Written by: Kieron Gillen
Arted by: Tim Salvador EspinSpinning directly out of UNCANNY X-MEN comes the most important new X-Book in years, GENERATION HOPE! When Hope Summers returned from the future she triggered the rebirth of the mutant gene. Five lights appeared on Cerebra and five mutants’ powers came to life, but their activations have been chaotic and dangerous, nearly killing each of them. It was only the touch of Hope that saved their lives. With Rogue and the four new mutants who were gathered in UNCANNY X-MEN, Hope heads to Japan to join Cyclops, Wolverine and the fifth light. But will this new light be a hero or a villain? Only KIERON GILLEN (THOR) and SALVA ESPIN (SAVAGE SHE-HULK) know!
The Kieron Gillen era in the X-Men universe begins! He’s here and in charge of growing the new X-Men universe in its new direction. What’s with all these new characters? We’ll find out soon enough, and you can find out what I thought about it after the cut!
Put plainly, this book is kind of frightening. Hope, the new savior of mutant kind, seems to be exerting so much control over these new characters, and it’s so ambiguous as to whether she’ll use it for bad or good, that I’m legitimately unsure of how this will play out. Will she end up on the side of the angels? Or was Bishop right? More frighteningly, is Burpee right?! Oh me, oh my, I don’t know how to process that.
But if we’re just talking about the book itself, it was very enjoyable to read. Aside from the frightening fact she can seemingly control all of the 5 Lights with nothing but her words, she seems to be taking on a heroic path with her charges; like saving Tokyo from the 5th Light, Kenji, whose powers have overtaken him.
Everything about it feels like classic X-Men adventures. Traveling to other places in the Blackbird with young teenage mutants unsure of their powers, but still trying to make the world a better place? Gillen’s clearly done his homework, and has a love for the universe. His plotting was brilliant as well, because not only do we get a re-introduction to the characters that are starring in this book, but it’s not boring! We’re put in the thick of the action, without a load of unnecessary dialogue slowing things down.
The art, while not as strong as the words, is still serviceable, and I can see why it was chosen, it does well to match the tone of the book, as well as convey the action in an almost manga-style, echoing the locale of Japan. There are even tentacles! What is with Japan and tentacles? I imagine this was Gillen and Espin’s little joke, and I laughed when I saw it.
If there’s one pet peeve I have with the title at the moment, it’s the lack of a cohesive character design for the characters in the book. Kenji, for instance, looks wildly different in the book as he does in Greg Land’s headshot of him. Teon is another that seems to differ in the headshot, the interior of the book, AND the cover, from Olivier Coipel, as well as Idie. As a matter of fact, the only characters that seem to have any stability in their designs are Laurie and Gabriel, who I’m assuming stay the same because blue skin is hard to differ from artist to artist. But in the case of Idie, it’s especially frustrating, because not only did she look different in the three different pictures, but in the book she looked vaguely Latin, while the cover had her with an afro, and the Greg Land teaser had her with braids and her skin was noticeably lighter. Am I nitpicking? Maybe, but that doesn’t change the fact it’s there.
But be that as it may, the book is a great jumping on point for new X-Men readers, with loads of tentacle fun and action for us all!
Final Verdict: 7.5 – Buy
