Counter X - X-Force Part 3

"Rage War" (X-Force#110-113) - Ian Edginton/Jorge Lucas

Ian Edginton takes over as full writer from Warren Ellis with this penultimate storyline, and boy does the title move into some weird places. I will give Edginton props for actually trying to DO something here - some of the characters have some personality, an interesting story starts emerging, and there are efforts made to connect past stories to a larger conspiracy. It becomes such a convoluted mess by the end that I can't help but feel Edginton isn't playing a joke on readers. It's a hugely flawed story, but it's never uninteresting, and I'll give credit to Edginton for adding some depth to this title.

The story starts off with a somewhat simple premise - the Russian government is checking in on sleeper agents planted across the US during the Cold War. These agents had been testing upon to release secondary mutantagenic traits locked within them. In the intervening decades, they have had children, and the KGB is here to recall them. From this straightforward idea, the story spirals off - X-Force is recruited by Nick Fury to find the true person behind this, Niles Roman, who murdered Pete Wisdom. When the team finds him, Roman proceeds to delivers a long speech portraying himself as the victim of a vast conspiracy that ties into all of X-Force's recent cases. When a mysterious figure at an unidentified facility decides all involved have learned too much, a switch is flipped and a bomb goes off on our protagonists. The end.

I think it's the unexpected nature of this story that really got me. It starts off fairly simple, as the collection of the mutated children plays out with a touch of strangeness to it. It's the type of plot at home in this revamped title, and the cryptic scenes of spontaneous mutations and violent deaths work well. Jorge Lucas' artwork is much different in the first two chapters than the last two - he draws meticulous detail into the mutated humans, and also brings that detail to the settings - rooms and cityscapes look grimy and filthy. It's very effective, and his style drastically shifts in the final two chapters. There's also some effort made with the characters. Proudstar and Bedlam are ciphers as usual, but Sam and Tabitha get a decent scene to reflect on recent events and find comfort with each other. It hasn't felt like human characters have been in these stories, so these softer scenes are appreciated. And, to Edginton's credit, the story has a nice plot twist, when the team learn Valentina, Pete Wisdom's friend from the first arc, is closer to this conflict than they expected. These are hardly perfect comics, but the first two chapters have potential.

Things take a massive shift as the story continues. The mutated children story is essentially dropped. It's still there, but only as background for the team to find Niles Roman. There's extended nonsense about Proudstar being injured and needing a cure - time-wasting to get us through part 3, and it's noticeable time-wasting. And SHIELD shows up so that Nick Fury can set the team's sights on Niles Roman, the man who killed their leader. The final issue is in large part a bloated battle scene, with the team invading Roman's headquarters, and a number of silent, or nearly wordless, pages. It's not great stuff, but at least it's a quick read. As mentioned, Lucas' art takes a big swerve in the final two issues. He goes for a massive Kirby homage. Gone is much of the detail, replaced with very heavy lines, and faces, expressions, page layouts, action scenes, and body language cribbed right from Kirby. That said, it doesn't look bad. It certainly livens up some weak comics and it's endearing to see how faithful Lucas is in every panel to Kirby's style.

In the end, the team find Roman, who proceeds to explain that he is the victim of a massive conspiracy involving aliens, a piece of moon rock that landed on Earth (and seems to be connected to Domino's back problems from the previous story), and anti-mutant scientific experiments. The bio-engine from the first story is connected to the KGB experiments from this story. Roman also explains how various governments have sought his death for thirty years, resulting in him hiding out. In the end, an unseen female decides all involved have heard too much and Valentina, revealed to be a robot, explodes, seemingly killing them all. I can't help but feel Edginton is playing a joke here - riffing on the 'evil villain reveals his plans in a speech' idea or even the notion that everything has to come together and fit into a nice whole. The speech Roman delivers is equal parts preposterous and well-planned out. It does provide a nice coherent narrative, but also goes off the deep end into complete madness. It's endearing to think such a wider-reaching conspiracy is playing out in this little, ignored book. Hey, if the readers don't find this book important, at least the writer should.

