Patrick on Joss Whedon: Joy, Art, and Realism

[Patrick sent me this as a guest blog. This is territory we cover every once and a while on this blog, but it is also one of my favorite topics, and also one that never really ends. So I thought I would print this, weigh in, and then see how interested everyone is in the comments.]

Recently on the CGS message WetRats had some interesting comments on the current direction of Marvel Comics.

I read the latest Daredevil today at lunch. It was incredibly well-written. But I'm dropping the book. I've come to the realization that nothing good is ever going to happen to Matt Murdoch. And I don't want to keep watching an endless series of horrible things happening to a character I care about. Upon thinking more about it, I realized that's the way I feel about the entire Marvel Universe. There's no heroes in Marvel anymore, only survivors. Nobody triumphs, they only win the latest fight. Nothing gets better for anybody. Nobody is happy. There is no joy in Marvel.

I must say that gave expression to a great deal of my thoughts and feelings toward Buffy post Season Six. The senseless whacking of Tara and Willow's subsequent descent into nerd-flaying marked the end of both the sense of the Scoobs as a family (you know, what the series WAS ABOUT), and the possiblity of any real sense of fun or joy in the series. After S6 all I see are endless series of horrible things happening to people I care deeply about, there are no heroes , no triumphs, nothing ever gets better, nobody is happy and there's no joy, either in the characters or the storytelling (and no I don't believe for a second Whedon ever intended to resurrect Tara).

I realize a lot of fans respond to this and that a lot the time this is how "real life" is.

Yet, I am kinda of the opinion that art or literature(especially escapist fiction like Buffy) is under NO obligation to reflect "real life" to that soul-killing extreme. If anything I believe one of the key purposes of art is illuminate and even REDEEM our bleak, crummy world totally absent of time travel and jet-powered apes.

The most recent issue of Season Eight has kinda confirmed this suspection. Whedon seems to have no interest in healing the divisions between Buffy and Willow and only wants to further the rift. I highly doubt they will even be friends anymore by the time issue 25 comes out.

I'm going to continue with the fandom for as long as I can, but I'm starting to think it would be less and less of a major loss to get off the bus at any point.

I could be entirely wrong about this. Opinions?

[Well, here is mine. "The senseless whacking of Tara and Willow's subsequent descent into nerd-flaying...". In order to talk about this, I have to separate these two things, because they are quite different, in my opinion, and take us to the heart of the issue.

Tara's senseless death was shocking, which was fully intentional: on a show that often focuses on heroes and heroic violence, often in a flip way, here comes something brutal and absurd. I thought Tara's death was one of the more amazing things about the Buffy run -- it showed a capacity for surprise six seasons in (not an easy thing to do); the emotional shock was real and powerful; because conflict is the essence of drama, as McKee puts so forcefully, there must be a cost for heroism, and this is a serious one; it offers an important counterpoint to Buffy's self sacrifice -- there is more to the story than people dying heroically to save others; it is a moving and necessary consequence of Willow's decision to play with black magic, regardless of how well intentioned -- we can't have her draining the blood from a deer to bring back Buffy and then nothing, everything is right with the world. For me this works, this is strong writing.

For many fans it was the wrong choice, but this judgement is muddied by the fact that the Buffy story, from this moment on, becomes badly told. Unlike Angel, who we really get to spend time with as a bad guy before his redemption, Whedon has hardly any time to establish Willow as evil, and redeem her -- the whole thing is rushed, and a mess. Also Wheon loves "Ally" as he calls her, and does not really have the desire to write her as evil, and it shows. By the time the deaths of the series finale come along more than a year later, Whedon's core "Scooby Gang" (Buffy, Willow, Xander, and Giles) will have become an awful smug and safe little clique, in no danger of real change (which, I counter, was what the show was really about); because someone has to die, it becomes everyone around them, characters that had more complex life to them, like Anya (the demon trying to fit into a world where she can never be fully redeemed) and Spike (the rapist who feels real love). Most fans will tell you that the end of season six and arguably all of season seven are bad, but it is because the story is being badly told, not because of the subject matter. And here come my point:

Shakespeare's King Lear -- a horrific vision of nihilism -- cannot be dismissed as a soul-killing picture of a bleak, crummy world totally absent of time travel and jet-powered apes. It cannot be dismissed in that way because, for all of its dark subject matter, you have to be happy to have found something that well written. In that way the crummy real world is redeemed -- because you just experienced a work of unbridled GENIUS. The content is not the point, the form, the language, is.

I think Patrick is right to be angry and frustrated with Whedon to a point. But I think he is mistaking the cause of that frustration. Just as in the context of Shoot Em Up I argued that you cannot expect your "cool" content to do the work for you, you have to write it well, so here a bleak story is not why we should dismiss the end of Buffy season 6 and most of season 7. We should dismiss it because it is badly written.

As for sticking with a book, that depends on whether you think you are getting enough well told story for your time and money, and whether you want to stick it out. I have invested in the Buffy canon and I am going to stick it out for a while, but I also would not grab someone and force it into their hands as I would The Wire.]

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 20

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing x-Men run. For more posts in this series, go to the tool bar on the right.]

Whedon starts out with a clever gag where we think the team is on a fancy escape pod, but it turns out they are actually left on the burning ship -- the pod was sent out to distract the attackers. There is, maybe, an unintentionally funny moment when Brand, without remorse, speaks of the few minutes time the probably doomed soldiers on the escape pod bought the team and says "Let's not waste them." Then in the next panel it appears they used that precious, precious time to change their clothes.

Whedon then creates an exciting sequence, filled with various tensions, of the team, split into two groups rocketing toward the planet in little junk ships, trying to get there safely. Kitty and Peter get split up from Wolverine and Armor. In the next issue Brand and the Beast, who have a rivalry going, will also be separated. Plus the soldiers on the ground. Plus Ord and Danger have been captured. All of this serves to forward Whedon's character moments. Peter feels doomed. Kitty balances his doom with optimism. Wolverine is damaged and tough. Armor is new and nervous, but he gives her a pep talk. These scenes are well written certainly -- there are some great lines and moments -- but it is also crystal clear what Whedon is really interested in here. He is paring characters up because it is the most efficient way to allow him to write scenes where they can distinguish themselves, before he puts them back together for the conclusion. I like this issue, but I also find myself with not that much to say about it. I can imagine someone objecting that what it really is is a fancy package for "short scenes for actors (in pairs)." It occurs to me that Claremont, because he was writing some absurd number of X-Men issues could afford to have an issue where everyone plays baseball, and gets to know each other (and us, them). Whedon, on a contemporary prestige run, does not really have that luxury -- he has to build space for quiet character moments in the midst of battle. Because this is his gift he expands out what someone else might put into a panel or two into a couple of pages.

The issue ends with what initially appears to be a great ending beat -- the giant image of Colossus carved into the rock destroying the Breakworld as we hear Kitty's voice superimposed telling him nothing is carved in stone. People, myself included, complained that this does not make much sense if you think about it, but a few issues down the line, it seems like it is not supposed to -- because this is a modern carving faked to look ancient.

Blogging is always an experiment. I feel like I have less to say here. Is that because I am burning out here and missing stuff? or because it is good but also basically simple? Or because these issues have too many similarities and we get the basic point? Or is it that I am a little stuck because as of last time, I am doing an issue by issue post on an arc that is not yet over?

It is a cheat but I am going to do it anyway: links to two posts by Neil Shyminsky.


Neil on Astonishing X-Men 20

Neil on Astonishing X-Men generally

Neil on Whedon repeating himself in Astonishing X-Men

Neil's complaints have substance, but I find Whedon's charms overwhelming. I am still thinking about it though. I am not quite sure if Whedon is doing something new, doing old things better, repeating past achievements, or some combination where he repeats, improves, and then builds toward the creation of something new at the end. That last one is my hunch.

I am finding this hard to discuss since the run is not over yet, and I think I am going to wait to finish this series after the last issue of Whedon's run hits the stands.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 19

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men run. For more in this series click the Astonishing X-Men links in the right toolbar.]

