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4.16 AVERAGE
4.16 AVERAGE
adventurous
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
It’s a bit scatterbrained as a collection, and if I hadn’t read both X of Swords and Hellfire Gala alongside it—which wasn’t nearly as difficult as it could’ve been—I might rate this slightly lower, since it essentially lacks a driving sense of momentum. But taken as the backbone of the broader story Hickman and company are creating, this is quite the achievement. It builds off the exciting rebranding of HoX/PoX with more thought and care than I’m used to seeing from a major relaunch. The soul of these stories is familiar, and doesn’t stray too far from what we usually associated with the X-Men, but the trappings around them are bold and big and fascinating to watch unfold. All of the art is good-to-great, as well, and I really appreciate how consistent the style of this era is even when drawn by an ever-growing collection of artists.
The anthology-adjacent structure works, too, and, even if it does lead to some inconsistent plotting on a broader scale, it gives Hickman time to dig into various characters and ideas in ways I often found very refreshing. Are there a few too many issues that don’t amount to much independently or collectively? I think so, but even the “filler” here—although I loathe that word—is rarely uninteresting. My biggest complaint is probably how rushed the ending feels. After 20 issues (and more, if you include the crossovers), Hickman’s time as the lead ends abruptly. It feels like we’re still in the early stage of this story, and seeing its architect step aside from the driver seat this early is a little disappointing. Admittedly, he had spent several years on the book by the time he got here, so I don’t begrudge the decision, especially considering how definitive an identity he created. I can’t say I expected to find myself this into a mildly convoluted X-Men saga, but I’m glad to be here! I’m eager to see if the next phase of stories keep their hooks in me the way this one did.
The anthology-adjacent structure works, too, and, even if it does lead to some inconsistent plotting on a broader scale, it gives Hickman time to dig into various characters and ideas in ways I often found very refreshing. Are there a few too many issues that don’t amount to much independently or collectively? I think so, but even the “filler” here—although I loathe that word—is rarely uninteresting. My biggest complaint is probably how rushed the ending feels. After 20 issues (and more, if you include the crossovers), Hickman’s time as the lead ends abruptly. It feels like we’re still in the early stage of this story, and seeing its architect step aside from the driver seat this early is a little disappointing. Admittedly, he had spent several years on the book by the time he got here, so I don’t begrudge the decision, especially considering how definitive an identity he created. I can’t say I expected to find myself this into a mildly convoluted X-Men saga, but I’m glad to be here! I’m eager to see if the next phase of stories keep their hooks in me the way this one did.
First reread since reading the issues. The omnibus collects xmen and giant size xmen, but it’s missing the x of swords tie in issues.
Hickman’s Xmen series was always interesting, and some of these issues are the best of the Dawn of X line. The art is great for the most part, though I do think Linel Francis Yu maybe wasn’t the best fit. There was a general sense of alienation to Hickman’s writing, which led many to have “are the xmen the bad guys now” takes, and I don’t think Yu’s stiff figures and sometimes creepy faces really helped that. It didn’t strike the balance of tone that Larry’s and Silva did in Hox Pox.
My biggest complaint is more about the whole line, which falls in part on Hickman as the “Head of X” and a bit on some of the other writers in the line (many of whom just didn’t bring their A game or enough imagination) but probably the bulk of the blame belongs to the editors at Marvel. Head of X or not, I cannot imagine Hickman had taken on all the roles of an editor, and everything I have read from him and others make it sound like he was primarily supportive and hands off.
Either way, my main problem is that the line felt far too unfocused. Sure, the close collaboration they had let them do fun stuff with the timeline, but it really feels like there were some major gaps in story potential and a real lack of focus. Many of these issues feel like Hickman is tossing up layups for some other writer who never takes the ball. Maybe he was planting seeds for himself for later, and maybe his early exit was what fucked everything up. That may explain some of the unresolved threads in these issues but not the other part. In short, the line was a disappointment after the incredible height of Hox/Pox. The quality of the work put out by the other writers and the clear roadblocks that Hickman ran into (storm was supposed to get pregnant, Franklin was supposed to be a mutant, etc) when he should have been given carte blanche almost certainly played a part in him leaving.
Hickman’s Xmen series was always interesting, and some of these issues are the best of the Dawn of X line. The art is great for the most part, though I do think Linel Francis Yu maybe wasn’t the best fit. There was a general sense of alienation to Hickman’s writing, which led many to have “are the xmen the bad guys now” takes, and I don’t think Yu’s stiff figures and sometimes creepy faces really helped that. It didn’t strike the balance of tone that Larry’s and Silva did in Hox Pox.