If somewhere were to write off the end of this troubled little story as completely stupid and insulting to the audience, I wouldn't blame them. I can't help but enjoy that Edginton tried something here, though. This book was lifeless in its first two arcs, and there is an energy and unique quality to this story, despite its faults and choppy focus. If Edginton had been allowed this free reign before, who knows what could have resulted. After this, the Counter X period of X-Force wraps up with a two-part story, and I'm actually interested in seeing what comes of that.

Counter X - X-Force Part 2

"Shockwave - Murder Ballads" (X-Force#106-109) - Warren Ellis (based on a story by), Ian Edginton (writer)/Whilce Portacio, Lan Medina, Ariel Olivetti, Enrique Breccia

For their second arc, each of the Counter X titles went back to explain how the Counter X status quo came to be, in four-part stories dubbed "Shockwave." Instead of doing on a full-on flashback, X-Force juxtaposes the flashback scenes with a present-day story in which the team reunites with Domino in the wake of Pete Wisdom's death and helps her combat a murderous pursuer. It's safe to say neither story sets the world on fire. There's definitely an effort to create a group dynamic for the cast, as well as attempts at starting ongoing mysteries, but uninspired plotting and action scenes, fairly lifeless characters, haphazard plot elements, and general malaise prevent this story from being any good.

As mentioned, the story follows two threads. In the past, Pete Wisdom recruits all willing members of X-Force to join him in combating wrongs perpetrated in the Black Ops community, and former team members depart in anger. He proceeds to teach the team new ways of accessing and expanding their powers, while indoctrinating them to his mission. In the present, the team mourn Wisdom's passing, and reunite with Domino, to help her combat Marcus Tsung, a mutant killer who is pursuing her, using 'virtual bullets' to kill his targets from afar. They also investigate an alien device implanted onto Domino's back, while Pete's sister Romany Wisdom hangs around the fringes of the story to hint at her brother's less than heroic past.

The flashback material is really thin here - to the point where, in the final issue, it gets all of one page. Unlike, say, Generation X, which devoted the full four Shockwave issues to flashbacks, this title intersperses a small number of flashback scenes with the Domino story. The only reason I can see for this is that there isn't much of a story to tell for X-Force. Outside of the old team splitting up, it's ground that we all covered in the previous story (in terms of Wisdom’s mission and the powers stuff). The break-up of the previous team is really contrived stuff. Domino and Moonstar have such an adverse reaction to Wisdom taking over and using the team for a bigger purpose, but it doesn't make much sense. Neither of them offer an alternative, and they agree that the team needs a purpose. So Edginton tries to create tension but having everyone yell a lot. Beyond this, the other scenes are fine. There is a nice idea behind expanding the team powers - the last story before Counter X saw the High Evolutionary wipe out the mutant gene. When it was returned, each mutant now had complete access to their full potential, hence, hence things like Proudstar flying. Beyond this, the flashback scenes are thin. The characterization doesn't really work in the break-up scene, and, beyond that, the team kind of just listens to Wisdom talk and shouts about their powers.

So it falls on the present-day scenes to carry the story. It's fairly uninspired on that front. The gist of that story is that Marcus Tsung is trying to kill Domino. Seems simple enough, but Edginton can't seem to decide what he wants the story to be about - is it about Tsung cutting a swath of destruction across America as he looks for her? There are a few simple scenes showing his cold bloodshed, and they are actually good. Unfortunately, the story is cluttered with a bunch of unnecessary crap - extended nonsense about a living alien device growing in Domino's back, the introduction of three Black Ops types to help determine what's going on with the device (all pointless characters, very quickly killed off), and the machinations of Romany Wisdom and her crew, who pop up when necessary. The problem is that the Tsung story doesn't have anything to it. Edginton tries to pad it out with his backstory, but that gets convoluted when we learn Domino has already encountered him and it resulted in this thing growing out of her back. Huh? That just seems to come out of nowhere, and I don't understand why she didn’t tell the team right away. Any intrigue surrounding Tsung’s character is ignored in the final issue, a big fight in the streets with helicopters and explosions. It looks dreadful, has no life to it, and removes any interest from this story. Tsung is also never given a proper motivation. He is killing all mercenaries hired for an old mission (of which Domino is one). Ok. For what reason? The final big fight doesn't even try to discuss that. By that point, we'd become so embroiled in the thing in Domino's back that it's possible Edginton hoped we forgot the villain had no motivation. I'm not even going to touch further on the crap with the three agents investigating Domino's back - what a pointless, waste of time.