In the first issue of “Unstoppable” (and I think I have accidentally referred to this as “Unbreakable” in the past) the team gets briefed on the situation as they fly toward the Breakworld, before being attacked by a Breakworld armada.

As I keep pointing out Whedon is a genius with opening and closing beats. In his cold open a stately speech on the Breakworld about a child being hope turns out to be, not a birth, but an alien funeral. This hits us both because we completely misunderstood what was going on, and because we might not have expected the Breakworld to be a place of compassion.

Whedon continues to focus on Kitty, giving her a “tough guy” moment with Agent Brand. Because her colors match the colors of Cyclops’s New X-Men jacket, and because she is holding a gun, I cannot help but think of Cyclops last issue. I do not know what to make of this, except to say that while Whedon appears to be fascinated with Kitty as the prototype of Buffy and many of his other female characters, his real focus will turn out to be Cyclops – the Kitty thing is just smoke and mirrors for what he is really up to on this book, the rehabilitation of Cyclops.

Whedon has a lot of exposition to establish, and the “discussion en route” template is pretty stale. (It was one of the most egregious parts of the film version of League of Extraordinary Gentlemen). He has to establish that Nova is not in Emma any more, he has to do something to curb Danger, he has to explain why they are not killing Colossus, and he has to establish what the basic threat for the arc is. It is not the worst exposition I have ever seen, but I have seen Whedon do better.

But we do get a nice moment of Kitty detoxing from Nova’s manipulation of her mind, and there is a great joke where, after Agent Brand explains that the Breakworld psychics say Colossus will destroy the world, she says to him “I’m assuming you’re as mystified as the rest of us, Rasputin.” Colossus says “No. I’m not. I have been planning to destroy the Breakworld since I was a child.” This is tremendously effective because it is exactly the kind of wrinkle Whedon would introduce into this plot – but of course it is ALSO the perfect set up for Whedon’s deflated drama humor. There is a beat and Colossus says sheepishly “This is why I don’t make so many jokes. I never know when is good.” I thought the exchange was really funny, especially after how serious Kitty and Peter were being in the earlier scene. A lot of internet people were angered by the way Whedon make Peter’s English broken. I think if Wolverine’s healing power can be inconsistent over the years, I don’t mind Colossus’s English varying a little, but I can see the force of the objection, especially if there is evidence in Whedon’s run that he speaks perfect English.

Overloard Kruun is introduced as we cut to the Breakworld. His barbarity in the scene is pretty standard for introducing a character of this type, but I like that he complains of Ord “The stink of his incompetence will outlast his body’s decay.” The phrase sound like something you would come across in the war poetry of ancient Rome, and it lets you see the violence in the context of the civilization. They are not barbarians. It is a culture of violence, with its own kind of bloody poetry.

And the ending beat is as good as the opening one. Brand says “Plan A is we land before they find us, find this missile, and disable it.” The Armada arrives sooner than she expected and begins to fire, hitting the ship and causing what appears to be serious damage.

Cyclops: What’s Plan B?
Kitty: We all die now.
Cyclops: What’s Plan C?

A shot of the attacking ships and the issue is done. Whedon always does the same thing – deflates dramatic moments – but I always fall for it.

I do not have much to say about Cassaday here, except to note that his style – fairly realistic but not overly so – is well suited to a story on an alien world – he really helps sell the other world. He makes it believable.

Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men 18

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men run. For more posts in this series, see the toolbar on the right.]

In the final part of “Torn” Ord, Danger, Nova and the X-Men collide moments before being “beamed up” by SWORD and taken into space.

Where on earth can you really go from the apotheosis of Cyclops at the end of the last issue? Whedon goes with the glorious freedom of shooting (illusory) people with a gun while making off the cuff quips. It is brilliant because Whedon is brilliant, but it is really brilliant because we finally get to see Cyclops just cut lose. Cut loose from the mode he has been in forever, but also cut lose from Morrison – one of the first things Whedon has him do is blithely shoot Morrison’s most enduring X-Men legacy, Nova, like it was nothing. He is finally free and it is exhilarating. He is happy. He is smiling. Morrison changed him, but he was still pretty angst-y, petulant, and over-serious a lot of the time.

In a battle with Ord and Danger, Wolverine is aided by the character who will be known as Armor. She is Whedon’s answer to Jubilee I suppose, a character I feel like a little bit of an idiot missing. She was terrible, right? I am sure I am remembering her through rose colored glasses. Importantly, we are re-introduced to Armor's powers in the fight, something that will become more important in the remaining issues of “Unbreakable,” I think.

One of the best bits of Whedon dialog: Wolverine: “Quit whining kid. I got eaten today.” Beast: “Yes, about that…” Wolverine: “Forget it.” Beast: “I can’t begin to apologize.” Wolverine: “Pfft! That’s what friends are for.” Beast: “I’m fairly certain it’s not.”

Kitty’s “Cry me a river, bitch” is also pretty inspired.

Whedon’s persuasively re-imagines Morrison’s defeat of Nova – since Emma put Nova away, Nova placed a psychic suggestion into Emma, and it fed off of Emma’s survivor guilt – guilt from Morrison’s Genosha attack. This is a much smarter – though to be fair much smaller – ret-con than something like Deadly Genesis. And Whedon delivers it without losing the tension of the scene because the explanation is going on as Nova is jumping into Armor -- you see why were were reminded who she was. All the talking actually builds tension, because they do not know they are missing something deadly, but we do.

Everyone collides, they are all hijacked into space, and Whedon ends with a little foreshadowing from a psychic character on the ground – one will not be coming back. This is Whedon at his best – simple, effective, fun, and smart.

"Gifted" was pretty good, "Danger" had some weak stuff, "Torn" is great and, as far as I can tell, "Unbreakable" will be amazing (it is as of issue 23).

Joss Whedon's story in Giant Size X-Men 3

[I know I should be writing about Astonishing X-Men 18 today, but I wanted something less taxing, and this is sort of on topic. I am using a label to attach this post to my issue by issue look at Whedon's Astonishing X-Men because it is an X-Men story of his that came out during that run.]

Marvel put out Giant Size X-Men three in 2005. I do not remember where Whedon was in his Astonishing run at that point, but he was in the middle I think. The book has an eight page comics story called "Teamwork" written by Whedon and drawn by Neil Adams. The rest of the book just reprints stuff: Fantastic Four 28 (X-Men meet the Fantastic Four), X-Men 9 (X-Men meet the Avengers), 27 (a page where the X-men meet Spider-Man), and 35 (a full on X-Men/Spider-Man meeting). I do not understand why the theme is heroes meeting each other -- is it because the original X-Men met the new team in the original Giant Size X-Men? That seems like a weak connection. The only reason for this thing to exist is because 30 years have gone by since Giant Size X-Men. I do not really understand how this is much of a tribute to that milestone.

The cover is a parody of the cover to Giant Size X-Men: instead of the old team above looking down in shock at the new team ripping out of the paper cover below, Whedon's Astonishing team (drawn on the cover by Cassaday) looks down in shock at the team from Giant Size drawn by Dave Cockrum. Its a little weird that three of the members below are also above. (Though Cyclops was above and below in the original).

Whedon's contribution takes place during Giant Size X-Men. This is, I guess, an untold tale from that day, or an expansion of the training page from the original Giant Size X-Men. Wolverine, Nightcrawler, Sunfire, Colossus, Storm and Thunderbird meet in the danger room to train on everyone's first day. As in the original issue they are amazed to be able to speak English to each other. Sunfire does a Whedon-style double take at the fact that he is in costume for the training while many others are not. The joke falls so flat I am not even sure it is supposed to be a joke.

Wolverine says they need to be a team, which they are not right now because they have not been working together for years. He says "We're one too many. Prof knows at least one of us won't make it as an X-Man." Wolverine thinks they can weed out the weak member by fighting. They all get to show what they can do in a battle. Wolverine thinks this battle, not authorized by Professor X, will tell them who they can trust. Wolverine says "Personally, my money's on T-Bird to outlast the rest of you. I ain't been hit that solid since I scrapped with the green guy. So. Anybody wanna get a beer?" The end.

