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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
18 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
3.0 out of 5 stars
A comics classic spoiled by re-coloration.,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Marvel Masterworks: Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1 (Hardcover)
Let's start with the obvious. This is one of the all-time classic series of comic books, reprinted in a beautiful new edition. The story is good (although Claremont's writing would improve in later issues) and the art, by Dave Cockrum, is simply stunning. And, of course, these stories served to introduce the most influential and popular Marvel characters since Spider-Man in the early 60s.
So why the three stars? I was comparing this book to my original comics and I realized that the coloration had been changed significantly. This may seem like a minor point -- the pencil work and inking is, obviously, exactly the same as it was in the originals -- but the choice of colors used in this book does a lot to determine the "atmosphere" of the stories, and in this reprint, the atmosphere is a lot brighter, featuring noticeably more primary colors than the original comic books. In some cases -- e.g. the character Colossus -- a lot of subtle detail, created by the use of different shades of the same color, has been eliminated. The space-opera scenes are a lot more "cartoony" looking, with bright blue replacing the subtle blue-grey that was originally used for the exterior of the spaceships. Throughout the stories, panels that were previously colored in subtle earthy shades are now done in bright primary colors or some other high-contrast color scheme that completely changes the impression the artwork makes on one's eyes. This may seem like a lot of nit-picking, and I realize that the re-coloring was probably a mechanical requirement for reprinting the stories in full-color (rather than four-color), but I don't feel like the changes are really insignificant. Compared to the original comics, this book looks like a Saturday morning cartoon show. Considering that this is an extremely expensive deluxe edition, it seems to me like Marvel could have spent a little more time to get it closer to the originals.
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum reinvent the X-Men,
By Lawrance M. Bernabo (The Zenith City, Duluth, Minnesota) - See all my reviews (VINE VOICE) (COMMUNITY FORUM 04) (TOP 500 REVIEWER) (HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)
This review is from: Masterworks: The Uncanny X-Men # 94-100 + Giant Size X-Men #1 (Paperback)
I greeted the new and improved X-Men with less than open arms. I had been a big fan of the original Uncanny X-Men, which had gone out in a blaze of glory with comics drawn by Jim Steranko and Neal Adams. When Chris Claremont and Dave Cockrum revived the title in 1975, after "X-Men" had been reduced to a reprint comic, I was not overly thrilled with the decision to jettison most of the original group. If Cyclops had not stayed then I might have given up on the title right then and there, but this was the old days when you could still buy every title in the Marvel universe each month for less than five bucks (remember, this was when you could fill up your car and get change back on a $5 bill). So I stuck around and saw how Claremont, Cockrum, and John Byrne turned the "X-Men" into one of the premier comic books in the land. This collection stops short of the point where Bryne became the artist for the series, but it still serves as a prelude to greatness. The original strength of the X-Men was that their being hunted mutants served as a subtext for various issues involving social prejudice. Claremont and Cockrum put that in an international context by having Professor X go around the world to recruit his second generation of merry mutants recruiting from the mountains of Kenya to behind the Iron Curtain. This time around we find not only that the X-Men are no longer all white, they are also not all as young as before (Banshee qualifies more as a contemporary of Charles Xavier). Also thrown into the mix is their disparate temperaments; early issues always have Wolverine and Thunderbird in a contest to see who can blow up first. This volume contains "Giant Size X-Men" #1 and issues #94-100 of "X-Men." The new X-Men are put together to rescue the old X-Men, at which point the question becomes: what do you do with thirteen X-Men? The answer is to get down to a half-dozen by having all of the original X-Men leave except for Cyclops, to have one of the new X-Men decide not to play, and then you are down to seven, one of whom is doomed to die (and if you pay attention to the group logo on the cover you can see that they telegraphed their choice from the start). Ultimately the idea of recreating the X-Men is more interesting than most of the particular stories being told in this collection. All things considered, the new X-Men are an improvement over the original group, not only in terms of their powers but also in terms of their secret identities. I mean, all things considered all Angel could do was fly and the Beast was a muscular acrobat with lots of brains (the decision to make him blue and furry admits to the character's liabilities). Storm is an exotic elemental queen trying to fit in with regular folk and Colossus remains a man-child at heart, even in this brave new world. Most importantly, Wolverine makes the Thing look like a cuddly teddy bear, giving the group a dangerous edge. Claremont liked to skate as close to that edge as possible, and eventually he would send the series over the edge with his Dark Phoenix plotline and the demise of the asparagus people.
10 of 12 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Not the first in the X-Men series, but still a good read,
By
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Marvel Masterworks: Uncanny X-Men, Vol. 1 (Hardcover)
Note: the previous reviewer's comments apply to ''Marvel Masterworks: X-Men, Vol. 1''. This volume collects ''Giant-Size X-Men #1'' plus X-Men #94-100 from 1975-76, written by Chris Claremont and penciled by Dave Cockrum. It introduces a new set of X-Men, including Wolverine, Storm, Nightcrawler, Colossus, and Banshee, though Cyclops, Jean Grey, and of course Professor Xavier are also featured, and all the old X-Men appear.
I am not an X-Men X-pert or a comics connoisseur, so I'll just give my impressions. I found the plots a bit more sophisticated than the early issues, but only a bit (a madman is threatening to launch the entire US nuclear ICBM arsenal, and the Avengers ''can't handle it right now''?) Several stories are carried over across multiple issues, giving them more time to develop, and there are hints of an overarching plot. Some of the characters show signs of -- well, perhaps not depth, but conflicting motivations at least. Cyclops in particular appears to be evolving into an anti-hero. The writing is generally pretty lame -- the supposedly humorous banter leaves me cold, and the editorial comments are tiresome, though there is an amusing inside reference in #98 where ''Stan'' (Lee) and ''Jack'' (Kirby) appear for a couple of panels, commenting on the current story. And there is an occasional high point -- Scottish housekeeper Moira MacTaggart: ''Well, if sonic blasts'll do nae guid, let's see how yon kelpie fares ... against close-range machine-gun fire!'' The art is decent; there is somewhat more realism, especially regarding military hardware (the Air Force fighters are recognizably F-15's, for instance). The colors are as usual pretty garish -- I mean, if you were building a bunch of mutant-killing robots, what colors would you paint them? Ok, blue is not bad, but magenta? The layout occasionally departs from strictly rectangular frames, as in the awesome 2-page spread in the beginning of #97 depicting an alien space battle. On the whole, I'd say this is solid entertainment, well worth the price. There are many references to earlier events, so if you're new to the series, you may want to start with the other ''X-Men Vol. 1'' and work your way up. Also, be warned -- the last story in the book ends on a cliffhanger, so you'll have to get ''Uncanny X-Men Vol. 2'' as well to find out what happens!
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