The Romany Wisdom scenes are really the only ones of note. Her changing appearance (which I initially figured must have been an art error - I wouldn't put it past this book - until one of the characters mentions it), and general benevolence towards the team are interesting. We don't know where her loyalties lie, and that's potentially a good story here. She drops a bomb on the last page - that Pete himself used to perpetrate the same type of black ops crimes against mutants that he assembled this team to fight against. Yes, it's contrived, clunky, and presented to us as a big exposition dump on the final page - but it could potentially be an interesting story to pursue.

Unlike the first story, there was some effort at characterization here. Unfortunately, most of it is shrill and whiny. The bulk of it is built around the fact that the team went with Wisdom and not Domino, and now they've all got to work together. Most of it falls flat, because Edginton insists on having everyone gripe, bark, and shout at each other. Gone are the Cannonball and Proudstar of old, two sensitive, intelligent young men, or the energy and fun of Meltdown. They're all replaced by whiny kids who yell at each other, when Edginton even bothers to give them dialogue. There is also a lot of talk about how this group are the outsiders, marginalized by the rest of the mutant community. It's all talk, to make this an 'edgy' title, from what I can see. This group is deliberately cut off from the rest of the mutant world because the Counter X titles deliberately did that, not because of anything happening in the story. (Also, I have to mention the high rise tower the team now resides in ... actually, the less said about this twist the better).

It doesn't help the art is a haphazard mess - two issues co-drawn by Portacio and Lan Medina, one by Olivetti, and the final by Breccia. Olivetti actually does a great job, for the most part. His angular, expressive style is more in keeping with the tone of the book than Portacio's art has ever been. He makes use of open space nicely, as well. Medina's clean style does the job on his flashback scenes. The other two are terrible - Portacio has one good scene (when Tsung invades a birthday party and kills everyone). The rest is rushed and ugly. Breccia is perhaps the worst offender. His closing issue, the big fight scene, falls completely flat, with stiff figures, cramped settings, and ugly characters. The big fight was already a cop out from a story point of view, and the art certainly doesn't help it. The whole story feels rushed and ugly as a result of the changing art.

So, another story down for Counter X X-Force and nothing's changed. The plotting is completely uninspired, the characters are miserable to read about, and, with Ellis' influence diminishing, Edginton takes the story in completely unnecessary directions. With the rotating art teams, it makes the book feel like a rushed product, running to keep up.

Counter X - X-Force Part 1

"Games Without Frontiers" (X-Force#102-105) - Warren Ellis, Ian Edginton/Whilce Portacio

Counter X was a last ditch effort to salvage three flagging X-spinoffs in 2000 - X-Force, Generation X, and X-Man. Warren Ellis was pegged as sort of a plotmaster who redefined the concepts behind the three series, leaving the scripting to other individuals (who eventually took over as full writers). This launched in March of 2000, the same month of Chris Claremont's ill-fated return to X-Men and Uncanny X-Men, an event branded "Revolution." All in all, it was a pretty dire time for the mutant books. Outside of Fabian Nicieza's strong work on Gambit, a stellar arc on Wolverine by Steve Skroce, and a well-received run on Cable by Robert Weinberg, Revolution was basically panned. A blight on the X-franchise that required a further creative reshuffle in May 2001.