I recently read Giant Size X-Men #1 and have been reading the Claremont issues, including the issue where Thunderbird dies. I have NO. IDEA. what Whedon was thinking when he wrote this. It is rare to read something by an established guy like Whedon and not find one nice thing to say, somewhere. I see Whedon is aiming for irony with Wolverine's end pronouncement that Thunderbird will outlive the rest of them, when the audience knows he will be the first one to die and, generally, stay dead while the rest of them, basically, live. (You have to talk like this writing about comics). But so what? Whedon is often great with irony, but this one just sits on the page, doing nothing. I can sort of see this as a kind of homage to the old X-Men comics in which everyone's strengths and weakness would be revealed in a battle in the danger room -- Sunfire is proud and shoots fire, Colossus turns to metal and protects women, Storm shoots lightning and is afraid of confined spaces and so on. But again -- so what? Whedon is smart enough to know that the best homage is not reproduction, but going above and beyond -- as he does with Morrison in his Astonishing run by having Nova come back, or Cyclops be cooler than he ever was in Morrison's hands. Is Whedon hamstrung because, since this story has to fit in a crack in the original, no characters are really capable of change?

I do not have any Neil Adams comics that are not in storage, but I remember that he is kind of great. I could be misremembering that. He is beyond awful here. This is as sloppy, rushed, and ugly as the worst Igor Korday New X-Men issues, and, like Cassaday in many spots on Astonishing X-Men, Adams has decided that he does not need to draw a background for most of the issue. Also Wolverine has a hot pink shirt. Was that a continuity thing from the original issue? Or is it just a random super-lazy version of Whedon's habit of not knowing what to do with tough-guy characters -- is he making Wolverine more feminine, as he does in "Torn"? It boggles the mind.

When Whedon does a short comics story as a tribute to Stan Lee and Spider-Man, he writes a charming, if throwaway, little thing. So it is not the work-for-hire tribute thing that is wrecking him here. It is bizarre to see a great writer just totally implode for no reason that I can see. Any thoughts on what happened here? Is there some part of this I am not understanding? When I first read this I assumed it was my lack of appreciation for the era, but now I HAVE been appreciating that era, and I am just lost. I think it is just a really bad story.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 17

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men run. For more in this series click the Astonishing X-Men links in the right toolbar.]

First of all, this issue has surely one of the best X-Men covers of all time – a white background and Wolverine’s head, looking around the corner in the lower left hand side like a frightened little girl, one claw the tip of his teeth like someone who bites their fingernails as a nervous habit. When you see a really striking cover like this you realize how little variation is allowed in superhero comic book cover design. It was one of the reasons Planetary was so exciting when it was first coming out. You never knew what the covers we going to look like.

This issue opens suddenly, with no context, into a sequence of more than five pages in which Kitty and Peter have a son, years pass, the X-Men (including Peter) take her son from her (with vague justification about the kid having “terrible power”), and she returns to confront Peter and get her son back. The emotional pitch here is as good as anything Whedon has ever written in any medium. The cutie pie happy stuff (Kitty: “I made him myself”) gives way to the X-Men coming, in uniform to take the kid. The uniforms are a nice touch – when the X-Men visit Kitty in the hospital they are casually dressed like friends – when they arrive in uniform they are much more imposing. In a heartbreaking moment Colossus turns on her and helps his team-mates take his son from Kitty. This could have been handled as a nightmare scenario in which everyone turns on Kitty for no reason, but Casaday and Whedon have Colossus seem very upset by what he is doing. Had he smiled evilly we would have said “Oh, this is all a dream sequence…”. Here we are less sure, which gives the moment more emotional resonance.

We immediately cut to dark and stormy night in which Kitty has the handle of an axe phased through Peter’s temples – “You blink and I let go.” The image is stunning because it is a serial killer tableau (though the axe is being used differently, it would be the weapon of choice anyway). Amazingly the previous four pages make us side with Kitty, even though the image, in isolation, would have us feeling otherwise. When Peter pleads, Kitty says “Don’t talk to me like a person. You’re not a person! Big metal fucking robot and somehow I didn’t see it.” The frighteningly few pages Whedon has for this sequence are all the time he needs to tell this powerful little story. One of the best moment in Astonishing, period.

It is all a mental manipulation – taking up 18 months of her mental time -- to get Kitty to break into a box in the mansion. Kitty is being made to believe her son is in the box, but whatever is in the box is what the Hellfire club is after.

One scene here that maybe got on my nerves. Whedon has had a lot of serious stuff in this issue and he needs to balance it out with some humour. I feel like there are scales on his end, and that the darker he goes the lighter he needs the humour to be to counterbalance. The problem here, maybe, is that he counters with a scene in which Wolverine – brainwashed to act like a Dickensian waif by Nova – gets hit on the head with a can of beer in the explosion of Danger and Ord entering, and remembers who he is. This is funny, but it also feels a little too broad. Barely too broad. You can argue Nova is not paying attention – that this would have worn off anyway -- but it is awfully silly for this story. I do not hate it, but I am also not sure how much I like it.

Kitty gets the thing out of the box thinking it is her son – it is a pile of green goo readers will remember as the alien that Emma trapped Nova’s consciousness in at the end of Grant Morrison first year on New X-Men. Looking at something issue by issue is bound to get a little redundant, but I will just say it again: Whedon draws on Morrison’s run in surprisingly specific ways, and does it very well. Whedon’s use of the Hellfire Club was all a big distraction. It looked, for a moment, like he was using a this set of villains to avoid using a bad guy Morrison used, but it turns out it was all smoke and mirrors for the real story he was telling: The Return of Casandra Nova. The way the story is told we do not feel like we are going around in circles, which is important, as “we are going around in circles” was one of Morrison’s big (and stupid) themes.

In another of the best moments in Whedon’s run Emma is shot in the back, and the ending page reveals Cyclops, in his New X-Men jacket and no glasses, holding the smoking gun. Casaday puts the “camera” low, so Cyclops is even more imposing. Whedon may be drawing on Morrison’s Nova and his New X-Men run, but here he has earned to right to be so bold as to outdo Morrison in the treatment of Cyclops. The difference between Morrison’s Xavier suddenly just having a gun at the start of New X-Men, and Whedon’s Cyclops needing a gun this deep into Whedon’s run is telling – the symbol is the same (Change is Here) but the execution is more convincing, because it is less arbitrary. Cassaday has been stunning throughout this issue (especially in the axe scene) but this last page is where he really needs to come though. And he sells the moment perfectly.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 16

[This post is part of a series of posts looking at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run issue by issue. For more in this series go to the toolbar on the right and look under "Best of the Blog".]

In this issue Ord escapes SWORD custody, Kitty regroups the team and confronts "Perfection" (and we learn who "Perfection" really is), and the mutant who will destroy the Breakworld is revealed.

In the opening few pages you can see something has changed -- Cassaday is firing on all cylinders. Characters are not repeated, and backgrounds are fully drawn with details rather than patterns, for the most part. Even the panel composition is more interesting that it usually is: in the opening splash page a soldier's face is put upside down and screaming in the extreme foreground while the center of the image, Ord fighting, is in the middle ground. ("Middle ground"? Is that the right word?). Later in this issue he draws a great image of Kitty biting her lip as Wolverine babbles at her like a little kid. It is one of the few panels where he draws a cute girl cute. The reason I complained about Cassaday so much in the book is that he is clearly capable of more. Now he has decided to give it to us, which is nice.

Whedon continues his emasculation of Wolverine, who is hiding in a tree from Beast and narrating like a Dickensian waif: fairly funny I think, if a little obvious. When Beast finds him his prayers turn to "I hate you, Lord! I hate you lord!" and in another obvious but still funny joke Wolverine pops his claws and, instead of remembering who he really is, as we might expect, screams like a little girl. I say this is obvious and a little broad, but I do not think anyone has done it before, so Whedon gets points for doing something different at least.

