Page 45 Review by Stephen
Exceptionally eloquent and comprehensively thought-through elevation of the mutant legacy.
For the very first time the X-Men have a geopolitical power base and a global economy of their own. The latter derives firmly from the former, thereby securing its stature, and indeed future.
Didn't you ever wonder how ridiculous it was that Charles Xavier could somehow sustain a Westchester mansion housing, feeding, clothing and presumably funding several dozen Playstations for nearly one hundred mutants...? For decades...? Let alone defend it!
All of this - all of it - is secured by their new base of operations and its "produce". As if that weren't clever enough, Hickman hasn't even had to invent their home - it's an established part of mutant lore - but he has extrapolated infinitely more potential from its nature than any writer has been imagined before.
Plus, mutants now have a language of their own for, without language, how can they hope to have a culture?
With all this now laid as bedrock, Professor Charles Xavier approaches the global stage with a positive, pro-active, worldwide agenda. He has economically enticing gifts - many revolutionarily beneficial for human health - to offer countries which would revoke their former genocidal hostility towards mutantkind, and engage openly, honestly and commercially instead with his new nation state.
Professor Xavier also has sanctions.
This is the most astute and entertaining X-MEN run ever, easily equalling Claremont & Byrne's tenure on UNCANNY X-MEN, Morrison's NEW X-MEN, then Whedon and Cassady's ASTONISHING X-MEN.
Artist Pepe Larraz was a revelation, too. Svelte! His gesticulations are graceful, arms acting expressively when a face is concealed.
From the writer and designer of BLACK MONDAY MURDERS, THE NIGHT NEWS, THE MANHATTAN PROJECTS, EAST OF WEST, SECRET,as well as his fabulous new series, DECORUM #1.
It's also from the writer and designer of the definitive FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 1 and FANTASTIC FOUR VOL 2, equally recommended and reviewed at greater length, this whopping edition collects HOUSE OF X #1-6 and POWERS OF X #1-6, and leads straight into X-MEN #1 which launches the new slyly composed and attitude-ridden series by Jonathan Hickman and Leinil Francis Yu. At the time of typing, we've a complete run in stock.
This is twelve chapters long, I would remind you, and only the beginning...