My biggest complaint is more about the whole line, which falls in part on Hickman as the “Head of X” and a bit on some of the other writers in the line (many of whom just didn’t bring their A game or enough imagination) but probably the bulk of the blame belongs to the editors at Marvel. Head of X or not, I cannot imagine Hickman had taken on all the roles of an editor, and everything I have read from him and others make it sound like he was primarily supportive and hands off.
Either way, my main problem is that the line felt far too unfocused. Sure, the close collaboration they had let them do fun stuff with the timeline, but it really feels like there were some major gaps in story potential and a real lack of focus. Many of these issues feel like Hickman is tossing up layups for some other writer who never takes the ball. Maybe he was planting seeds for himself for later, and maybe his early exit was what fucked everything up. That may explain some of the unresolved threads in these issues but not the other part. In short, the line was a disappointment after the incredible height of Hox/Pox. The quality of the work put out by the other writers and the clear roadblocks that Hickman ran into (storm was supposed to get pregnant, Franklin was supposed to be a mutant, etc) when he should have been given carte blanche almost certainly played a part in him leaving.
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
inspiring
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
I'm a little conflicted about how to rate this one. I'll try writing the text of the review and see where that gets me.
House and Powers of X was bold relaunch of the X-Men line that came bearing all of the crazy ideas that you'd expect from Jonathan Hickman. With that out of the way, you could only wonder what his run on the line's flagship title would be like, and...it's no HoX/PoX, let me tell you.
Hickman's tenure on the X-Men book, collected almost in its entirety in this omnibus (we'll talk about that later), reads more like an X-Men TV show. Each issue or pair of issues tells a different, self-contained story about the various going-ons in the Krakoan Age of the mutants. This stuff is great for worldbuilding, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't totally absorbed by this book whenever I picked it up.
I like that Krakoa isn't just a mutant paradise - that'd be boring! This is a setup that's built on bloody and shady foundations, and the mutants now have these weird practices that are very cultish. Every single mutant is totally onboard with what's happening on Krakoa, so the reader is left to figure out for themselves if this is all really okay. Particularly, when the mutants talk about themselves and their relation to the humans, they come dangerously close to being prejudiced against humans themselves - gaze not into the abyss and all that.
But if you're like me and you dipped your toes into this run expecting the sort of plotting and payoff that we saw in his Fantastic Four and Avengers runs, you're out of luck there! Every time Hickman starts a new plot thread, he finishes it up himself a few issues later. The upside of this is that HoX/PoX, this omnibus and maybe Inferno make for a pretty tight X-Men story. I guess my problem is that it didn't quite meet my expectations, and idk, is that Hickman's fault? Of course, all this is complicated by the fact that the X-Men team was beheaded too early, so maybe Hickman did have a plan for all this.
All this stuff aside though, it's Jonathan Hickman. His writing isn't for everybody, but if it is for you, there's more than enough to like about his run on the title. The story is backed by some jaw dropping visuals, for which this omnibus is perfect!
Now, I do wanna talk about the omnibus in particular, because I have a few problems with what Marvel has done here. I'll start with something that I thought was kinda funny - Marvel has left out the X-Men issues that were part of X of Swords, so this book will jump from issue #12 to #17. What makes this hilarious is that the story does not skip a beat, and the characters even imply that the events of X of Swords didn't matter to the cast of this series.
Less funny is the exclusion of Hickman's issues of New Mutants, which I had to go out of my way to read. A lot of this book deals with the Krakoan X-Men's interactions with their old buddies at the Shi'ar Empire, not to mention the Empyre tie-ins. That storyline is established in New Mutants, and the simple summary in here isn't enough to cover it.
The most egregious one of all, though, is the exclusion of the X-Force issue in which someone tries - and succeeds - in assassinating Xavier. I know that wasn't written by Jonathan Hickman, but it does come up in this series, and early on at that! I was pretty floored when Xavier called out humans for attempting to kill him, and I started flipping back to see if I'd somehow missed this.
While we're at it, why not throw in Planet-Size X-Men too? It was one issue!
Overall, like I said before, you can pick up HoX/PoX, the X-Men omnibus and Inferno and have a pretty good story going. I did check into the other comics in this line, and I wasn't impressed with either of them. The story isn't as interconnected across the books as I thought it'd be - even skipping the Xavier assassination issue of X-Force isn't really much of a loss. As much as I've complained about the things that were missing from this omnibus, it's priced quite reasonably, so why not?
Just check your expectations as you go in.