We learn the Hellfire club is trying to get into a mysterious metal chamber in the mansion and that they have manipulated Kitty to be on the team from the beginning so she can open it. For the second issue in a row Whedon continues to set the stage for the ascendancy of his favorite girl archetype at the expense of the team. She is like Batman on the JLA, as I have already pointed out. If you like Whedon you will like this; if not, not.

Finally we get a really great dramatic moment when it appears Emma is confronting some kind of other personality in a mirror: she says to herself "Did you really think you could hide in there." It turns out nicely, that it is Kitty on the other side of the mirror -- it is a nice twist on the moment that you can only do in a story where one character has psychic powers and another can walk through solid objects. As much was Whedon imposes himself on these characters, he is also a master at finding persuasive tensions and scenes. Unlike his standard jokes, I think you can appreciate moments like this, even if you do not like Whedon.

But this scene twists again -- Whedon always finds that extra twist of the screw you did not think could be there. It turns out Perfection, the secret woman in the hood whose face was never shows, is ... The White Queen! So there is a double of Emma after all! Except, as JossWhedon knows perfectly well -- this makes no sense. Rather than belabor us with a long speech about how such a thing could be possible, he simply shows Kitty in wide eyed shock one moment, then squinting and thinking about it (as the reader is) as she delivers the now classic Whedon line "Yeahbuhwhat?" End scene.

There are two kinds of twists. One is the kind where if you were smart enough, you could figure it out because all the clues were there -- The Sixth Sense for example. The other kind of twist is the out of nowhere twist that is there just for the sake of shaking things up -- just for the fun and crazy of it. Raymond Chandler is fond of this kind of twist, as was Alias. (The main problem with the Xorn reveal in New X-Men was that Morrison seemed unclear what kind of twist it was). Hard science comic book fans like the former kind -- because it is more like a puzzle, something they can figure out, like the real-world physics of the light saber. Both can be great, but the nice thing about the unjustified twist is that there is no need for laborious explanation -- because there is not one to be had. Whedon generally does not degenerate into exposition, which is one of the reasons I love him.

(Peter is revealed to be the mutant who will destroy the Breakworld, but I do not have anything to say about that right now. Next time.)

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 15

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run. For the whole series so far, go to the links under "Best of the Blog" in the right toolbar.]

In this issue the Hellfire club finishes their attack, taking everyone down except Kitty Pryde, who is ready to rally back by the end.

I remember being a little frustrated with this issue. Taking Scott down took a whole issue, and I just assumed that we would get one issue taking down one member of the team at a time -- issue 15: Beast v. Nova; issue 16: Colossus v Shaw; and so on. Taking down everyone else here probably makes more sense, and it is also serves to highlight how much of a badass Scott is -- his take-down needed a whole issue; everyone else requires only pages. Whedon should do a whole Scott Summers miniseries. Whedon is the King of Scott Summers-ville.

Throughout my Astonishing X-Men posts I have been taking Casaday to task for laziness -- he has a bad habit of giving us either no backgrounds or backgrounds that are just patterns, and he will repeat an image whenever he can. Though it will not fully kick into high gear until next issue, it is clear from 15 that he is making an effort. The first page basically repeats an image four times, but for a good reason, and for the rest of the issue he seems more committed. When backgrounds drop out they drop out for a reason, and every character seems to get due attention. It is nice to see him bounce back. We even get a nice visual motif of panels giving us Leonie style close-ups on intense eyes: The Beast's are furious, Scott's are vacant, Wolverine's are intense as a set up for a joke, and Kitty's are determined. The blind girl's eyes are also highlighted, as are Emma's, with her fake tears.

Casaday's Nova is as terrifying as Morrison intended her to be. She stands confident and simple in a variation on the Safari outfit Morrison introduced her with -- it is the "camera" that leans at a 45 degree angle to register how off, how weird, and how frighteningly powerful she is.

Whedon delivers some very nice character moments. Kitty calls her opponent "some goth punk" then chastises herself for how old she has gotten. Nova's analysis of her opponents betrays Whedon's sharp grasp of character: Hank is a beast who thinks he is a man, and Wolverine is a boy who thinks himself a beast. Similarly Danger appears to Ord -- Whedon nicely does not just forget about his first two villains with the entrance of a third -- and smartly argues how much they have in common: both the last hope for their respective people fighting against mutants. Characters are given Dante-esque ironically appropriate punishment by the Hellfire Club (get it: Hell, Dante): Shaw says "Summers is a Zombie, Pryde's a Ghost, Rasputin, a victim of his own rage." Whedon gets character, and fights with him are always an excuse to explore character. We are even reminded, yet again, of Agent Brand -- you can feel him building to bringing all these elements together.

Whedon does have his usual preoccupations, and while I like them, I can understand the objection that they become predictable. A little girl, Hisako, is shown to be tremendously powerful -- like Buffy, River, Willow, and so on. And another standard masculine hero is deflated, as Wolverine is reduced by Nova to a whimpering little boy; tough men get unmanned in Whedon often -- Angel's reduction to a puppet in Season Five of his show will serve as a single example, but there are many. Whedon is divisive among fans -- if you share Whedon's joy in these things you will probably like him most of the time; if you do not he will probably get on your nerves mostly. He is a very good writer but you see his limitations quickly -- and either accept or reject them early.

The issue ends with a great moment I have written about already: you can click here to go to that post.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 14

[This post is part of a series of post looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's AXM run issue by issue. For more of the same click the label at the bottom of this post.]

In this issue Emma begins her psychic attack on Cyclops.

Whedon does what he does best here -- emotional weight reinforced through some light undercutting. Whedon gets excellent milage out of Scott and Jean's history. He sees without his goggles because of her, and they are comfortable with each other -- and when she asks if she makes him sad, it is a real question and a good one. Whedon's emotional compass here is great right where it needs to be for this issue to work -- he shows us how Scott is too controlled, how he feels inferior to Jean. We know this, of course, but as on Buffy Whedon knows how to give genre fiction serious emotional weight. And so much of the issue is just talking -- but it is such intense well realized talking it is never a defect. The talking is really getting to the heart of these characters here. Many times the "let me know you your dark desires" comes off as staged -- but here you believe this could break him down. Emma's arguments are actually pretty good -- maybe Xavier DID make Scott the leader because he had nothing else. Using Morrison's Black Bug Room is a great touch -- Whedon is deft here -- he does not tell us more than Morrison did about it -- but gets more pack for his punch out of the fact that the reader's know that it is bad news and little else. After demonstrating how well he understands Scott's character Whedon adds his own bit to the mythology -- the day Scott, as a boy, decided not to control his power. Maybe this is a false memory, maybe not, but Whedon has earned our trust with his handling of Scott in this story, and so he earns the right to add something new. People say Morrison did a great job with Scott Summers. He did. But Whedon puts him to Shame with this run.

Kitty and Peter's lighthearted subplot -- also with sex as a theme -- serves just to get us out of all this intensity, and it works perfectly.

A hook for the next issue: Brand knows the mutant that will destroy the Breakworld (though we do not yet) and Beast and Nova meeting again -- and he is out with a great issue.

Whedon is in fine form, but Cassaday fails him here. This issue is especially egregious in terms of Casaday's backgrounds and repeats. Not all are terrible -- some are used for good comic effect -- but there are so many of them they seem lazy, when you see them in aggregate. And I have mentioned this before -- Casaday is a great artist in many respects but Emma and Jean need to be very sexy to make this seduction work and Cassaday, as far as I can think, does not do sexy faces well. Travis Charest is the guy I would want here.

