Customer Reviews

Ultimate X-Men Vol. 10: Cry Wolf

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

***This review covers all three paperbacks of Brian K Vaughan's first year on UXM, including The Tempest, Cry Wolf, and The Most Dangerous Game. All three are absolutely fantastic, and are collected in the Hardcover Vol 5, and will be reprinted in a forthcoming "Ultimate Edition" paperback within the next year or so, I believe.***


I've posted reviews for hardcovers 1-3 in this series. Reviews that trashed the bloated, stupid mess that Mark Millar made of the first three years of Ultimate X-Men. In the issues contained in this volume, Brian Vaughn pulls off a work of genius: he manages to work with everything he's been given, and make it real, personal, exciting, fun, and actually resets the book on the path it should have been on all along: presenting the X-men as teenagers, who behave like teenagers, with all of their problems and flaws, plus the problems of learning about their mutant powers and roles. He makes the characters lovable. He writes plotlines that are taught and tense. He writes dialog that provides a particular voice to each character, and is frequently laugh-out-loud funny.

The artwork is exceptional throughout the whole book, with Brandon Peterson's typically serviceable pencils jacked up to ultimate levels by the incredible inking and coloring, and Stuart Immonen's typically genius work perfectly fitting the "teen" feel of the book.

Let's get specific. The first arc, The Tempest, features a gleeful gutting of the Mr Sinister concept from the original series. This is a trademark of Vaughn's UXM-- take a familiar character or storyline, and recast it in a way that gives a wink and a nod to the old, but reinvents the concept in an unexpected way. Who cares if you loved the original Sinister? You can see him back in action in recent X-men titles like Messiah Complex, ok? He's scary AND ridiculous here, and it works.

The second arc, Cry Wolf, once again ties some "legacy" concepts in new knots: Gambit is introduced, as well as the villains Fenris. The Gambit character works well here-- amazingly, Vaughn sets up the relationship between him and Rougue so well. Gambit's powers are used very effectively, as well--the fight between him and the X-Men, including an awesome throw-down with Wolverine, is perfectly choreographed!

The third arc, The Most Dangerous Game, is another genius reinterpretation of a classic: Longshot/Spiral/Mojo!! It is brilliantly plotted with a kicker twist. The character of Longshot is very well done, including his powers, which are used in some really clever ways.

Throughout each of these arcs, there is an excellent balance of character development and action. The fight scenes are are very well worked-out, with the character's powers feeling real, and playing off of each other in surprising ways. This is another monster improvement over Millar's UXM. In the earlier issues, the characters' powers were jacked up through the roof and they were always used in the bluntest manner possible. Vaughn takes the hard road and shows the X-Men regularly getting their butts kicked by resourceful villains. When they win battles, they win by working together and letting their powers play off of each other, or by digging in to reserves of powers or using their powers in new ways. (And NOT new ways like Pheonix cutting out a piece of the Earth's crust and sending it into outer space, ahem, Mark Millar, that was just STUPID.)

But the real focus of these stories is putting the characters on new footing--grounding their personalities, personal stories, and relationships with each other in utterly credible ways. Each character gets space and BV establishes motivations for them that will carry through the next two years of the book. Incredibly, he manages to work with all the plot and character elements that have been preestablished, and in many cases, he makes those prior events more believable and meaningful in retrospect than they ever were in their original forms, due to Millar's hack jobs. For example, Storm's relationship with Beast was always completely contrived. It never felt REAL, just invented for a plot device. But Vaughn uses it to establish motivation for Storm. He uses it to show her character, to give her motivation. He makes their relationship poignant in retrospect and gives it power and weight.

Professor X is, thank god, toned way down from the inexplicable maniac that Millar portrayed him as in issues 1-36. He's still icy cold and calculating, but hardly the stupid, deluded jackass prone to speechifying and pontificating he was. He's generally just less of an ever-present nuisance. His character takes a backseat so the kids can drive.

Jean Grey and Cyclops's relationship gets a much deeper treatment from Vauhgn as well. He's frightened of her powers, jealous of her mental intimacy with Xavier. Vaughn subtly introduces the idea that Cyclops is terribly scared to lose Jean-- to her powers, or to an identity as a world-class telepath--it is clear he is starting to cling. You finally feel the love--at least from Scott! All so ominous...It is all done with subtlety.

Wolverine and Storm work brilliantly together. Vaughn seems to have been inspired by the deep and conflicted relationship that Claremont established in the original series. The character's play off each other to reveal each other's personalities and inner turmoil. Previously, these characters were shown to be moody and conflicted, but in a vacuum--they always lacked motivation. Here, by putting them together in dramatic situations and deep conversations, we actually see what makes them tic.

Other character's seem to have their own natural pairings that allow their personalities and personal stories to bounce off of each other: Dazzler/Angel, Colossus/Nightcrawler, Iceman/Kitty Pride, this gang of six junior leaguers also get their due, with deep relationships and stories of their own. They also provide tons of comic relief. Vaughn's gift for humorous dialog shines when writing these characters. I was constantly laughing at the way they relentlessly crack on each other.

Back a few issues, I was pretty skeptical when Dazzler was introduced as a pissed-off (and utterly fake and cheesy) punk rock singer. But BKV does the character right-- she's hilarious and believable. In a lesser writer's hands, she'd be a caricature of teen angst with a loud mouth. In this gifted writer's hands, she's intelligent, disaffected, funny, and, unbeknownst to herself, completely lost and crazy.

