Legion

This Week In X: All-New Wolverine, Legion, & X-Men Blue

March 2, 2018 by krisis

It’s the ninth week of new comics in 2018, and This Week in X we have an unusually light week of X-Men. There are just three new titles and three collections to cover, although one of those collections is a really big deal to me!

All-New Wolverine (2016) #31 is a fun-filled one-off team-up of Honey Badger and Deadpool.
Legion (2018) #2 is a comic book that does not star Legion nor appeal to his fans from any medium.
X-Men: Blue (2017) #22 finds some character moments in this symbiote space saga, but skimps on details.

Learn more about how each of those series reached their current issues and hear which ones I’d recommend picking up. Plus, learn what new X-collections are out this week, including Legion – Son of X, New Mutants, and Weapon X!

The Pull List: Avengers: No Surrender, Backways, Detective Comics, Maestros, Marvel 2-in-One, & more!

January 26, 2018 by krisis

The Pull List has grown a lot longer this week – 17 issues in all!

That’s due to catching up with another Marvel book (Thanos), several new indie #1s, and a few Image books I’ve read to the present in the past few weeks. Also, starting this week I’m running very short reviews of the X-Men books covered in This Week in X here, so that you can catch up on all the week’s new titles in one place!

Here’s what’s on my Pull List:

Abbott (2018) #1
Avengers (2017) #677
Backways (2017) #2
Detective Comics (1937/2016) #973
Dissonance (2018) #1
Doomsday Clock (2017) #3
Gasolina (2017) #5
Legion (2018) #1
Maestros (2017) #4
Marvel 2-in-One (2018) #2
Phoenix Resurrection (2018) #4
Raven: Daughter of Darkness (2018) #1
Thanos (2016) #15
Vinegar Teeth (2018) #1
Wonder Woman (2016) #39
X-Men: Blue (2017) #20
X-Men: Blue (2017) Annual 1

I hope these capsule reviews can help you decided what series you should add to your own pull list, or at least catch up with once they hit collected editions! And, remember, this feature is still new and evolving, so your comments and suggestions count a lot! [Read more…] about The Pull List: Avengers: No Surrender, Backways, Detective Comics, Maestros, Marvel 2-in-One, & more!

This Week in X: Legion #1, Phoenix Resurrection #4, and X-Men Blue #20 & Annual 1

January 26, 2018 by krisis

It’s the fourth week of new comics in 2018, and it brings a bumpy week of four X-Men titles that are all kind of average.

We have the debut of Peter Milligan’s Legion #1, the penultimate chapter of Matthew Rosenberg’s Phoenix Resurrection #4, Cullen Bunn wrapping up a major arc on X-Men: Blue #20, plus the kickoff of a new crossover with Venom in Bunn’s X-Men: Blue Annual 1.

As much as I abundantly loathe the time-displaced original X-Men, I couldn’t help but be thoroughly impressed with how Bunn reinserts some urgency and mystery into their title just as it his the 80-issue mark.

X-Men Legacy – Definitive Collecting Guide and Reading Order

The definitive issue-by-issue comic book collecting guide and trade reading order for X-Men Legacy comic books in omnibus, hardcover, and trade paperback collections – including runs by Mike Carey, Christos Gage, and Simon Spurrier. Part of Crushing Krisis’s Crushing Comics. Last updated December 2024 with titles scheduled for release through June 2025.

X-Men Legacy (2008 / 2013) #300 Textless X-Men Legacy is a title that covered a pair of X-Men volumes published from 2008 to 2014. Both volumes shared a theme of diving deeply into the continuity of a single lead character – first Professor Xavier, then Rogue, and finally Legion in the second volume.

The first volume of X-Men Legacy emerged from the “Messiah Complex” crossover. At the close of the event, the traditional co-flagship book of “adjectiveless” X-Men (1991) was renamed to “Legacy” and dropped its cast to focus solely on Professor Xavier in the wake of the event.

Initially the relaunched series was partially driven by the flashbacks of Xavier’s fractured psyche, which comprised half of each issue. In an intriguing turn of storytelling, the flashbacks – which called back to specific moments in classic X-Men issues – were illustrated by different artists than the present day sequences.

This mined a lot of deep X-Men history and reconciled it with the present day. That was especially useful, given Wolverine had recently regained his full memories and Cyclops was currently in Xavier’s place as the leader of the X-Men.

Starting with issue #219, the focus moved to Rogue as a primary protagonist. Fresh from enduring considerable physical and psychic strain leading up to “Messiah Complex,” Rogue underwent a major transformation at the top of the run – she gained control of her absorption powers.

With the curse of her powers finally lifted, this version of Rogue felt as though she had the most agency and development in her 40-year history – even though we had seen Rogue lead several X-Men teams over the previous 20 years! The next 50+ issues of X-Men Legacy cast her as a rebel, a mentor, and a leader while continuing to tie up long-hanging threads of continuity.

In 2012’s Marvel Now, Legacy relaunched with Professor Xavier’s son Legion as the improbable lead character. The tidy, 24-issue run spent as much time in his mind as it did on real world adventures. Both settings were soaked through with X-Men lore and British cheekiness, courtesy of series writer Simon Spurrier.

Fun fact: Nightcrawler, Vol. 4 by Chris Claremont was originally intended to be X-Men Legacy, Vol. 3! At the last moment, editorial decided that the market had X-title fatigue and that solo series were more in vogue, thus the name change.