Cassaday repeat/background watch: a zoom on Scott, a zoom on Scott and Jean, Jean is repeated, Jean is repeated twice, we have a triple zoom in, a panel of kids on a couch is repeated, Peter and Kitty get a zoom, Scott is repeated, Emma and Scott get a zoom, Scott is repeated twice, a panel is almost exactly repeated twice. As for backgrounds, again, we have a lot of patterns and blank spaces: Sunset for Scott and Jean, a curtain and a wall, wood paneling, bookcases, blank brown backgrounds, a photograph of earth, grey, red, blue.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 13

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's AXM run. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

This issue functions as a prologue or teaser to Torn, the six part arc centered on Casandra Nova and the Hellfire Club.

Whedon further anchors his story in Morrison's run. I discussed this at length last time, but he always goes deeper than I think he is going to -- here he returns to just before the Genosha attack and reveals that Nova was responsible for Emma's secondary mutation.

In Whedon's first issue I discussed how the "nothing has changed" line that properly opens Whedon's run is an attack on Morrison -- Morrison changed too much (so many people thought) and so Whedon was brought in to put them back, to emphasize continuity. It is important that the "nothing has changed" mantra returns in this issue twice: Wolverine opens a scene with the line, speaking to the kids recovering from Danger's attack, and Agent Brand opens a scene by saying it to the new commander of Shield. There are many layers of irony here. On the one hand Whedon protests too much. First: A lot has changed in Whedon's run. Second, as he dips into Morrison's "dangerous" changes more deeply he needs to assert his nothing has changed mantra more strongly, so he says it twice. Third, quite a bit has changed in the Marvel Universe since Whedon took over X-Men -- Fury is no longer head of Shield, and he has to acknowledge that. Not to mention Civil War. Whedon ironically puts Morrison's changes (which everyone was so upset about) in the context of the larger editorial changes to the Marvel Universe -- with Civil War, are people really going to bitch about all the continuity revisions in New X-Men?

Sebastian Shaw is hard to take seriously. Whoever designed him decided that a male villain should unironically wear a large purple bow in his hair. I am sure it was based on some Victorian fashion design and was terrible accurate, but taken out of context -- as he is in this issue -- keeps poking out at me as unintentionally silly.

Whedon builds some great mysteries here with what the Hellfire Club is after, how they can be in the mansion, how Casandra Nova, who needs no teammates, is involved, and who the person is in the cloak. Particularly smart is when Emma admits to loving Scott "with all [her] predator's heart." It counters a fear that Whedon is just reversing Morrison, that he is going to have Emma just say she was lying the whole time and all of Morrison's changes were an illusion. Point, Whedon.

The issue is not perfect (see the repeat background watch) but it ends with what I am going to call a major flaw -- Whedon, so spectacular at finding ending beats, ends this issue with a "shocking" image we have seen in Morrison's run: Emma in Jean's Phoenix outfit. What is wanted is surprise, and perhaps a revision. What we have is a rerun. Maybe there is something to the fact that it is the green outfit and not the red one. Maybe there is a revision here I do not see. But the first impression is that Whedon screwed up, stealing from Morrison at the end of an issue in which he invoked him as a predecessor: a deadly combination for a writer. "Look at what the last guy did" he seems to say -- "I can do that too."

Cassaday repeat background watch : Emma is repeated, Hisako is repeated, Wolverine is repeated, a student is repeated, Peter is repeated, the woman in the cloak is repeated, Kitty is repeated three times on one page and the background is repeated as well, a second whole panel with Peter and Kitty is repeated. We have a few scenes with either no background or just a pattern as a background -- trees for Nova and Emma, grey for the danger room, sunset sky for Peter and Kitty, grey for much of the mansion interiors, blue sky and white clouds for the Shield-Sword meeting, a single painting on a red wall for a second Kitty and Peter scene. What sucks about this is Cassaday is great when he decides to put work in -- in this issue Hank's lab is full of cool stuff, and the Shield carrier and Sword headquarters are wonderfully rendered. It only highlights where Casaday decides to put less work in.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 12 (Part Two of Two)

[This post is part of an issue by issue look at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run. For more of the same, click the Astonishing X-Men tag at the bottom of this post.]

Finally we come to the last page, the return of the Hellfire club that has been whispering in Emma's head the whole time -- a Hellfire Club that includes Casandra Nova. Emma of course comes from the Hellfire Club, so this is a great choice; it is amazing Morrison never invoked them in any serious way. But to put Morrison's Nova in the club is beyond brilliant. Here Nova appears on Genosha with the super-sentinel -- we are fully drawing on Morrison's first arc. It never occurred to me Whedon would draw on Morrison so directly. Ironically drawing on a predecessor character feels fresh, because I did not know it was in the options box. Whedon's anxiety of influence revisonary swerve is amazingly successful: He will not have to stand against Morrison so starkly if he offers himself up as a continuation of what Morrison began.

If I was talking about the relationship between New X-Men and Astonishing X-Men in How to Read Superhero Comics and Why, I would have quoted Bloom's fifth revisionary ratio, Askesis: "The later poet does not, as in Kenosis, undergo a revisionary movement of emptying, but of curtailing; he yields up part of his own human and imaginative endowment, so as to separate himself from others, including the precursor, and he does this in his poem by so stationing it in regard to the parent-poem as to make that poem undergo and askesis too; the precursor's endowment is also truncated."

But you probably get the idea. A Morrison run separate from the Whedon run demands comparison, and Whedon will lose, just from lack of scope. But if Whedon continues Morrison then his run is a part of a new whole. That means that Whedon's run does not stand on its own, but it does gain power from the connection; and Morrison's run is now retroactively figured as part of Whedon's, the necessary "prologue."

Cassaday repeat background watch: Here and there, but the art is top-notch in this issue.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 12 (Part One of Two)

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run; for more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post].

The X-Men and Xavier defeat Danger and Casandra Nova's super-sentinel, Xavier gets in trouble, and the hook for the next arc is revealed.

In a breathtaking page Whedon must have been drooling over Kitty Pride saves everyone from the super-sentinel blast. If I love seeing Xavier be a bad-ass, Whedon must love seeing Kitty be a bad-ass. "Is that all you got ... bub" she says, exhausted. Cassaday's super-sentinel is gorgeous.

Whedon tries to outdo the climax to his first arc in this arc by simply doubling the number of Fastball Specials that will not be named as such, and deflating the device with Emma's "You can't just throw people at all your problems." It's pretty funny, I guess, but not the most successful "do it and deflate" Whedon moment. But you can see why he wants it: he wants to replace the big male powerhouse Wolverine with his little geeky girl fighter in the Fastball Special and in the book as a whole. He wants to put her front and center always. That is his revisonary swerve and always will be. Smart girls replace dumb men: Buffy, Firefly, Sugarshock. Even Runaways already has this in the concept.

Emma simply wanders off in the middle of the fight. Cyclops says "Honey...? War?" which is not exactly in character, but I do love me some Whedon dialogue, so I will forgive it. This is all to build toward one of Whedon's best hooks, the hook to end year one -- one more bit of tension before the reveal of who has been whispering in Emma's head since issue 6.

The fight scenes here are beautiful and pretty fun I guess, though maybe this one is a bit of an anti-climax compared to the last two. Henry drops the professor to attack Danger and defends himself by saying when you deal with computers you have to work on instinct: that is a repeat of what Colossus did with Emma, but without the joke. Whedon may be running out of fight ideas after four issues of fighting.

Kitty says "I promise to come back" to Colossus after she asks him to throw her into the sentinel. It is a nice moment because it cuts immediately to what the issue is in the scene. Economical is what I would call it. This kind of thing, and not the jokes, is why Whedon is great.