House and Powers of X was bold relaunch of the X-Men line that came bearing all of the crazy ideas that you'd expect from Jonathan Hickman. With that out of the way, you could only wonder what his run on the line's flagship title would be like, and...it's no HoX/PoX, let me tell you.
Hickman's tenure on the X-Men book, collected almost in its entirety in this omnibus (we'll talk about that later), reads more like an X-Men TV show. Each issue or pair of issues tells a different, self-contained story about the various going-ons in the Krakoan Age of the mutants. This stuff is great for worldbuilding, and I'd be lying if I said I wasn't totally absorbed by this book whenever I picked it up.
I like that Krakoa isn't just a mutant paradise - that'd be boring! This is a setup that's built on bloody and shady foundations, and the mutants now have these weird practices that are very cultish. Every single mutant is totally onboard with what's happening on Krakoa, so the reader is left to figure out for themselves if this is all really okay. Particularly, when the mutants talk about themselves and their relation to the humans, they come dangerously close to being prejudiced against humans themselves - gaze not into the abyss and all that.
But if you're like me and you dipped your toes into this run expecting the sort of plotting and payoff that we saw in his Fantastic Four and Avengers runs, you're out of luck there! Every time Hickman starts a new plot thread, he finishes it up himself a few issues later. The upside of this is that HoX/PoX, this omnibus and maybe Inferno make for a pretty tight X-Men story. I guess my problem is that it didn't quite meet my expectations, and idk, is that Hickman's fault? Of course, all this is complicated by the fact that the X-Men team was beheaded too early, so maybe Hickman did have a plan for all this.
All this stuff aside though, it's Jonathan Hickman. His writing isn't for everybody, but if it is for you, there's more than enough to like about his run on the title. The story is backed by some jaw dropping visuals, for which this omnibus is perfect!
Now, I do wanna talk about the omnibus in particular, because I have a few problems with what Marvel has done here. I'll start with something that I thought was kinda funny - Marvel has left out the X-Men issues that were part of X of Swords, so this book will jump from issue #12 to #17. What makes this hilarious is that the story does not skip a beat, and the characters even imply that the events of X of Swords didn't matter to the cast of this series.
Less funny is the exclusion of Hickman's issues of New Mutants, which I had to go out of my way to read. A lot of this book deals with the Krakoan X-Men's interactions with their old buddies at the Shi'ar Empire, not to mention the Empyre tie-ins. That storyline is established in New Mutants, and the simple summary in here isn't enough to cover it.
The most egregious one of all, though, is the exclusion of the X-Force issue in which someone tries - and succeeds - in assassinating Xavier. I know that wasn't written by Jonathan Hickman, but it does come up in this series, and early on at that! I was pretty floored when Xavier called out humans for attempting to kill him, and I started flipping back to see if I'd somehow missed this.
While we're at it, why not throw in Planet-Size X-Men too? It was one issue!
Overall, like I said before, you can pick up HoX/PoX, the X-Men omnibus and Inferno and have a pretty good story going. I did check into the other comics in this line, and I wasn't impressed with either of them. The story isn't as interconnected across the books as I thought it'd be - even skipping the Xavier assassination issue of X-Force isn't really much of a loss. As much as I've complained about the things that were missing from this omnibus, it's priced quite reasonably, so why not?
Just check your expectations as you go in.
adventurous
challenging
dark
funny
hopeful
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
fast-paced
Top tier comic writing. Hickman belongs among the greats; Moore, Grant Morris, Kirby and Lee, Geoff Johns. He's that good, and I will read anything Hickman does going forward. He understands characters, these characters, like few ever have. The way he writes Magneto alone? Favorite. Of all time.
adventurous
challenging
funny
hopeful
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
adventurous
fast-paced
adventurous
inspiring
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Hickman is so far my favorite comic writer and he has done the best thing to the X-men since Morrison took over for 50 issues. Each issue whether an arc or just a little one off adventure was perfect. My favorite story especially though was the Children of the Vault one. Darwin, Wolverine, and Synch is a trio I never knew I needed and after reading Synch has become one of my favorites among the X-men characters. Hickman is a god at writing comic books and even at just 21 issues he has left me satisfied.
All of the giant-sized issues are great even if they don’t exactly serve as something of importance to the character in the title.
Overall X-men by Jonathan Hickman was amazing and I could not have asked for anything better to happen to my favorite superhero team.
All of the giant-sized issues are great even if they don’t exactly serve as something of importance to the character in the title.
Overall X-men by Jonathan Hickman was amazing and I could not have asked for anything better to happen to my favorite superhero team.