Weekly Comic Book Review

writers: Mike Carey, Craig Kyle, Zeb Wells, Christopher Yost

pencils: Kalman Andrasofszky, Carlo Barberi, Clayton Crain, Leonardo Manco, Clay Mann, Diogenes Neves, Mike Norton, Ibraim Roberson, Mateus Santolouco, Alina Urusov

Necrosha, an X-Force story that affected both New Mutants and X-Men: Legacy as well, was criticized for being the Blackest Night of the Marvel Universe—an unfair criticism if anyone cares to follow the plot threads that started far back in New X-Men, or even just from the first issue of X-Force. But whether or not this mini-event was a rip off of Blackest Night or not, Necrosha still needs to be able to stand on its own. So, as a story, does it hold up well or was it pumped up for no reason? The answer to that is a little confusing. As the single issues were being released, Necrosha was not getting the best of reviews. It was condemned for being too long, for having too much filler, for needless tie-ins, and sub par art. I’ll admit that for all but that last point, I was feeling the same way until the last two issues of the main event where the X-Force finally did something. Those were my initial feelings. The hardcover collection of X Necrosha changed a lot of my animosities towards the event.

There’s a lot to cover in this. And before I get into any of the stories, the first thing I want to point out is the price of the set—$39.99 might seem like a lot, but you’re actually getting about fifty dollars of comics (a little over, actually). When the trade paperback of this comes out at 34.99, it’ll be even more of a deal, but for five dollars more the hardcover is definitely worth it. What’s included in this is the Necrosha one-shot that starts all three stories, Necrosha: The Gathering one shot, introducing the merry band of murdering mutants, X-Force 11, 21-25, X-Men: Legacy 231-234, New Mutants 6-8, New X-Men 32 and “UnDeadpool” from X-Force Annual 1. That’s a pretty good listing. And like I said, it gives quite a lot to cover.

Let’s start with the main event, taking place in X-Force. This received the most criticism by far, but looking back it’s a lot stronger than I remember it to be. The story is…actually not that simple. Selene, former Black Queen of the Hellfire Club, wants to make herself a goddess by absorbing the souls of dead mutants. To do this, she has to resurrect them first and do some kind of ancient spell. Unfortunately for her, Warpath is holding one of the key ingredients to this—a dagger carved from the bones of her mother. So Selene sends her army of undead mutants to Utopia to basically piss everyone off and torment Emma Frost with her dead Hellions. The X-Force must band together to stop her. Meanwhile, Elixir is still recovering from the events of Messiah War and Rhane Sinclair is dying after getting knocked up by Asgardian Wolf Prince Hrimhari (even if they are of Norse legend, you still gotta use a condom people). Hrimhari, or as Warpath calls him, Wolf-guy, calls upon Hela to save Rhane and the child, but is forced to choose one in return for his own soul. He pulls a fastball and chooses Elixir, waking our favorite golden healer from his coma, who then saves Rhane and unborn child. Fast-thinking, Wolf-Guy. Or course, Vanisher makes his return to X-Force only to find out that Elixir already took a tumor out of him, but sticks around anyway.

Seems like there’s a lot going on that could warrant a six issue story, doesn’t it? Most everyone seems to be in agreement that Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost are some of the best X-Men writers to date, so by default this story has to be above average, which it is. It’s actually a kick-ass story when you get to read it without waiting month to month. A lot of people might hate the “writing for the trade” trend, but sometimes it does work better. Necrosha is an example of this. However, even reading it as a trade, it still feels one issue too long. Somewhere around issue 23, battle fatigue begins to set in. The last two issues come in and save the day, reminding us that we’re in good hands, but it’s actually one of the weaker stories in the Kyle and Yost X-Force series—but weaker for them is still insanely good for us. They’re X-Force was just that good.