Once inside she gets the sentinel to unlock a program Danger has closed - its memory of the Genosha attacks from Morrison's second issue. It flies away in grief, taking Danger with it since she has uploaded herself into it. This is a little tricky. What you want to do in a story is establish a rule, then adhere to that rule in surprising ways. In Sixth Sense we establish that the kid can talk to dead people to help them; at the end we figure out Willis is one of the dead. Here I was unclear on the rule -- I did not realize that the machines Danger brought to life were capable of emotions like grief. I know the old school sentinel from earlier in the arc talked religious nonsense, but I thought she was screwing with the X-Men by remote control, not giving a sentinel religious feelings; the blackbird jet, I notice, did not care that it blew up a base in China in Morrison's X-Men annual (if it is the same jet and if she did not lock that memory away as she did with the sentinel). All this is to say that the defeat of the super sentinel is maybe a little unsatisfying. It was not clear to me why Danger could not re-program the sentinel and return right away. But again, replacing Wolverine with Kitty is the point -- Wolverine's violence will not save the day; the day requires a woman to unlock an emotion. Alright. Fine. I can live with that as a theme or whatever.

In the last post I mentioned that Whedon's Xavier is as persuasive as Millar's Xavier. Here the comparison sinks Whedon. In the denouement to this issue Xavier, it turns out, knew he was oppressing an AI intelligence when he created the Danger Room. The Xavier of Astonishing X-Men 11, like the (for me) definitive Xavier of Millar's Ultimate X-Men is morally questionable, which is wonderful. I like Xavier to have a creepy post-human sheen of beyond-good-and-evil about him. But Xavier in this issue is less like Millar's Xavier and more like Brubaker's Xavier in the "sort of dreary but maybe sort of well written I guess" Deadly Genesis: he is not beyond good and evil so much as he is just guilty, in a crummy please forgive me kind of way. In Millar's Xavier and the Xavier of just last issue he knows he breaks merely human law and does not care -- he is writing mutant law. Here, as in Deadly Genesis, he is just a bit of a fuck-up, and pitifully accepts the censure of the team he created. This is a big step down. It is sad, and lame, to see they guy who took apart Danger with an axe hanging his head in shame over his bad behavior like a wounded puppy.

I will talk about the last page next time, in a short post.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 11

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run; for more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

In this issue Xavier squares off against Danger, while the X-Men regroup and join him.

This issue opens strong, continuing the excellent framing story from the last issue -- even panels paced and sized for maximum tension, and great, terse exchanges. After the initial setup, Xavier simply plows into Danger with the cab of an 18-wheeler (rigged to allow him to work the pedals with his hands, a nice, unremarked detail by Cassaday). "What did you think? That I'd save myself with reason?" As I mentioned earlier, Xavier is one of my favorite characters, and I love it when he gets to be a bad-ass -- this surely has to be the most bad-ass Xavier issue ever. Danger was so collected fighting the X-Men; it is a god-damned sight to see, when Xavier riles her to the point where she degenerates into "Kill this fucking cripple!" He even gets her into a mind-space and throws philosophy at her ("If no one had limitations what would God do with his time?") before the reveal that this is all a distraction so he can hack her robot body to pieces with an axe. Best Xavier issue anywhere. At the end she just looks at him and says "They don't have the slightest idea of what you are, do they?" to which he replies calmly "I like to think Jean knew." Mark Millar came up with a serious bad-ass Xavier in Ultimate X-Men -- probably the best investigation into the character I know and the most persuasive Xavier to me -- but this is as good as anything Millar came up with. This is my Charles Xavier: aloof, brilliant, in control, zealous to a fault, and not incapable of violence and coercion.

But this issue is not without its flaws. Early in their fight Xavier tells Danger that he has had "a friend" shut down all machines in the area so that she cannot bring any to life; he adds that "this is not his battle." I find it unpersuasive that THIS Xavier, a guy who has done some morally questionable things (as we will find next issue), and who takes her apart with an axe knowing what she is, would feel so honor bound to establish this kind of artificial proving ground, and not just have his friend, obviously Magneto, atomize her. That would be the practical thing to do -- as far as he knows she may have just killed all of his X-Men, and the whole truck-axe thing suggest he wants to be practical, violently and ruthlessly so. You can argue that given his responsibility for her (I do not want to get into the next issue here), and given that he thinks he has lost everything, and given that he is an ego-maniac, he would just want to do it himself, personally, but invoking Magneto in this half-assed way is just not doing it for me. The explanation is lacking, and raises more questions than it answers. Whedon should have avoided it altogether. I don't really see why is is needed in the first place. I bet editorial insisted on it.

And finally it turns out EVERYONE -- all the X-Men and all those children -- are alive. That is lame ass. The explanation in the issue: Danger only cares about Xavier, they mean nothing to her. Well that fails on a couple of levels. One, it takes self-control to incapacitate but not kill a bunch of trained fighters -- if she really did not care about them I think she would have simply killed them all. She did throw a giant spike through two of them and it must have been easier to have it kill them than to calculate a way to make that not instantly fatal. Two, if she hates Xavier so much surely killing the students that mean so much to him would be a great way to strike at him. And don't give me that "Robots cannot understand human emotion" stuff; she is out for revenge and we see she gets very angry. Also she understands enough about humans to make detailed religious metaphors, and that is way more advanced than emotion.

Finally, at the end of this issue, in its cliffhanger of the giant sentinel from Morrison's run -- nice to see that again -- we see Whedon's structure in total for this arc: (1) a prologue, (2) a sentinel attack, (3) a sort of locked in a haunted house thing, (4) the X-Men versus Danger, (5) Xavier versus Danger, and (6) Danger and Casandra Nova's giant wild sentinel against the X-Men and Xavier. You can understand why the famously talky Whedon might err on the side of action, and people did call it an error. (Whedon lamented that fans complained the first arc had too little action and the second arc had too much). But I admire the attempt to give us such a sustained series of action set pieces set off by sweet character moments like Peter and Kitty talking in this issue.

Cassaday repeat/background watch: Danger gets a zoom, Kitty gets a repeat, and there are quite a few panels at the mansion where everyone is in a grey matrix. Overall, not bad.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 10

[This post is part of a series of posts looking at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run issue by issue; for more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

I am just going to say that the cover to this issue is bad; I can see what they were going for but a black and white blurry zoom on Professor X's weird cranium on a white background is not really working for me.

In this issue Danger beats the crap out of the X-Men, and then Professor X shows up, ready to put her down.

The frame story with Danger and Xavier is perfect. Professor X is one of my favorite comic book characters, and I love it when he gets to be a bad-ass. Cassaday keeps the tension high by showing a series of even sized close-ups until the final page; Whedon keeps the exchanges almost Western in simplicity, and ends with Xavier's wonderfully confident "I am incalculable ... You've fought the X-men a thousand times, a million in your mind. But you've never fought me." Maybe one of the great Charles Xavier moments. The shot of him in efficient black combat gear, in a giant stone wheelchair, is awesome.

The main part of the issue itself has some problems, however. I am not in love with Danger's "The thing I have in common with every dimestore villain these X-Men ever faced: I want to be understood." That is maybe too on the nose, or something, too clear a justification of the villain speech, I think. Eventually, in his old age, Whedon will just have stories where all the characters sit at desks, scripting their own lives complete with stage directions they can say out loud.

And oh dear, you have to be very careful about allusions, intentional or otherwise. Danger is a robot with big boobs and a shapeshifting hand. Where have I seen that before? Oh. Yeah. Terminator 3. When invoking other works a good rule of thumb is to stick to the ones that do not suck outright. Especially if your bad guy already has design problems.

We get a shot of how Danger is thinking, how she processes the fight. This is admittedly not an easy thing to do -- comics, like film, are not great at showing internal states (as novels are). So I have no idea how this could have been improved. But I have no patience for things like text superimposed over Cyclops that reads "92% probability of early frontal attack." Cause computers think like this. No, that is just annoying, and reminds be of Ziggy on Quantum Leap, in a bad way. Danger is a combination of the Fem-Bot from T3 and Ziggy Quantum Leap. Scheesh.

And Danger throws a spike through Kitty and Colossus. The way Cassaday draws this -- and people can say I am wrong about this -- but it seems to me it would be instantly fatal, just because of the size of the spike. And yet you know Whedon is not going to kill off these characters, so the moment just feels like a mistake, a cheap attempt at making me think you are doing something only to take it away next issue. And no I do not care that a healer has already been established in the mansion -- instantly fatal. He would have to be Jesus Christ Man or something to bring back the dead.

