been up in the hills for a few days, recovering; The school terms just started; no mention is made of Xorn or the X-Men's Chinese adventure.... And Sublime turns up later, Jean is left in the institute alone (we know all this from the solicitations)... and all this fits with the events of the annual.

Another thing: will the Beast remember what happened to him? Will Cassandra allow him to remember? Does she even give a fuck? I mean, she's got the fucking Shi'ar on board now.

And that brings me to the gooood stuff:

The Royal Guard in the teleporatation Beam. Fucking great. Morrison knows drama: if you have no idea who they are, it's like "who the fuck are those hard looking bastards?", but if you do know what they're about it's the same: "who the fuck are those hard looking bastards?" They've never looked so good. So, kudos to Sciver for pulling that off (even if he does go for Jimenez-style naturalism and end up with horrible, morphy lumpheads).

"The Beak"? Sickeningly sad and sentimental, and...no! Cassandra! All he wanted to do was give the Beast his prized baseball bat, you evil, evil, red-eyed bitch! I loved the way Grant didn't delay in clearing up some of the mystery: Cassandra just doesn't give a fuck and the plot moves at the pace of a freight train.

And do you think Wolvie knocking Jean back puts a bit of a cap on the VERY OBVIOUS Jean and Wolvie infidelity thing, and clears the way for the real, adulterous, melt the anus, action between Emma and Scott? Now, that's far more interesting.......

The way Trish lets Henry down.... So clumsy and confused... But what the hell would you do? Good, complex stuff. And the way Cassandra insults him... That would be the way to get to the Beast, wouldn't it? "Devolver....where will your gift take you next, I wonder? Will you become an insect? A worm? A slithering, incoherent slime mold still trying to charm human women with it's awkward poetry?" Great. Morrison can pull off fear and horror without the comic's rating going up one inch and still make his books more "mature", more disturbing, etc than a million "Fury"s.

the students running around halls with cameras to get a snap of the mothership.... Lovely touch.

Cheers Grant.

[ 30-09-2001: Message edited by: young runt ]
 
 
Jackie Susann
09:38 / 01.10.01
I thought this was the most disturbing comic I'd ever read. It made me think, God, they let kids read this? Bring back the comic code I say.
 
 
Regrettable Juvenilia
09:38 / 01.10.01
Hardly any actual kids are reading it anyway - they're too busy playing Resident Evil 8 or something hardcore like that.

I think the reason it's disturbing is because the first few issues of Grant's X-Men weren't radically different to what good superhero comics tend to be like: whereas this was just a bit more... sick.
 
 
elephanthead
09:38 / 01.10.01
The feeling I got after reading 117 is the same feeling I would get after a first reading of an Invisibles issue. A little dizzy, heart pounding, pacing around my apartment muttering "fuck, fuck!" And now I know how much I missed that feeling. Thank you, Mr. Morrison!

Don't really have any complaints about the art. If someone can point me to a good site to catch up on my X-Men back story, I'd appreciate it. It's been a good long time since I picked up this title and I'm realizing how much I've missed.

Cheers, all!
 
  

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