I just finished Essential X-Men Volume 10. I have been reading these volumes since getting the first one in the year 2000. Reading volume 2 in one weekend was one of the best reading experiences I ever had. After burning thru volume 3, the releases slowed down.
Volume 4 had the Brood saga and was great in general. Had to wait til 06 to read volume 5, which I think is one of the weaker volumes. Storm and Rogue took over the book. It was beginning to feel like "The Adventures of Storm: featuring Rogue and guest starring the X-Men".
There were some very good issues in this volume. Great use of Juggernaut and a great X-Men and Inner Circle team up against Nimrod:The Future Sentinel.
Volume 6 puts the series back on track. Everything is sharp and in focus. You get things like the X-Men in Asgard, which was a very cool setting.
This concludes with the Mutant Massacre, which was the very first X crossover. Since the first volume, X-Men went from a bi monthly book to three books. X-Men, X-Factor (The original team) and New Mutants (X-Men in training). Here the storylines never crossed into one another. Or the teams never interacted. It is a very tight storyline and feels organic. Not simply a cash grab. Big things happened here, Kitty and Nightcrawler are injured and leave the team.
We end up with my favorite version of the new team. Storm, Wolverine, Rogue, Havok, Colossus, Longshot, Psylocke and Dazzler
Volume 7 was the Fall of the Mutants. Where the X-Men "die" fighting a demon named The Adversary.
This was a very good story and set up the X-Men being in Australia. Which is an era I love.
Volume 8 deals with Inferno. Which to me feels like the ultimate bang zoom finale of the book. So many long running threads come to an end here. X-Factor finally meets the new X-Men and end up having a big ole fight. The X-Men have been manipulated by Cyclops ex wife into thinking X-Factor are mutant hunters.
Also she is an elder demon called "The Goblin Queen" now.
I really liked how it brought all the anger and tension to the surface. Building on real resentments the characters had.
This was the best the trio of X books ever get at working as a single unit. They brought in all these disparate elements and made it work, all while seeming seamless.
Volume 9 of X-Men was the X-Men getting back to "normal". No big crossover here, but some generally good stories. The cyborg Reavers were pushed up to big bad status. Claremont is always good at bringing up master villains and not allowing them to wear out their welcome.
The Reavers launch their big attack and the X-Men are losing badly. Psylocke decides to use the Siege Perilous. This mystic portal given to the team by Roma, after they killed the Adversary.
Most of them go thru and end up different. There is a great three parter set in China where Psylocke has been turned into a ninja assassin. This became a mess later, but for now is cool. This is probably my favorite Mandarin story ever. He came across as a villain on the level of Doom, Magneto and Loki.
Havok turned up in Genosha (more on that later) with amnesia. End of this volume we run into Storm who has been turned into a kid. We will not find out what happened til volume 10.
10 is mostly okay. At this point it feels like a long running series, that has ran two seasons too long, but has gathered a second wind for the finale.
We get caught up with kid Storm and are introduced to Gambit. Her reunion with the team does not transition very smoothly.
I think the book has come under the influence of Jim Lee and I don't think he has contributed much creatively. A lot of it feels unfocused.
I think probably the high point to this volume is the annual crossover "Days of Future Present". Franklin Richards from the Sentinels timeline shows up in the present. Trying to alter things to fit his memories. I thought it had some good character moments and firmly connected the X-Men to the greater Marvel Universe.
The main event here is the X-Tinction Agenda. Back in volume 8, the country of Genosha was introduced. In the 80s, Apartheid was a hot button issue and there were a few ham fisted attempts to write about it in super hero comics. The problem was no matter what you do, you ruin the fantasy. The heroes end Apartheid and it does not feel true to life. Or the hero fails and it fractures the fantasy.
Genosha was a very good work around. It is a fully fictional country that treats mutants as slaves. The X-Men are free to fuck things up, without real world concerns. The X-Men save the day but Genosha still exist as a future threat.
X-Tinction Agenda really hinges on whether you can buy Cameron Hodge as a big bad. I liked Hodge as a slimeball friend of Warren Worthington in X-Factor. Trying to steal his fortune, and heading a anti mutant organization.
But once he was defeated, that should have been the end of him. Instead he came back in Inferno, where he was granted immortality by an elder god. Until Archangel decapitated him.
But turns out being immortal, his head is still alive. He had his group make him a cyborg body. Which I just wonder how he made that phone call. Ordering a cyborg body for his decapitated demon head. If it were Dr.Doom or Magneto, you don't bat an eye. But Hodge always seemed more street level.
Somehow he meets up with Genosha's old hag of a president. I thought she was Regan in drag. They kidnap four of the New Mutants and put them on trial. Warlock ends up dying. Or as close to death as a computer program alien can get.
The writing was fine for X-Tinction Agenda. But the seams are showing and this crossover felt like a chore. I never felt like Hodge was a true threat. His cyborg body seemed to pull out new powers as the story needed.
So suddenly he can phase thru walls, all the while cackling like Joker with none of the credibility. I grew frustrated waiting for him to get his ass kicked.
In the middle of this, Storm was aged back to an adult by the Genoshan Gengineer. Havok regains his memories. Rayne of the New Mutants is stuck in her wolf form.
This was an eight part story that should have been done in three.
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