A few years back, Marvel released the first eight issues of each Counter X title in a series of trades (each book went on to have one further story before concluding). I thought it was an odd decision given their legacy. They’re not seen as Warren Ellis' strongest work. They really struggled to come into their own and do anything interesting with their redefined concepts. The art was of wildly varying quality. Still, I took it as an opportunity to finally read these stories. Prior to this, my collection of these issues was pretty spotty.

So I'm starting off with the first story in the Counter X: X-Force trade. Ellis plots, with a script by Ian Edginton and art by Whilce Portacio. It's worth noting that the second arc of each Counter X title was devoted to filling in the gap as to how the characters changed - the first arc threw us into a new status quo, hinting at what had changed. I had been a fan of X-Force prior to this and thought John Francis Moore did a great job on the book. This new status quo was a complete re-imagining of his approach - it wasn't bright and fun, it didn't have warm, considered characterization, and it was almost deliberately alienating. So how does X-Force's first story hold up?

Well, it wasn't awful, which is what I was expecting. Its heart is actually in the right place, in terms of the new concept. Part of the problem is that you can see where Ellis' concept stops and Edginton's weak attempt to do anything with it starts. Choppy characterization and plotting, weak art, and a fairly bland story are the other problems. Still, some of the ideas here aren't bad.

The story involves a streamlined X-Force roster (Cannonball, Jesse Bedlam, Meltdown, and Proudstar), now led by Warren Ellis creation Pete Wisdom, acting as a covert mutant squad who police scientific groups that have perpetrated crimes against humanity. In this story, Wisdom leads them to dismantle a bioreactor buried beneath San Fransisco that activates the mutant gene in latent mutants, causing their powers to emerge violently as they mutate physically. The reactor is leftover from a decommissioned project called Cuckoo from the 1950s. Meanwhile, as the team do this, Wisdom himself is pursued by a mysterious man, who may be the mutated remnants of Cuckoo's creator, Dr. Niles Roman.

It's a fairly standard story, from the sci-fi tropes at its core to its execution. I do like the high concept Ellis brings to the book. It's not that innovative or unique, but this book needed a concept. Since Age of Apocalypse, the book has been fairly directionless. An often great portrayal of a group of young mutants? Yes, but one without a core concept in sight. I like the idea of paring down the roster and giving them a purpose. The idea that Wisdom has made them test their powers in new ways is also good. The problem is that the cast don't connect to this premise - Pete Wisdom knows everything about the case and the team just listen to his stories and follow his orders. They don't seem particularly motivated to right the wrongs of underground scientific activity. Ellis builds on a tradition that includes Black Air from his run on Excalibur and the Captain Britain Warpies story. That stuff all gets lips service here. The problem is that those stories play into the lengthy Marvel UK traditional and history, and Sam, Jesse, Tabitha, and James have nothing to do with that.

The other problem is that the story presented here is pretty basic stuff. To the creative team's credit, they pull off some wordless scenes, where powers erupt out of people in San Fransisco, which are pretty good. But the story doesn't go anywhere. The final issue is a big fight scene in San Fran that is kind of dreadful in spots - full of the team using their powers in new ways and congratulating each other, as the background visuals get sparser. And there's a weird plot problem here - Wisdom says mutants can't deactivate the bioreactor because going near it will cause their powers to go out of control. Then X-Force go off to deactivate it. Ok. The story also has an utterly bizarre ending. The mysterious man pursuing Wisdom finds him, kills him off panel, and then the team abruptly discover his body in the final panel. It's choppy, arbitrary, and not pulled off effectively. There's no effect from it - it happens and there's no chance to react. So this book, which has no unique qualities outside of the Pete Wisdom character, just lost that character?

