Does Chris Claremont’s celebrated return to the X-Men work in an All-New Marvel Now! landscape very different from the one that he left years ago? Read our spoiler-free review below to find out.
Written by Chris Claremont
Illustrated by Todd Nauck
Colors by Rochelle Rosenberg
Lettered by Cory PetitNIGHTCRAWLER IS BACK!
Newly-returned from the afterlife, veteran X-Man Kurt Wagner finds himself in a world that’s a far cry from the one he left: Professor Xavier is dead, Cyclops is on the run, and the X-Men are divided. But determined not to let his new lease on life go to waste, Nightcrawler hits the road alongside Wolverine, eager to right some wrongs and safeguard the future mutantkind…and he’s going to do it by the means he loves most: swashbuckling, lady-charming and—of course—BAMFing!
Let’s start at the end of “Nightcrawler” #1 – no spoilers – just a teaser caption for issue #2 that says “Can we go home again?” That phrase teases what’s to come from a plot perspective, but there’s no doubt that Chris Claremont is intending for some double-meaning there. In fact, it’s a good question for the very last page of his first real longform foray back into the X-Men since 2009-2010s’ “X-Men Forever” (which *whispering* wasn’t even canon): how did Chris Claremont do coming home again?
The answer is an unequivocal, “yes, mostly.”
I say “mostly” because for a little while there’s a definite “been there, done that” feel to the opening issue. Though Claremont works through that to eventually hit ground and start running, the book begins in the kinda corny, kinda expected way you might have feared it would. Don’t get me wrong – there is a definite comfort food feeling to watching Logan and Nightcrawler sparring around the Danger Room. There’s also a definite hokeyness that Claremont almost has to work through to not only get Nightcrawler up to speed with where the characters are, but himself as a writer as well. There’s a great deal of expository work done through Nightcrawler as a “reborn” character. “This is Wolverine – this is what I remember about him. This is Storm – this is what I remember about her.” and so forth.
By the time Nightcrawler leaves the Jean Grey School, however, “Nightcrawler” the comic book starts to connect a lot more with its nostalgia factor. As Kurt sips tea in front of a couple of giant framed pictures of famous covers to “Classic X-Men” and “Excalibur”, the truly fun aspects of having a legend like Claremont back on board start to reveal themselves. For Claremont megafans, this is basically Claremont X-Men porn. Also, by taking “fish out of water” Kurt away from the school, we spend less time on sensory overload of coming back to a world he barely recognizes and a little more time with an intimate look at who he is as a character and the heart of what he left behind on Earth. This culminates in a heart-tugging reunion and an incredible homage to a classic Nightcrawler moment (the issue was “Uncanny X-Men” #168, in case anyone wants to compare).
Todd Nauck is responsible for capturing that moment, as well as all the other fine art in this inaugural issue. Nauck is the definition of a “reliable artist” who made a lot of hay in the “Invincible” universe lately for Image Comics. His colorful cape sensibilities play right in to what Claremont is doing on “Nightcrawler” and, to that end, Rochelle Rosenberg’s colors pop off the page too. Nauck’s characters have traditionally been very facially expressive and he works well with making chaos on the page look clear. In that way, he’s a really nice fit for the X-Men, especially in the current status quo, where the X-Men have been allowed to be playful and light at times (mainly around the school).
Nauck nimbly depicts the early sparring scenes, making them more interesting to watch than they are to read. Once past those scenes, the synergy between artist and writer shows that this is more than a pairing of a legendary writer with an established superhero artist. This is a creative team that is capable of calling upon some very affecting references and squeezing every drop of nostalgia out of some iconic and storied characters.
What begins as the perfect picture of a writer trying to find his feet with a classic character again, ends as a celebration of all of the stuff that made that character great. While issue #1 doesn’t blow the doors off of the X-Men status quo, it’s not trying to. It’s going to be fun to see Claremont sort of work around the back, with a solo title, rather than trying to run things or recapture past glories again. Fans who drifted away from the X-Men titles in recent years (maybe even because of the lack of Claremont) would do well to come back around and check out this title. The early exposition will get you caught up, clunky as it might be, and after that you just might be reminded of why you fell in love with these characters all those years ago.
Final Verdict: 7.7 – Buy