But back to the good: There is a great moment when Brand makes fun of a psychic alien, who "senses destruction" when the mansion is clearly blowing up; Whedon reminds us of Brand, Brand's mole, Emma's secret, and of Ord -- this is all going to come together soon, where a lesser writer would have left Ord behind for five years until a dramatic return. There is also a pitch perfect joke in which Cyclops throws Emma at Danger just to do something Danger would not expect.

Cassaday repeat/background watch:Danger gets a double take, then another. Emma gets a triple take; there are maybe 25 panels here with just no background, but there are a lot with background; it is only a little annoying in spots.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 9

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men link at the bottom of this post.]

In the danger room Wing gives weird speeches, and the X-Men attack, releasing the Danger Room in humanoid form.

"This being has power we can't fathom, and all it has ever known in violence." This is a persuasive point, and justifies Whedon's idea of a sentient danger room. Whedon adds some stuff about consciousness and contradiction and finding yourself in the contradiction which is actually pretty good, I think, though I do not know much about the science of consciousness and language. It sounded pretty good, which is all that matters here. And the contradiction Whedon imagines makes sense: we thought the danger room was programed not to kill, but Whedon's idea is that is was programed to kill and then had a separate parent program that prevented it from killing -- hence the anger, aggression, and the feeling of being trapped. This is pretty good stuff, well thought through.

Two problems here, though. The first may not really be a problem, and I need to check it to be sure, but Chris Bachalo drew an arc of Uncanny in which Cerebro became sentient, then came back to kill the X-Men. I expect, and like, major plots like Return to Weapon X and Days of Future Past to be returned to again and again in different versions. That is inevitable, and good, as I explained in the context of Morrison. I am less sure what to say, and what to think, about a doubling of a minor earlier story with no real acknowledgement. That seems to leave allusion and revision behind for less reputable modes of memory. Or is could just be inevitable that stuff like this happens in a comic book that has been around for more than forty years, and it is no big deal.

Problem number two? As everyone pointed out at the time the Danger Room -- Danger from here out -- has dreadlocks. Now the word dreadlocks refers to the dread of god Rastafarians have; they do not cut their hair because of a biblical commandment. This fits in with the religious stuff the religious stuff Danger has been spouting. But it does not do much about the fact that Danger is a bit of a design disaster. She is at boring and a bit silly when something awe-inspiring is needed. It has other problems too, which I will talk about next time, as it comes up.

Cassaday repeat/background watch. Wolverine gets a zoom, the X-plane gets a double take, Wing gets a double take. The X-Men spend time in a blank grey space, much of the danger room is a blank red space, which morphs into blank blue space. Enough of the panels have a background, or assorted details, to make the empty ones acceptable. Cassaday does some cool stuff here, before the reveal of Danger.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 8

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

The team deals with a reactivated Sentinel and discovers the Danger Room is the new enemy just after the children are locked inside with Kitty.

Three separate beats, three different scenes, on the first page, perfectly handled. A shot of the danger room on the second page foreshadows the conclusion. Whedon is good at foreshadowing. Within this issue we hear more of the dark voice that speaks to Emma without learning anything. This is important because this will not bear fruit until the next arc like 8 issues down the line. Set this stuff up early and do not lose track of it, and your story will stand better when the time comes. Brand gets a page here as well -- there is a mole in the mansion. She might get a page every issue in this arc. Ord takes out Wing, Wing releases Danger, Ord Danger and Emma's voice come to get revenge at the same moment and they all end up on the Breakworld. 24 issues tied tightly together.

Whedon does some cool stuff combining a classic sentinel with religious talk -- he crawls toward the mansion with "I come... I hear you, Lord...Praise be to you...my Lord is watching you... she tells me the children will pay for the father's sins and I must not fear death." The classic Sentinel "Destroy" is revised by Whedon into the intriguing "Destroy the oppressors." "I want this thing off my lawn" says Scott and one amazing large red panel later it is down. If Cyclops gets a better moment in Morrison, or anywhere else, I cannot think of it. Even Wolverine says "Sometimes I remember why you are in charge." Whedon rehabilitates Scott much better than Morrison did, though Morrison layed the groundwork.

Wing is back as a twisted zombie ready to murder the children locked in the Danger Room with him. That is a great moment and I am hooked.

Unfortunately that is not where the issue ends. Two twists can be even better sometimes. But here, Whedon's second twist is a mess. Emma says "Our enemy is not in the danger room." Beat. "It is the Danger Room." The "its not IN x it IS x" is such a cliche, one devastated by the Aqua Teen Hunger Force episode about Mothman (the third episode): Mothman parks a school bus in front of the house; Shake, scared out of his mind by nothing but his own fear thinks (for little reason) that there is a vampire in the bus, before shifting into "It's not IN the bus! It IS the bus! The bus of the undead!" When Sara and I read this issue together in a coffee shop in Oxford when we went to turn to the last page, before we even saw it, we were already saying together in our best Master Shake voice "It IS the danger room." That is not good. That is not the effect that is wanted.

Cassaday repeat/background watch. The farm guys get a triple take zoom, Emma gets a triple take, Cyclops gets a triple take zoom. Backgrounds are solid throughout. No problems here.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 7

[This post is part of a series of posts looking at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men issue by issue. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

In this issue the team does a stand alone thing, taking down a monster with the Fantastic Four; meanwhile Wing dies in an ominous way suggesting that it means bigger things.

We are hooked immediately by a mysterious voiceover -- change is coming -- and Wing on the edge of suicide because he has been depowered. Cassaday does an amazing job with the background for a specific reason -- this will turn out to be the danger room. If Cassaday skimps here people will go back and say Oh that's why it was so empty. And someone will suggest many scenes were in the danger room. Before we know this is the danger room, we are shocked to discover Wing's friend Hisako suddenly wants him to commit suicide; after we will have to completely reevaluate what we have seen: a great fake-out. Someone with fortelling powers confirms that this death is a big deal. Something is coming, and whedon knows how to make us care, in part because we have spent time with Wing. He matters to us.

The title page spread is fantastic and elegant: Colossus surfs on top of the X-jet; below is the title. below that the team discusses how he seems psychologically. They are literally below him, and so their panels are below him, discussing what is going on beneath the surface of their friend.

Colossus, Kitty and Wolverine each get a page fighting the monster. Each page has an internal monologue. This is Whedon's thing: action reflects psychological states. Colossus and Kitty are disturbed. Wolverine is pure concentration, thinking only, after three panels of silence "I like beer." Action reflects psychology can be a bit of a cliche -- Whedon makes light of the device, and so it stands well. We get some great banter between the X-Men and the Fantastic Four: The Thing making fun of Wolverine for being Canadian; Wolverine messing with Johnny (who responds "Reed, can we be evil now?").

Brand gets an amazing character moment, standing up for herself at her performance review. This character gets our respect from now on. She is a bad-ass. Whedon is building for his final story. Again -- if we like a character early, they will matter more when they play a bigger role.

I have not been talking about themes. I do not have much to say in this department. Weigh in. These Whedon posts may be too thin to continue with, though I like that they are easy to do.

Cassaday repeat/background watch. Wolverine's face is used twice, Emma and Scott are doubled in separate panels. This is better than his last issues. Worse is the use of photographs for backgrounds: photos of New York fill in for New York for pretty much no reason; they tank the aesthetic integrity. It is especially bad because no where else in this issue does Cassaday skimp on the backgrounds as he has a tendency to in earlier issues, as I have pointed out.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 6

[This post is part of a series of posts looking at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run issue by issue. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post].

In this issue we learn that Ord is from a planet he believes is destined to be destroyed by a mutant; that is why he is trying to destroy all mutants. He tries to get away, and the X-Men stop him.