At the same time, I think Pete Wisdom is kind of the problem here. Ellis has been allowed to bring in the prototype Ellis character – the chain-smoking, wise-cracking, cynical trouble-maker with a hardened worldview. Hell, Ellis created Wisdom when he was writing Excalibur! That’s all good, but Wisdom completely overshadows the rest of the cast. He has some amusing lines, but it’s almost as if the writing team go out of their way to marginalize the rest of the team. In the first issue, the most they do is exhibit new uses of their powers. Proudstar doesn’t even speak. This continues in the rest of the story, with nary a shred of personality shown by the four X-Force members. Besides a single scene where Sam and Tabitha argue about Sam handing leadership over to Wisdom, the four characters are complete ciphers here.

It feels deliberate. We’re being alienated from the characters we’re comfortable with and thrown into a world where Pete Wisdom has all the answers, gives all the speeches, and sets all the priorities. The old cast do no more then marvel over their powers and gripe at each other. It makes the book feel unwelcoming and unpleasant, and not in an effective way. It’s not like the villain or black ops squad concept is so strongly conveyed that this doesn’t matter. It makes for a hollow product.

Whilce Portacio is a polarizing artist, but I tend to like his work when he is really on. The true energy of his work back in the day is no longer there, but there are some strong set pieces and character expressions. Unfortunately, the rest is pretty weak, with choppy storytelling and dropped backgrounds. I don’t know if he’s the artist for this type of story. His depiction of the battle scenes and underground stuff is so bland that he doesn’t sell it as a strong new direction for the book.

And, at least in this opening story, this Counter X revamp kind of flunks. The concept has legs, but Edginton doesn’t take it anywhere. His attempts to mimic Ellis poking fun at superhero comics (Wisdom constantly calling the team “My X-Men!”) fall flat, and he brings no life to the cast or their mission. Each issue opens with a splash of the team horsing around like kids. Fine, but why didn’t we see any of that in the issues? All we got were four ciphers who stood around waiting to hear Wisdom’s stories and instructions. With Wisdom dead, where exactly can things go from here?

X-Force and John Francis Moore, part 2

I'm moving on in my reread of John Francis Moore's run on X-Force. Artist Adam Pollina leaves the book with #81, after which Moore shifts from his non-conventional roadtrip storyline to a much more traditional superhero book, albeit one with a strong focus on the characters and some fairly detailed plotting.

This period covers X-Force#82-100. I seem to remember the momentum trailing off . Well, I'm halfway through it, and if anything things are only heating up. When Adam Pollina leaves the book, the team moves into a warehouse in San Fransisco. From there, Moore's core five characters (Warpath, Meltdown, Siryn, Moonstar, and Sunspot) are joined by returning characters Domino and Cannonball and new character Jesse Aaronson. Except he's not entirely new. He and his brother Chistopher appeared as the Bedlam brothers in Age of Apocalypse. More than 3 years later, Moore revives the character in the main Marvel Universe, taking this blank slate and running with it.

There are two main story threads running through the first half of this period. In one, Jesse struggles to learn about his past and missing brother, a mystery which nicely winds its way through the other stories and comes to a head in some marvellously ominous and suspenseful issues. #87, where brother Christopher's plans begin to fall into place, is the strongest of this very strong group of issues. The other story thread is an odd one - Moore has dredged up Marvel's Deviants characters and decided an X-Men spinoff was the place for them. I don't think I'm off-base in saying no one has ever found these characters interesting. But I'll give Moore credit for weaving them neatly into his stories - they are connected to the woman who sought revenge on Domino during Operation: Zero Tolerance, they were behind the town that performed genetic experiments on its children, and their influence pervades a number of other areas. I'm cautiously optimistic because their story is just fine right now.

The character work is where Moore's real strength lies. I mentioned in my last entry that the roadtrip issues really felt like disillusioned youths running off to find their own place in the world. Things aren't quite so amibitious here - it's pure soap operatic character drama, but Moore excels at it. And just because it's soapy, it doesn't have to mean the characters don't feel real. Bobby and Tabitha's relationship is quickly burning out; Sam is struggling with his best friend and ex-girlfriend being together; James continues to grow and mature in the wake of discovering what happened to his family; Danielle is struggling with unusual new powers. It's also a lot of fun to have Domino back, without Cable around, She treats these kids as equals in a way Cable didn't and Moore writes her well. Jesse swoops in from nowhere to take a pretty large spotlight. He's hesitant and unsure of himself, and not particularly liked by the group. His journey has been enjoyable to read.