Similarly, when Millar suggested Colossus was gay, I took it as yet another ploy to add "cool", "edgy", and "contemporary" elements to the book (another Millarism that ruined the first 3 years). But Vaughn makes him real. He's twisted up inside and feels like a mutant among mutants.

I could go on, but by now you get the picture: it is all here. Fantastic art, great characters, inventive plots and battles...this is the Ultimate X-Men we've been waiting for, and a worthy companion book to Ultimate Spider-Man, or Ultimate Fantastic Four. This is a work of super-hero genius, and luckily, it's just the first of two years with BKV at the helm!

Of all of Marvel's Ultimate books, Ultimate X-Men has always been the one I've liked the least, even when Mark Millar debuted it. Cry Wolf finds Wolverine, Storm, Colossus, Rogue, Iceman, Shadowcat, and Dazzler at the Coney Island fair, and the gang's fun comes to an end rather quickly when the cajun mutant for hire Gambit makes his presence felt and kidnaps Rogue. The X-Men assemble and track them down, culminating in a predictable series of developments that ends with the team being short a member. Considering that the Ultimate line is supposed to be new takes on classic stories, almost everything about Cry Wolf is predictable, right to it's ending. What's even more surprising is that Brian K. Vaughn, a writer who has given us smashing comics like Y: The Last Man, Ex Machina, and Runaways, could come up with something as hokey as this, but then again, he probably didn't have much say in terms of plot development. Not to mention that longtime fan favorite X-Man Gambit's characterization finds him reduced from an ultra cool character to a second rate player aching to have his backstory revealed. Veteran X-Men artist Andy Kubert supplies his usual array of solid pencil work, but it's not enough to save Cry Wolf from being pretty mediocre. All in all, Ultimate X-Men faithfuls will want to check this out, but it's nothing special in the least.

for the most part i agree with the other reviewer. some more thoughts: i hated the "ultimate" design for gambit. he really looked like a slob, and not at all like the charmer we know and love. also, rogue was an extremely underdeveloped character here and definitely not a prime choice for the focus of a story arc so soon. i found myself not really caring much about her b/c this is pretty much the first ultimate story where she's the center of attention and we don't really know her at all. w/ that said, i found most of the other characterization to be decent. i like how dazzler (much much diff. from the other marvel character) is developing and hope to see more of her. also, there are some small emotional details like storm's lash-out at rogue and the last page that were handled well and proved to be highlights. all in all not the best in the series and not vaughan's best work, but if you're reading this review you're prob. going to get it anyway.

Slightly better than Brian K.Vaughan's previous sotry arc, "The Tempest", but it seems no one at Marvel has informed him that he is writing about the X-Men...

Its odd that Vaughan views Sinister as a "villian who never quite worked" and turned him in to the worst thing to happen in the Ultimate X-Men thus far, but retained virtually every aspect of such mega-hit fan favorites like the Fenris twins (note the sarcasm).

Rogue and Gambit take center stage at the great expense of hardly having the rest of the X-Men appear at all, aside from a shot out of left field involving Storm and Wolverine kissing... some build-up would have been helpful. As for Gambit and Rogue, they are so dull there is no way Vaughan could have done this by mistake. The X-Men are pretty much just there, as if the brass at Marvel forced a miminum requirement for their apperances much to Vaughan's contempt.

The Fenris twins are the only redeeming aspect to the book, not so much in how interesting they are, but it how it breaks Vaughan's trend of taking perfectly good X-Men villians and stripping them of any qualities that are interesting, inspired, creative and just plain cool while poviding no interesting "Ultimate Universe twist" what-so-ever. Although the Ultimate Fenris is almost identical to the main-stream Marvel one, the only real difference being they might be siblings, they might be married, they might be both...

Well, the gang is back, this time for a little outing at Coney Island. Gambit shows up and the party starts to get roudy. Wolverine gets his head ( and heart ) broken , Rogue gets abducted....and the usual bickering kicks in...
I really liked the art work ; the colors are wonderful. Really enjoyed the storyline and script . I think this issue is a keeper and am looking forward to July's edition.
This may not be for the ultra hard core "X" fans, but I think it's a fun read. 5 stars - Badger B

Well, this graphic novel is one of the better Ultimate X-Men I have read. This volume of Ultimate X-Men can only make one laugh and cry. A definite buy for any X-Men fan (long with the previous 9!). It's quite amazing how only 4 issues (Ultimate X-Men #50-53) can make one feel like days have passed after reading it.

Not my favorite of all the archs in Ultimate X-Men but its nice to have. The story mainly revolves around a reintroduced Gambit who is now under the employment of mutants working the corporate world. His mission to retrieve Rogue leads to conflict between the X-Men and other parties.

It has one really cool part where Gambit fights Wolveriene to a standstill. First because gambit kicks wolveriene's knee backwards, because tendons arn't bone, and second Gambit's abilities alows him to charge wolveriene's skeleton and cause him to explode. This part is far too brief.
I did not even know of these twin villians in regular 616 marvel, and they failed to impress me here.

... is going nowhere to my opinion: the only thing to see is the artwork, which is great. Maybe it's because i'm not used to the changes(especially that Dazzler look, when i expected something of a "Lavigne" look). Still the general story is 'too many things happening in too little time, and everybody running around, each to his/her work'

Dazzler said: "Yeah, team"... But where's the team?

What a boring character. Did they really have to drag him into this continuity so quickly? He brought my interest in this otherwise-fun series to a grinding halt... Not sure if I'll pick up the thread again later...