Kyle and Yost really deliver on the characters here, most notably Warpath. Necrosha is really James Proudstar’s story of seeking redemption for his actions in X-Force. Early on in X-Force, he goes to visit his tribe’s burial mound only to find it dug up by Eli Bard, lap dog servant of Selene. Ever since, he’s been with X-Force to eventually find peace and a little revenge. He’s the spine of this story, and we see him go full circle. Then we’ve got Elixir whose fight with Wither drastically changes him in a way that you just need to see, and Vanisher who has ever reason to bail on the X-Men but when the time comes mans up and does the hero thing (until Second Coming anyway). What happens with Rhane and Wolf-guy is tragic, but it’s the former three characters that really get the character development. Wolverine, X-23, Domino, and Archangel remain the same as they ever have been.

I think the main criticism people gave Necrosha was for Clayton Crain’s art. And really, I have no idea why. I get that it can sometimes be too dark and occasionally hard to follow, but it’s such a unique look and serves Necrosha wonderfully (side note, why the hell couldn’t they get him in Second Coming and someone like, oh I don’t know, Greg-fucking-Land out?). One thing that the hardcover does is clean up the art a little. The pages are glossier than the comics and the colors shine a bit more. Towards the end of the story, Warpath prepares X-Force to be able to walk in the spirit world, protecting their souls from Selene. The image of X-Force standing together with the white clay on their faces is beautiful—I’d friggin’ love a poster of that page somewhere in my office.

The second story in this collection is “Binary,” the New Mutants contribution to the event.  For me, this is when Zeb Wells started to prove his writing talents. I mean, he made Cipher—he with the lamest of mutant powers (being able to understand any language)—an interesting force. Cipher! His ability to see everything as language sets him up to be a very powerful player in the X-verse. For instance, he can now read movement as language, which he uses to kick the crap out of the New Mutants, and he can read emotions. While spying on Xavier and the New Mutants reuniting, Cipher’s ability to read between the lines (literally) transforms a joyous reunion of a mentor and his students into an awkward exchange of half-truths. Returning Warlock and Cipher to the New Mutants seemed pointless even if done well, but anyone who has read the more recent Second Coming know that their returns have extreme payoffs. Unlike Psylocke, they weren’t brought back from the dead (or elsewhere) for the sake of having a cool character return. They—especially Cipher—were crucial to Second Coming. I also like Ibraim Roberson’s art for one very specific reason: I can tell the difference between Magma and Magik. Having two blondes on the team seems to confuse some artists, and with the New Mutants wearing the same Uniform, doubly so. Ibraim gives each character distinct characteristics. With some artists it’s hard to even tell apart Cipher from Cannonball, but not with Roberson’s. The art might not be as fancy or polished as Clayton Crain’s, but that one ability is an underrated talent in the comic industry.

And our last main feature comes from Mike Carey and Clay Mann in the X-Men Legacy arc “The Foretelling,” or, as the chapters actually call them outside of the table of contents “Earth, Give Up Your Dead!” which is a far more awesome, if less foreboding, title. And while sort of fun, well-written, and well-drawn, it’s not exactly essential either. The New Mutants Necrosha story did some very important things, but X-Men Legacy was more or less a throwaway story—a very long throwaway story for Mike Carey, who is good at condensing his stories to 3 or less issues. His crossover with Utopia was only two issues, and I’m left wishing he did the same here. If event fatigue set in with this relatively small event, this is why—one tie-in too many. X-Force was needed, of course, and New Mutants had definite justification. Carey more or less uses the Necrosha gimmick to launch into his story of Proteus, but before issue one is even over, Necrosha is an afterthought. I’m sure Carey had other ways to tell this story, but if Marvel wanted Necrosha to be a big deal, he did a relatively good job shoe-horning the event into his own story. We still got Carey’s great writing and characterization, and a small development between Rogue and Magneto that is sure to blossom as they work together in the future. And seeds for future stories—Blindfold had a crazy brother that her mother died killing? Yeah, like that’ll be left unexplored.  I don’t want to hark on it too much, but I don’t think it needs much explanation either. It’s a good story, but in the grand scheme of Necrosha, maybe not the most vital.

