Thursday, June 12, 2014

Uncanny X-Men 413

After a long absence, I'm back, for what feels like the hundredth time... I'm going to fall back on the cliched "life got in the way" excuse again. Plus, well, my own personal laziness.

I figured I jump right back into my issue-by-issue musings on Chuck Austen's run. I just recently reread Jay Faerber's Generation X run, as I wanted to read something X-Men related before I went to see Days of Future Past (excellent movie, by the way). That lead to me reading the Brian Wood/Warren Ellis run that followed on the book, which lead to me wanting to read the Bill Jemas "Nu-Marvel" era of the main X-Men books, specifically Uncanny and New X-Men. I just recently started Austen's run on Uncanny, and it's amazing how much it contrasts with Casey's run, having now read all of Casey's run. Chad Nevett's already said all that needs to be said about Casey's work on the title over on his Graphicontent blog, but I do want to say that the contrast between Casey's high-concept work and Austen's more workman-like approach is startling and refreshing. Casey spends about a year of issues rehashing old ideas and tropes (and I have to agree with Mr. Nevett, I think some of this was intentional) before doing a pair of issues and an annual that read like an ad for his Wildcats comics. Meanwhile, Austen tries a back to basics approach, with the emphasis on interpersonal dynamics. While he gets mixed results over the course of his run, it does pay off for him a lot more often than it did Casey.

So, without further ado, my thoughts on this issue:

First of all, I want to say that not hiring Sean Phillips full time on Uncanny X-Men was a HUUUUUGE missed opportunity. After having read Casey's Wildcats plus his Uncanny issues (man, this Casey guy keeps popping up in my post...), I have to wonder how different this period of Uncanny would turned out had he been the main artist on the book. Maybe Casey would have put a little more effort into his run if he'd gotten to work with the artist that he wanted, maybe his run would have been longer I wouldn't be writing these posts? Knowing now that Marvel assigned more "traditional" artists to Casey, despite his protests, makes me wonder if that might have inspired the overuse of cliches in his run. Whatever the case, Phillips is a great storyteller, and he does a more than decent job on this issue. It's easy to read, and the body language and facial expressions of the characters are especially well done.

Another thing that I liked was having Annie narrate the issue. Austen does keep overusing the same lines with her narration, but it does help set up what I think is a nice last-page reveal. Whatever ultimately ends up happening with Annie's character, she does have some potential as the bigoted mother of a mutant living at the X-Mansion. It's certainly a lot more interesting than her Florence Nightingale thing with Havok. Speaking of Havok and Annie, they're the source of another scene I really enjoyed in this issue, which also involves Charles Xavier. Now, I'm a big Xavier fan, so a lot of things I absolutely hate have happened to him in the past decade or so. Having a scene that establishes how much Xavier cares about his students, his fellow mutants, his coexistence philosophy, and how much his own failings hurt him is something that I appreciated,, because these scenes will be come few and far between in the not too distant future. It's a well-executed scene that gives a good glimpse of everything you need to know about Xavier, while also setting up Havok's return to the X-Men. The last thing that I really liked was Juggernaut. Seriously, every time he shows up in the issue, he's just plain entertaining; there's even a disappointing scene where he helps make it just a little more bearable (which I'll get to later). Overall, this Lobdell-esque quiet issue (with its emphasis on interpersonal dynamics, characterization, and Xavier) is probably the best work Austen's don on this series so far. That's not to say he's perfect though.

As I said, there's a particularly disappointing scene, which involves Angel, Husk, and Stacy X. I know Austen has said in interviews that he wanted to bring back some of the Claremont's soap opera elements to the title, however he goes a bit too far with this cat-fight scene. That's really the best way I can describe it. It's a bit less than that though, and Austen's goal is admirable; here, he's trying to better establish a plot point Casey may have hinted at slightly, which is an Angel/Stacy X romance, while also bringing in Husk as a third element. He tries to develop Stacy X by having her reveal her jealousy, and while all of the dialogue itself is well-executed (in addition to the art), Stacy and Husk, a newcomer to the series, are essentially fighting over a man. Knowing about the claims of sexism against Austen, it's hard to ignore this blatant attempt at the cliched love-triangle, and the whole thing reads a little too much like an exaggerated, cartoonish attempt at doing a Days of Our Lives plot. Also, knowing where Austen eventually takes Angel's love life doesn't help this scene either.

Still, the issue is pretty good for Austen. I don't want to say it's all downhill from here, as I've read similarly good issues of his run that are later in the series. I'll get to them eventually, but so far, so good.