What Will the NEXT Era of the X-Men Be?

All this discussion about the X-Men canon really begs this question - Just which of the X books out right now really has the potential to be similarly canonized? Which one will people look back on fondly and think "I fucking loved that run!" instead of regarding it as another bland series of status quo changes and battles?

The most obvious choice would be the current run of ASTONISHING X-MEN under the helm of the new creative team, Warren Ellis and Simone Bianchii.


Before I begin, let me just say that Marvel's conception of ASTONISHING X-MEN is genius. And I'm not just talking about Joss Whedon's run.

Somewhere along the line, somebody at Marvel got the bright idea that all the best runs of the X-Men (ie: the three runs I mentioned) combined the best creative talent in the industry with some editorial leeway and permission to tell stand-alone stories that don't have to mingle with company-wide crossovers.

So when ASTONISHING X-MEN was created under this premise for Whedon and Cassaday, the idea behind the book was that they were just going to be the first creative team operating under these conditions, not the only team.

This was a big solace in the years preceding the close to the Whedon run on the book. Many fans like myself were paranoid we'd have to back to reading mediocre runs on books like UNCANNY X-MEN. Seriously, if even writers like Ed Brubaker (writer of SLEEPER, CRIMINAL, and now the two-time Eisner winner for BEST WRITER) can't make the book interesting to read, then who can?

There was a lot of speculation as to who at Marvel would take over. Frankly, a lot of their star talent was either busy or not apt to take it.

Brian K. Vaughan would have been an excellent choice. Among all the comic book writers, he's possibly the most similar to Whedon in terms of writing style, and for that reason it's no surprise that he was hired to write for LOST. Unfortunatley, he's pretty well finished with comics, so he's off the table.

Mark Millar could have brought a really cool character focus along with big plots to the book, but he already had a lot on his plate with FANTASTIC FOUR and WOLVERINE. Guy hasn't been known to take on more than a couple of books at a time.

Bendis is the most obvious choice for just about any Marvel project. However, he was the most swamped of them all. To boot, he's never written team books very well, and his run on ULTIMATE X-MEN was no exception.

Brubaker was writing UNCANNY X-MEN. Would have been weird for him to jump right into writing ASTONISHING.

Jeph Loeb may have been a possibility in the discussion, but I'm of the opinion he should be kept away from the book by a large, poleax wielding Frankenstein monster. Loeb isn't a very good writer, and if people don't realize that from reading ULTIMATES 3, then, well, I just have no faith in people at all.

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Really, there just weren't many choices available. Marvel needed somebody critically acclaimed, somebody that could take the book in a bold direction and wasn't afraid to take on such a widely viewed title. So Marvel called the one writer that could make it happen.

Chuck Norris.

Except Marvel realized that past the irony value of the decision, it would have been a really bad idea. Plus, Norris insisted during the phone call that the book take a Christian direction. Thankfully, that was overruled.

So Marvel instead called up Warren Ellis, the critically acclaimed writer of PLANETARY, the gritty, noirish FELL, and the multiple Eisner winning, Patrick Stewart favorite TRANSMETROPOLITAN.

Personally, I think it's a real testament to Joe Quesada's shrewdness and amiability with creators that they have Warren Ellis working for them in any respect at all. He's not only one of the most irritable people on the planet, but he's also one of the most vocal critics of corporate comic publishers next to Alan Moore.

But at the same time, there was a real risk in this decision. Warren Ellis has been critical of major corporate comic publishers for a reason.

The guy despises superhero comics.

Wasn't raised with 'em, doesn't like 'em, doesn't want anything to do with 'em.

And go figure - during many of the times he's written superhero comics, his lack of passion for the subject matter has really shone through.

Don't get me wrong - some of Ellis's Marvel work was awesome. His Extremis storyline for Iron Man might be the single best Iron Man story I've read and I firmly believe it should be the basis of the third Iron Man movie. His run on ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR was simultaneously well paced, filled with interesting ideas, and had fun character quirks all at the same time and still stands as some of the best stories told in the Ultimate universe. And for as relentless and over the top as his run on THUNDERBOLTS was, the stories were were full of unexpected twists and turns and featured a team dynamic with such incendiary chemistry that it probably took every ounce of Ellis's restraint not to indulge the most rational course of action and just have the team members outright murder each other.