As I said before, what makes this set really worth the money is just how much it comes with. And it’s sort of loaded with extra features, here’s a rundown:

• X-Men Legacy 234: The Telltale Heart has nothing to do with Necrosha. At all, but is thrown in with the rest of the Legacy issues I assume because it had the unlucky landing between two crossovers (Legacy 235 is part of Second Coming). It’s a fun story with Rogue briefly gaining the power of the Stepford Cuckoos. She manages to accidentally make out with Magneto and broadcast her sexual fantasies about Gambit to the population of Utopia (You know what, sort of finding myself on Team Magneto on this one, though Gambit’s like totally hot too). But Carey won’t let even a filler issue get away without some seed of importance, and in this we get a little taste of what Indra might be capable of—armored Indian badass.
• New X-Men 32: Whatever Happened to Wither? is probably the earliest tie-in to Necrosha and it’s great to see it included here. Wither, one of the New X-Men and later one of Selene’s killing squad—or gets owned by Elixir in a gruesome way—is trying to deal with loss of the girl he loved, Laurie, making him ripe for Selene’s taking. I mean, who thought that old woman he was ling with would turn out to be an insanely hot immortal Black Queen in dominatrix clothing?
• X-Force 11: Who the Hell is Eli Bard? Is the first real clue that X-Force gets about what Selene is doing. Her pathetic lap dog, Eli Bard, was actually a civilian of the Roman Empire that Selene cursed to vampiric (that’s a word, right?) immortality after he screwed up her spell by trying to save a little girl. Really Eliphas? You thought maybe this immortal sorceress woman dressing like a Trojan stripper and wanting to destroy all of Rome would be okay with you letting one wee little brat survive? It’s also cool to see Alina Urusov’s stone-etching like art of the Roman Empire scenes intermingled with Clayton Crain’s contemporary style (and that guy can draw Ghost Rider like nobody’s business).
• X Necrosha: The Gathering is one of those anthology pieces that is interesting but relatively unneeded. It’s good for readers who started with Necrosha and nothing else, but for people who have been following for a while, it can get a little redundant. The stories of Blink, Senyaka, and Mortis are fresh—especially the Blink story as she was the most unlikely candidate to join Selene. I can understand why Wither was included—even I didn’t read that New X-Men one-off. And Eli Bard’s story…well, X-Force 11 wasn’t that long ago, did we really need this even one the one-shot came out? With the hardcover, the Wither and Eliphas stories are just redundant, but it’s nice that they’re included.
• From the X-Force Annual, Undeadpool by Robert Kirkman. See, that sentence alone should be enough to make anyone reading this go: “Kirkman? Mutant Zombies? Deadpool? Suh-weet!” and with good reason. Yes, Deadpool is overexposed worse than the bright blue sky, but this is a short story done right. And really, how could they do a story about the undead and not have Kirkman write at least a little something? It’s a load of fun like only Kirkman and Deadpool can deliver.

So, yes, there is a lot in this hardcover collection, and even if it’s not all amazing, I don’t think anything is bad. One really nice touch? Right before Necrosha begins, there’s a nice page giving you a chronology of events to keep all of the various components together. Also, the red leather binding makes this one a little unique (even if you keep it covered by the dust jacket). I think on Amazon right now, this is going for 26 and some change. I say at that price, it’s a steal. And while rereading it for this review, it is one of those stories that get better every time you read it. Kyle and Yost have a talent for that (reread Messiah War. It’s actually pretty badass the second time around).

Final grade: A-

-Roman Colombo

Filed under: Marvel Comics, The Graphic Novel Reader Tagged: | Christopher Yost, Clay Mann, Clayton Crain, Craig Kyle, Diogenes Neves, Mike Carey, New Mutant, New X-Men, Robert Kirkman, X Necrosha, X Necrosha Review, X-Force, X-Men: Legacy, X-Necrosha (Hardcover), X-Necrosha (Hardcover) review, X-Necrosha HC, X-Necrosha HC review, Zeb Wells