Written by Dan Way
Penciled by Jason Pearson and Sara Pichelli“MONSTROUS,” PART 2 OF 4: When the monstrous Fin Fang Foom attacks Tokyo, the X-Men head into action! While the Children of the Atom do battle with the reptilian menace that is Foom, Armor contends with matters of a more personal nature. Can the X-Men save Tokyo without losing Armor? Plus, a treacherous plot involving Roxxon Oil is brewing on Monster Island!
What’s so astonishing about all this, anyway? Let’s think about that after the jump.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the big draw on this run of Astonishing X-Men is Jason Pearson. Maybe there’s some pocket of the internet that worships the ground Dan Way walks on, but I’ve yet to find it. Usually, when Way does good, the reaction is mild amazement: “But isn’t this the Wolverine: Origins guy?!” Jason Pearson, meanwhile, is a consistent fan-favorite, although I suspect he may have drifted from the A-list into a dedicated cult territory over the years. Still, there are worse things to have than a dedicated cult, and there are few better artists to be, by my reckoning, than Jason Pearson. In case you haven’t guessed, I’m in the cult; I started buying Astonishing X-Men again solely for his art.
This is fortuitous for me because the entire construction of “Monstrous” uses his art as its center. This is a store that’s stripped to bare minimum in just about every non-Pearson regard. Looking back at the issue after reading it a couple times, the panels are spaced-out to the point that I remembered them as being even fewer in number than they actually were. Things are given physical space on the page to unfold leisurely — it’s uncommon in these 22 pages to find a panel with three word bubbles in it, let alone more. Even then, the dialogue in those bubbles is sparse and utilitarian, moving the story along in the fewest possible words so that they do little to obscure Pearson’s art. Even the plot is dead-simple, because it trusts the strength of the art to carry it. Pearson’s art, that is.
And yet, at least half of this issue of Astonishing X-Men is drawn by Sara Pichelli. Is this a bad thing, necessarily? No. She’s a fine artist, and seeing her draw major characters like the X-Men is always welcome (even if thrilling compositions of “the X-Men standing around against featureless anti-backgrounds” suggests a rush job). This is on top of the next part of “Monstrous” being drawn by Nick Bradshaw. That’s on top of a secondary storyline, by an entirely different creative team, being brought in on alternate issues, presumably to give Pearson more time to draw. And yet, this issue we get maybe ten pages of him.
It’s not that Pichelli isn’t up to the task, and Bradshaw’s weird new way of giving everyone teeny-tiny faces aside, he’s not exactly a slouch. Still, it’s like going to a solo concert only for said soloist to disappear for the entire middle of the performance. This arc was built for Pearson, and Pearson’s out for a bit. Fill-in artists are far from the apocalypse, but this is a story that seems to be actively suppressing itself in order to bring the star artist to the forefront. It’s a credit to the inkers and colorists — as well as Pichelli herself — that everything meshes pretty seamlessly; the transition from one artist to the other is subtle and fluid, retaining Pearson’s bold, clear lines and solid blacks. (The muted color palette throughout is the unsung hero of the book’s consistency, except I’m now singing it, so there.) The shift is only really jarring once you realize it’s already happened.
For Dan Way’s part, he could do well to keep it this simple more often. I’ve never been particularly sold by his Machiavellian aspirations for Daken, which too often seem like he started with “Daken is a genius” and then had to work backward from there. In “Monstrous,” things are easy to follow, which makes all the difference. Mentallo has taken control of Monster Island and is using it to extort a corporation; the X-Men are having trouble fighting a giant monster; Armor is dealing with the death of a relative. Armor’s story is the starkest shift from the usual Way dynamic — with everyone’s motive plain to see, there’s a chance for emotion to creep into things, which is weird to see in a Dan Way tale. Weird, but not necessarily bad.
The crucial question, though: does the book astonish? No. Not really. Even the Pearson stuff, which is the jewel the crown’s been built around, has a fairly anonymous feel this issue, as if he was just as rushed as Pichelli. It’s not just Karl Story’s inks — especially because he’s a great inker. Look at Way and Pearson’s last big collaboration, the Deadpool: Wade Wilson’s War mini-series, and you can see a difference like night and day. Pearson’s slicker here. Less detailed. Less astonishing.
Final Verdict: 6.5 / Such promise, and yet…