Wolverine goes nuts with a string of censored curse words. His "Diplomatic #%$@ *#%$@ *#%$@*#%$@ *#%$@* immunity?" starts the issue, and is a nice piece of exposition. You just pick this conversation up in the middle and know what is going on, and are also entertained by it. When Fury calls Wolverine "tiny" you simply KNOW, with a single word, that this guy is in control of this situation. You can never have read a comic book before and you will get the power dynamic in a single word. Whedon knows what he is doing. The guy tells a solid story.

Whedon told an interviewer he spent more time coming up with the acronym SWORD (Sentient Worlds Observation and Response Department) to match SHIELD than he did writing the issue. That is an exaggeration to be sure, but he did a great job.

Cassaday draws some really funny mutants who attack Benetech looking for the cure. Look in the background -- I think one of them might be Rorschach from Watchmen.

There is also a nice chiming of SHIELD knocking the mutants outside out with sleeping gas dropped from ominous flying contraptions and Agent Brand's story about how the Breakworld is destined to be destroyed. It actually took me a moment to realize the image was not of the Breakworld's future she described. Whedon does this to make the conversation more visually interesting and he succeeds well. Whedon is so talky that it is important that he does this kind of thing (as he has done before in the two danger room scenes) so it is not all talking heads.

Also elegant in this issue is the fastball special. The fastball special -- in which Colossus throws Wolverine -- is a classic, but dated and corny. Whedon gets to eat his cake and have it too by having Wolverine give a knowing look to both Colossus and the reader; turn the page and you get the two page splash image of Wolverine in the air and Colossus finishing the arc of the throw. Cassaday draws swirling clouds to show how the air is effected by Wolverine flying. The moment is possibly the best in the run.

Whedon will not wrap up his arc without that Whedonesque final beat, the hook to keep everyone on board (it is any wonder Whedon fans are so rabid: he made us like this): a voice tells Emma that when the time comes, they will deal with Kitty first.

With a few problems here and there Whedon's first arc is in the final analysis very good.

Cassaday repeat/background watch. Fury gets a double take, Emma gets a double take, Fury gets another double take, Brand gets a double take. Ord and Rao have a two page conversation in a white matrix, much of the conversation between the X-Men and Fury takes place in green matrix, Brand and the X-men have a conversation in a blue matrix, and in the end Kitty and Peter just get blue sky white clouds. That last one is fine with me; the other ones not so much.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 5

[This post is part of a series of posts looking issue by issue at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run. For more of the same click the Astonishing X-Men link at the bottom of this post.]

In this issue, the team rallies back against Ord and Dr Rao and the newly returned Colossus saves everyone before SHIELD shows up and stops the whole thing.

Cyclops wakes in a dreamscape caused by him being knocked out; Whedon uses the opportunity to make fun of code names (Ability-to-hop-man) and busy nineties costume design (all those pockets). This is all good fun, as is Kitty's demand to know if Colossus back from the grave is "a clone, or a robot or, yeah, a ghost or an alternate universe thingie .. a shapeshifter or illusionist." The switched body explanation makes no sense, but I do not really care about continuity stuff that much. Emma has a nice bit where she mentally controls two guards to vomit uncontrollably for 48 hours every time they hear the words "parsley," "intractable," or "longitude" which is awesome; Cyclops says in small letters "my girlfriend is very weird." And funny. Emma putting Dr. Rao between her and Ord is also a nice character moment. You can read comic book after comic book and have nothing like this. It is simple and small, but it is important. Comics should be fun, and a little silly goes a long way.

But there is a mistake brewing here -- I could talk about it later, but this is as good a time as any. At the end of issue three Hank says the problem they face is about the bodies Benetech is running tests on; Hank says "why does nothing ever stay buried" and Scott ends issue 3 with a muted "Jean?" In issue four they go looking for bodies at Benetech: Cyclops says "we probably won't find anything conclusive" and Emma says icily "Like a warm body?" Then Wolverine and Hank smell something: "Female. Dead." When they find the body, someone they don't know, Cyclops says "This can't be the only body." Then Colossus shows up. Issue four or five was promoted with an image of the Phoenix and the promise of a return; it may have been the same image as Cyclops's hallucination, but even if it is not that image serves as a parody of what we were expecting.

A fake-out can be great fun -- I loved the Ultimate/Regular-universe fake-out that led to the first appearance of the Zombie universe. But there the Zombies were pretending to be something that looked like the regular Marvel universe. Reed was tricked as we were. Similarly in Ocean's 12 much of the film is a fake out -- we are tricked as the Nightfox is. But here, we are led to believe the X-Men are looking for Jean for one, maybe two issues (depending on when you figure out you should give up on her return) -- and we have no surrogate in the narrative being tricked in this way, nor anyone in the narrative doing the tricking. All of those lines I quoted above are part Whedon's plan to make us think they are looking for Jean; but they must have known they were not looking for Jean moments after the final panel of 3 but before the first panel of four. Whedon is tricking us directly with no narrative surrogate of any kind. I am going to be bold and call this a reasonably sized gaff on Whedon's part, a full-on error.

I would like some debate on this point, if you are up for it.

Cassaday Repeat/Background watch. Cassaday reuses an image of Cyclops, a zoom in on Kitty and Colossus, a double take on Colossus, another double take on Colossus, another double take on Cyclops, a double take on Emma, a double take on Ord's weapon, a double take on Wolverine, and a double take on Ord. Many panels of Cyclops have no background, which is ok-- he is on the floor for those scenes, and a few panels are in a dream scape. Cyclops and Kitty have a conversation in an interesting space -- a red alien area underneath Benetech, but for much of that conversation and a whole page of the kids back at the school there is no background of any kind except for the shaded color. That, to me is a mistake, especially since early in those scenes a background is established. Cassaday just decides not to continue to draw it. Many panels in the fight with Ord have no background for a reason (that bold yellow is used again to communicate a strike), but many have no background for no reason, and then some do have a background -- it is all pretty random. You may think this lack of background is for emphasis. But it is not. I checked panel after panel for that kind of explanation. It works sometimes, but it is in no way consistent enough to call it a technique.

Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men 4

[This post is part of an issue by issue look at Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men run; for more of the same, click the Astonishing X-Men label at the bottom of this post.]

In this issue we find out more about Ord's background, his origin on a warrior world. The team goes to Benetech to find out about the mutant that Rao has been experimenting on, and Ord shows up at the school, fighting two children and de-powering one.

Cassaday is dead on in this issue: the opening shot of Ord on his home world, Ord confronting the two children in their pajamas (the girl drops her toothbrush which is pictured in mid air, a nice touch), and the tall vertical panels for the ascent of Kitty and later the descent of Wing and simple and effective. He reuses a shot of the children, which is ok, and he does a triple take of Kitty for great effect -- as she realizes Colossus has returned.

Whedon's authorial voice here is noticeable and likable: "As deaths go, its not the funniest" Kitty says. The conversation between the kids is great -- Whedon has Wing do a funny mid-sentence shift that is wonderfully not signaled with any punctuation. Classic Whedon is the awkward conversation between Ord and the kids at the X-Mansion. Ord is looking for a fight and he ends up putting a hand to his forehead in frustration and saying "And you're sure they're not here ... And you don't know where they went ... This is very frustrating." Also quintessentially Whedon is how this foolishness suddenly becomes something very serious, as Wing is de-powered just to sent the X-Men a message.

Having brought Kitty back to the X-Men, he brings Colossus back. Fans had a big thing over this -- Colossus died in a very heart rending issue (so they say -- I have this issue on my CD-ROM of all the Uncanny issues, and it is bad). Lots of people thought he should stay dead. But like Morrison's New X-Men Whedon's run is relatively self contained (with the exception of drawing on Morrison's run), to the point where I simply do not care. This is why fans love and hate these auteur comic book writers: they bring a new level of quality at the expense of continuity and sacred cows, and also at the expense of that editorial voice that can last decades no matter who writes -- Whedon always sounds like Whedon; Morrison always sounds like Morrison. Many fans angrily dismiss this as ego. I think it depends on the quality of the ego -- Morrison and Whedon are great writers.