But still - a big weakness in Ellis's writing is that he can be just outright stale.

His miniseries ULTIMATE HUMAN (aka ULTIMATE IRON MAN VS HULK) - stale. Every issue fluctuated from being heady dialogue about mutations and technology, completely beridden of any character stuff like endearing dialogue or introspective moments, to large, quiet issue-length fight scenes, without revealing much thought as to pacing the two concepts.

His MINISTRY OF SPACE featured a cool, Philip K. Dick-esque alternate history reimagining of Britain if it had been the leader of the race to space and the moon. But alas, these really cool concepts were overshadowed by a sense of sterility that pervaded the book Character development and interactions were kept to a bare minimum, a need-to-know basis. Flashy events and images popped up on the pages, but I couldn't help but feel like "Yeah... so what?"

GLOBAL FREQUENCY, his 12 issue maxiseries about a global call-and-response organization, featured 12 stand alone stories with completely different characters and situations around the world, all having to do with responses made by the Global Frequency organization. Every issue seemed to fluctuate between being a big, John Woo-style fight scene, with fists flying and guns blazing but almost no story or dialogue, to dialogue-heavy big ideas with slow pace, little action, and stale character interactions.

These two highly polarized situations have one thing in common. They both lack an emotional climax. They leave me with the same response:

"So what?"

Actually, this kind of dichotomy would probably be fitting of many of Ellis's stories. It sort of reminds me of an old joke: "God gave man a brain and a penis and enough blood to only operate one at a time." Ellis's stories fluctuate from being completely cerebral, dialogue heavy, full of big sci-fi ideas, to being completely visceral, with fast action and intense fight scenes.

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So just how will his run on the book turn out?

Best case scenario is that it's like his ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR run. It's fast paced, has neat ideas but is balanced by fun character interactions and witty dialogue. It has the characters we all know and love behaving in the ways that made us fall in love with them in the first place, but thrown into new sci-fi territory that Chris Claremont was never smart enough to write. It's a slam dunk and everybody adores it.

Worst case scenario is that it's as sterile as a mule. The said characters we all know and love, yadda yadda, are all made by banal by haughty conversations and extensive dialogue about sci-fi concepts about the X-factor gene and other concepts that Ellis will dream up. We all collectively yawn and get nostalgic for the lightheartedness and fun of the Whedon era.

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We're three issues in (four counting the first issue of the Ghost Boxes miniseries), and sadly, the latter description is much more apt.

Very little has actually happened so far. A mysterious dead mutant body was discovered in the first issue, there's been discussion about this Ghost Box that allows people to travel between parallel worlds, and now the idea has been introduced that something is traveling between parallel worlds killing mutants.

But there has been no action, the dialogue has felt dense, the pacing slow. The only thing it's had in common with the Whedon run is the lateness in the release schedule.

Of course, it could just be that he's just taking his time positioning the pieces and that the rest of the run will turn out to be awesome, or dare I say, astonishing? Hell, Whedon's run wasn't even that good three issues in.

In the meantime, however, I would bet money that this won't turn out to be the 4th volume of our theoretical X-Men canon.

So what will the 4th volume/era be?

Maybe it won't even feature the top tier, most familiar characters.

Maybe it will be YOUNG X-MEN. A book that features newer mutants that are still discovering their powers not only makes for a fresher character dynamic, but it's also more true to the X-Men ethos. After all, if the mutant gene arises in teenhood and can happen to anybody, not just scientists experimenting with cosmic phenomena and radiation or subjects of military experiments, then we should probably see more stories about nobodies that turned into mutants that are novices with their mutant abilities and throw in some more teen angst for good measure, which is exactly what YOUNG X-MEN is in terms of formula.

But really, I have no idea.

I mean, who am I to comment? I said that the X-Men should most definitely NOT go to space, and all three runs that I described as landmark runs in the series ALL featured either the X-Men going into space or featured some cosmic elements.

So for all I know, all my speculation could be wrong.

And that "astonishing" joke I just made? Ugh... terrible.