X-Men is my all time favorite super group.
Some might say they aren´t a supergroup. Whatever. As far as comic books go, you just need more than two people together wearing spandex (or a long coat) and voilá, you´ve got yourself a new supergroup.
Back to my point, I started reading X-Men when I was a teenager. And I loved the way they always looked like a family gathering dealing with normal-people problems and fighting menacing threats every other day.
Menacing threats? That sure sounded redundant…
I guess that´s the same reason a lot of people love the Fantastic Four, but I was caught by the X-Men. And that´s the only reason I keep on checking on them every now and then.
Here it is: superhero comic books got complicated. And I don´t mean geek fanboy complicated. I mean boring. Utterly boring!!!
A couple of years ago I bought one X-Men issue because it was drawn by Chris Bachallo. And I couldn´t understand a thing. There were SO many mutants, SO much happening, SO many fights… and nothing happening at all. I mean, does anybody even remember that run? Did it change your life in any way?
And I remember another story drawn by the same Chris Bachallo that was plain simple. One-shot Christmas Special (or X-man Xpecial? How do they call it?) in which Peter Rasputin was trying to find a ghost in the X-Mansion. There was a touching moment in which he talked with the memory (or the ghost) of his deceased sister and eventually received a Christmas present from Marrow.
There was no fight. No giant monster, sentinel or a mutant menace. In fact, there were few people awake in this story. Before that, I had only seen the X-Men cartoon on TV but I didn´t know who Illyana Rasputin was. I barely knew Colossus at that time. And, even so, it was a remarkable moment.
A touching moment. And I had never read X-Men comics before.
I kept reading X-Men for some years after that. But then there was university, internships, girls, parties… I ended up putting comic books aside for a while. Or at least the monthly issues I used to buy. I love comic books, wherever they´re from, so I would read French sci-fi, Japanese mangá, Italian fumetti and Brazilian underground comics all the time I felt like doing so. And I would only read superhero comics when praised and collected.
So, there were two moments in which I got back to the X-Men with no regret. And I have been using them as examples of good stories (and I don´t mean good X-Men stories; I mean really good storytelling) ever since. I call them GMW and JWW. And I, therefore, apologize for my fanboy-ish vocabulary that will now commence. Trust me, there´s no other way to explain those:
The Grant Morrison Way
The story is NUTS, no less. Serious original stuff, kick-ass storyline, awesome plot twists, good dialogues, amazing happenings. Trying not to spoil anything for people that – OMG – haven´t read yet: people die (and I mean important people), alien try to protect themselves on Earth, drug addicted mutant teenagers re-shape the very fabric of the world.
How many times did you see the heroes trying to come up with a plan and fail? Or the most trustworthy of the mutants falling into one of the oldest sins? I mean… WOW!!!
And, plus, you get to see Frank Quitely drawings sometimes. The silent story “Silence”, that happens inside Professor X´s head worths the whole run.
The Joss Whedon Way
Amazingly enough, everything here was super-predictable. Or almost: there are team fights tearing walls in every issue; the archenemy is either the oldest or the most stupid; people ressurect – and, quoting Monica Rambeau, “the X-Men come back more than Jesus” -; riots end up in nothing; Nick Fury is rude; the S.H.I.E.L.D. shows up for no reason… So, what makes this such a great run?
Answer: the characters. Rarely did I see such powerful characters in a comic book story. I´m not talking about Superman kinda powerful, I´m talking about “realistic” powerful. And this is mainly achieved by fantastically well produced dialogue.
Cyclops gives his speech – and is mocked – every now and then, Emma Frost acts like a total biAtch all the time, Kitty Pryde thinks (and convinces you) that Emma will betray them, Wolverine… how can I put this… He looks just like that cool uncle you had when you were a kid: he fights your bullies and tell you some shitty jokes. And has beer. Lots of it.
The characters are the way you think they should be if they were real people.
I´m not the biggest John Cassaday fan ever because I don´t like realistic drawings that much, but he sure knows how to draw. And that´s good.
Well, if you haven´t read any of this, do yourself a favor and read them all. Really, really great stuff.
I´m sure you won´t regret.
