X-Factor 13 cover featured Columns Reviews 

“X-Factor” #13-24

By | June 17th, 2019
Posted in Columns, Reviews | % Comments

Welcome back children of the atom, to our ongoing coverage of “X-Factor.” We last let our plucky private detectives in a perilous predicament in Mutant Town. Things don’t get easier for our favorite mutant B-listers, but tragedy and hilarity is sure to ensue. Let’s see how these issues stack up in the sprawling “X-Factor” epic.

Many Lives of Madrox (12-17)
Written by Peter David
Illustrated by Khoi Pham, and Pablo Raimondi
Inked by Sandu Florea, and Pablo Raimondi
Colored by Brian Reber
Lettered by Cory Petit

The first two arcs in “X-Factor” are both concerned with outside events. The first was all about ‘House of M’ and ‘Decimation’ and the second immediately was taken over by ‘Civil War’ despite being about rival detective agencies. So its nice that in ‘Many Lives of Madrox,’ we get a chance to focus on a story that totally belongs to X-Factor. There’s a lot going on in this one (as there always is)but basically, this is a story about Jamie Madrox trying to find himself- literally. He’s decided to round up his errant dupes, to make himself whole. It’s a great excuse to have Madrox running around getting into all sorts of different kinds of adventures.

One dupe for example, introduced in the ‘Civil War’ story, is a SHIELD agent. This leads to a story of mistaken identity, a HYDRA cell, and “cut off one head, and two others shall take its place” taken to a wild extreme. We also meet Pastor John, a dupe who’s started a family in a small town in Vermont, and Detective Madrox, a dupe with an alcohol problem.

This gives each story a chance to go into a different genre. We get a spy thriller, a small town thriller, and a downbeat detective story, all of which Peter David lampshades with his typical meta humor. But each story also gets to be the sort of high concept sci-fi that I love. When you are a Multiple Man, your internal struggles become external, and you literally have to confront yourself. Agent Madrox is a hardass who follows the rules because part of Jamie longs for structure. Pastor John finds peace in a simple life because there’s a part of Jamie that still has faith. Detective Madrox is an alcoholic mess because there’s part of Jamie that’s filled with nihilistic depression. I’ll probably point this out every volume, but Multiple Man is an amazing idea for a character and Peter David is still finding new ways to explore what that life must be like.

This story is a lot more focused than the last two, but it’s still got that soapy “X-Men” thing of introducing tons of disparate stuff. Sometimes, an issue commits to a certain theme, or sometimes a character beat gets to play out slowly over a few stories, and sometimes a totally random mystery is seeded. It’s great serialized storytelling.

Like take issue #13. It’s essentially a redo of the groundbreaking issue #87 from the original run of “X-Factor” (also written by David) The team meets with a shrink to talk about the story so far. Showing how everyone on the team reacts to a psychologist is a great story structure and this issue mimics the original down to the doctor’s hidden face eventually revealed to be the Doc Samson at the end. (David also also famously wrote about Doc Samson in his epic “Hulk” run in the 80s).

X-Factor 16 M and Siryn

The B-plots all follow the rest of the cast. Guido is dealing with the fallout of getting turned into a Manchurian Candidate. Rictor is balancing an attraction to Quicksilver, while knowing that he’s full of crap. But the highlight is Monet and Siryn who, after both sleeping with Jamie dupes, decide to be more active about their friendship and take a trip to Paris. Monet (in a Rolling Stones t-shirt for some reason?) and Siryn (…I don’t know how to begin describing her look) try to go shopping, get involved in the local mutant scene, and end up crucifying a bigot and abducting an orphaned child. See what I mean about a lot happening? He also get perfect set ups for later conflicts like the mysterious villain lurking in Paris who makes a police team disappear in a flash of light.

Continued below

Most of these issues are illustrated by Pablo Raimondi. If you look at Raimondi’s larger body of work, you’ll find that he’s one of those guys who has no trouble adapting to the house style du jour. But I like to think that this work is his ‘true’ or at least preferred style. First of all, he lists it rather prominently on his personal website, so clearly he’s proud of his work. But also, it’s got a great, painterly style that really fits the different tones of the different stories here. Because of “Alias” and other comics from this era, I associate these watercolors with a grounded, ‘street-level’ view. And even when they are spies or in Paris, these are slice of life stories, treating these characters as everyday people and not larger-than-life heroes.

