Universes cross over, and new superhero friendships are formed in a fun, stereotype-breaking issue of “All New X-Men”.
Written by Brian Michael Bendis
Illustrated by Mahmud AsrarDimension-hopping is something of an X-Men rite of passage and it’s about time the All-New X-Men took the plunge! I guess you don’t always have to travel Miles away to visit a new place . . . But will the web they find themselves tangled in Ultimately bring about their end?
When the Ultimate Universe was first introduced 14 years ago, Marvel tried to strike a balance between appeasing old school fans and appealing to new readers. They promised that the two worlds would never cross over, and keep the new French hating Captain America and the rest of the Ultimates away from their classic 616 counterparts. Of course sales will eventually trump almost any editorial mandate, and three years ago the OG Peter Parker and the awesome Miles Morales finally met in “Spider-Men,” opening the door to even more universe jumping. Now the original X-Men are getting involved, and lead to another appearance of Ultimate Spider-Man alongside 616 characters in “All New X-Men” #32.
After crossing paths with a young mutant just developing her teleporting/space-time warping powers, the young X-Men have been thrown to separate ends of the Earths. Angel is in the Savage Lands, Beast in Latvareria, Iceman is stuck far underground, while Jean is further away than anyone else. It looks like New York, it is New York, just not her New York. Miles Morales takes a break from being the only popular thing in the Ultimate Universe to become Jean’s new BFF, and the pair set out to find a way back into the good ol’ 616.
The reason that the Ultimate Universe was created was that typical opinion that the weight of decades of history within the regular Marvel U had become a hindrance to new stories. Where others see a challenge, however, Brian Michael Bendis sees an opportunity. The universes have already crossed paths at this point, with Miles at the center of this event. He knows there is another world, another Spider-Man, another group of heroes, and he thinks that is just dandy. A typical superhero team up involves everyone distrusting each other, and beating each other up until they begrudgingly join sides; heck, that’s what happened in The Avengers film and everyone still loved it. Miles and Jean, on the other hand, hit it off right away with only a bit of telekinetic help. Bendis just skips over what could have been a long series of dreary stand offs, and crafts a story that’s much more fun, vastly improving the pace of the story.
While Miles is obviously the main attraction in the issue, Bendis doesn’t forget that this is a team book, and the rest of the X-Men each are on their own adventures. Bendis pulls from even more Marvel history, and uses this opportunity to explore and expand the world of these characters. Iceman and Beast take a dip into the world of the Fantastic Four, X-23 pops up in an unlikely sporting event, while Angel reminds the reader that dinosaurs and X-Men totally still exist in the Savage Lands. It’s almost like Bendis is speaking to Ultimate Universe fans, and telling them that the regular Marvel U is pretty cool as well. This issue has a huge scope, but Bendis’ signature dialog keeps things from getting to complicated and slow.
If you finish the issue and get the impression that Brian Michael Bendis was trying to give artist Mahmud Asrar a stress induced nervous breakdown, it would be perfectly understandable. This guy covers more artistic ground in a single issue than some artists do in an entire run. In a couple dozen pages Asrar has to draw dinosaurs, mole people, an army of Dooms, an alternate Spider-Man and even a couple sharks just for good measure — not to mention approximately a hundred different locations as the team gets split up. And it all looks good, every bit of it. Even the scenes that are set underwater or deep in the Earth have striking details and fine line work. It would have been very easy to just to make the mole people an ill-defined and vaguely threatening mass, for example, but you can see fingers and horns, even as the swarm gets larger and larger.
Continued belowThe appearance of Miles doesn’t make things any easier for Asrar. On the contrary, the artist is forced to condense the 30-some issues of “Ultimate Spider-Man” into two pages of non-exposition catch up, and the results are incredibly impressive. The spread is visually interesting, and hits all the big emotional moments of Miles’ crime fighting career without overloading the reader. Asrar does stick close to the visual style of Sara Pichelli and David Marquez found in the regular Ultimate Spidey book, so if a reader of “All New X-Men” wants to jump into Miles’ story it will be an easy transition. This issue is light on action and fighting, but the art doesn’t feel stagnate or boring. When Spider-Man and Jean fly across the skyline, Asrar infuses the images with energy and motion, and is indicative of the enjoyable tone of the whole issue.
The main draw of “All New X-Men” #32 is the cross-universe appearance of Miles Morales, but we never forget that this is a team book. Brian Michael Bendis crafts a story that lets all the X-Men explore the far corners the Ultimate Marvel U and clearly set up a bunch of different and interesting story threads, while Mahmud Asrar fills every page of the issue with great art, and doesn’t falter under the weight of the million different visual elements Bendis throws at him. “All New-X=Men” #32 is a very fun read, and sets a good pace and a wide scope for the rest of the crossover, all while avoiding the tropes of superhero team ups.
Final Verdict: 8.0