Jim Cheung took over as artist from Pollina with #82. It's not a jarring shift, even though their style's are polar opposites, because, like Pollina, Cheung brings his own unique look to the book. It's a book that has had a strong visual identity since Pollina first started on it, and it needs an artist unafraid to bring that approach. Cheung's style is more conventional in nature, but his characters have a very unique look, and the energy he brings to the pages in incredibly strong. I'm a big fan of his style. The one area where things don't work visually is the costumes. The yellow and purple outfits looked dumb when they were introduced in 1995, and have definitely outlived their welcome by late 1998. Pollina really started using them less as the team wandered around the US, and rightfully so. There was no need for those stories to have a traditional superhero look. With Moore taking the book back in that direction, the costumes return, and are starting to look a bit dumb. Really, all of these stories could be told without the costumes.

Moore has taken this title back to a more traditional route, and I can't help but be slightly disappointed after the roadtrip year. Still, stellar character work and layered plotting and story progression shine through in every issue. If you haven't read Moore's X-Force and are under the impression there's no worthwhile X-books from the 90s, it really deserves a look.

X-Force and the Burning Man festival

I've been rereading John Francis Moore's run on X-Force lately. That might bring out snickering from the crowd, but it's quite good stuff. It's just got a couple comic stigmas against it - 1990s X-book, it was started by Rob Liefeld. Moore picked up the baton from a truly bland run by Jeph Loeb (who in turn picked it up from Fabian Nicieza, who had been doing some good work on the book) and ran with it.

The above cover is from #75, a true favourite comic of mine. At this point, Moore had pared down the team to five (Sunspot, Warpath, Siryn, Meltdown, and Danielle Moonstar) and had them turn their backs on Xavier and Cable, going on the road with no money to their name. This is a beloved era for fans. The X-books have always been steeped in youth, but how often hadthose youths legitimately rebelled against their elders? Yes, Kitty called Professor X a "jerk" (sidebar: Uncanny 168, what a great comic) and the New Mutants went off a couple times when Xavier said "no." But this X-Force represented a different opportunity. These characters weren't the youthful teens of earlier mutant books, but characters in their later teens/early 20s, who had all been around Xavier's school and dream long enough that they were a little bored and jaded with it. Moore had them go off and try to build something for themselves.

The art for this run was from series mainstay Adam Pollina. I don't think Marvel ever recovered from losing this guy. His characters alternated between lithe and attractive and bizarrely ugly, but they wore it well. His females almost always bared their midriffs, and Pollina was so relentless with this look that he made you believe that this is the only possible style of top, and any woman who didn't wear it is impossibly out of style. His page layouts dazzled, his body language was sublime, and his art style was uniquely his own.

The entire road trip story, which ran for almost a year, is great fun, but #75 is a true gem. Moore has the team stop at the Burning Man festival, where a boatload of stuff happens. There's a fight with Selene and an animated Burning Man and guest appearances from Karma, Cannonball, and Cable, but, like all of Moore's run, it was all about balance. The focus remained squarely on the characters and advancing their story arcs. So while this issue is a wild trip through the festival, there is always space for James to reflect on his family's death and be comforted by Dani, Dani to question her place in the team, and Tabitha and Bobby feel a growing attraction to each other. Moore expertly brought this balance to his entire run, including the Operation: Zero Tolerance crossover issues, where ongoing plots and character arcs never stopped for the sake of the crossover.

John Francis Moore's run on X-Force is highly recommended stuff, with the highlight being these road trip issues (#71-81). At a time when the main X-books were floundering, he brought believable character growth, well-structured long-term plotting, and fun to a book that had always been perceived as a joke, because of its roots.