X-Factor 18 cover featured

Heart of Ice #18-24
Written by Peter David
Illustrated by Pablo Raimondi, Khoi Pham, and Valentine de Landro
Inked by Sandu Florea, Pablo Raimondi, and Drew Hennesy
Colored by Brian Reber, and Chris Sotomayor
Lettered by Cory Petit

This volume mainly concerns X-Cell, a terrorist group that blames the government for M-Day and the Decimation. Government stooge Val Cooper tries to get X-Factor to cooperate with The Man and a lot of edgy mutants (like Callisto, Blob, Marrow, and Reaper) aren’t cool with that. What we get is a story that’s heavy on the complexity but light on the nuance. The terrorists are acting with flawed information, so their motivations aren’t terribly compelling. The government is demonized for being the government, but actually they aren’t really shown to be doing anything bad. They’re just kind of jerks about anti-terror security. As such, the story doesn’t really gel. It’s simultaneously tired and inscrutable.

That’s when Quicksilver enters the scene, and he’s not really bringing a lot to the table. This is a very peculiar couple of years for Pietro. He lost his powers along with the rest of his family, but due to some business with the inhumans, he’s got a whole new set of powers. They involve bending time (which makes it seem like he’s super fast), plus he can activate powers in former mutants. This is tangled up in some pseudo-religious cult stuff that feels false to his character and is also boring.

We are soon introduced to one Mister Huber who it turns out is the mastermind behind… maybe everything? He seems to be controlling the Singularity Agency, and half the characters in the cast. It’s not that it feels unearned, but Huber doesn’t have a lot of memorable staying power. Big twists- including the fact that their French refugee is really an android- feel much more like “oh, OK” than big “wow!” moments.

Fortunately a lot of character beats are really fun. Monet and Siryn continue to be an entertaining duo. Guido is made sheriff of Mutant Town, which promises fun drama to come. But minor characters are done no favors. Particularly, seeing Blob being a fat joke is a bummer in the face of his recent characterization in “X-Tremists.” But the heart and soul of this arc is Rictor. He’s the only redeeming part of the Pietro story, emotionally grounding all the nonsense. And then he starts hooking up with Rhane! It’s a beat that feels messy for both of them, but in an interesting, exciting way. It’s almost as if Rictor is turning to Rhane to wash away the bad taste of his feelings for Pietro. None of this is made explicit, but there’s a good amount of soulful subtext to parse through.

X-Factor 20 Many Madri

Another casualty of this arc is the artwork. A lot is asked of Khoi Pham, but he does not rise to the occasion. In issue #20 for example, there’s a dramatic moment when a crowd of Madri (Madroxes if you’re feeling vulgar) marches down the street to confront Pietro. After a big build up and full page reveal, the image falls flat. The Madrox figures are all blurry grey outlines, and they are completely out of proportion with the buildings around them- they look too big. I get that when your script calls for a crowd scene 300 Multiple Men deep it’s asking for a lot, but the final product completely undercuts the impact of what should be an exciting moment. That’s not the only time this set of issues fails to deliver. Abyss fails to look like the amazing visual he’s supposed to be. Fight scenes take place in nondescript panels.

Continued below

When Raimondi steps back in, things rise to the level of quality we’ve grown accustomed to, but even he isn’t firing on all cylinders. The last issue in this arc has many artists credited (including future “Bitch Planet” artist Valentine de Landro!) which seems to indicate that there was a tight turnaround. Maybe everyone was overworked and crunched for time in December 2007.

Of the five stories read so far- “Madrox,” ‘The Longest Night,’ ‘Life and Death Matters,’ ‘Many Lives of Madrox,” and ‘Heart of Ice,’ these have been the best and worst we’ve seen. ‘Many Lives of Madrox’ was grounded in strong thematic character work that unified a bunch of very different stories. ‘Heart of Ice’ worked as a mutant soap opera, but wasn’t nearly as strong as the work in any of the earlier arcs. A lame version of Quicksilver and a forgettable evil mastermind make ‘Heart of Ice’ the messiest “X-Factor” story yet.

But something else is happening here too. Even in these weaker moments, characters are moving forward, taking on new roles. Guido is poised to take over the book soon. And there’s the matter of the pregnancy test that Layla found, implied to belong to Monet. “X-Factor” may have stumbled a bit, but strong serialized storytelling makes me excited to read on!


//TAGS | 2019 Summer Comics Binge

Jaina Hill

Jaina is from New York. She currently lives in Ohio. Ask her, and she'll swear she's one of those people who loves both Star Wars and Star Trek equally. Say hi to her on twitter @Rambling_Moose!

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