There are some phrases that you don't naturally associate with certain people. One you'd probably not expect to hear from me is this: I enjoyed an X-Men comic.
It's not that I particularly have anything against the X-Men, but their backstory is so huge and complicated that I can't imagine picking one up and having any clue who anybody is or what they are doing, even if it's explained. I read a lot of them when I was a much younger, but I have an idea that I wouldn't even recognise the characters I recognised. There is such a huge weight of continuity and I don't want to have to read a zillion other comics to make sense of the one in my hands, and that's before you add in all the recent "event" comics.
But I picked up X-Men: First Class #1 on a whim, and partly because it was free of all that continuity baggage. It's great. Sue Richards mentors a teenage Jean Grey, who is feeling a bit left out among her all-male team. Hilarity ensues.
I loved the story, I loved the subtle nuanced characterisation of everyone except the Mad Thinker, and I loved his unsubtle characterisation. I loved the art, which supported the characterisation so well. I loved that I could read a satisfying story in a single comic.
Come to think of it, the last Marvel comic I enjoyed was also written by Jeff Parker.
He's okay.
1 comment:
Jeff Parker's good. He's the only writer who makes a Marvel Adventures title worth reading. (He's writing MA: Avengers.)
I'd recommend his criminally undersold Agents of Atlas mini, as well as the six-issue Walk In he did for Virgin Comics. Digital copies of both series are fairly easy to find if paper ones are not.
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