Overview of the New X-Men

16 Feb No comment

Grant Morrison is famous for his work on revamping the Justice League of America series, as well as working on Superman and Batman comics. He is also credited with breathing new life into the X-Men franchise, with his 2001-2004 run on New X-Men.

The New X-Men series focuses on a core group of the X-Men, Cyclops, Wolverine, Jean Grey, Beast, Emma Frost and a new character, Xorn. Although it is a more "traditional" X-Men team, the New X-Men ditch the lycra in favour of the black leathers, similar to the X-Men films.

Whilst the X-Men had previously behaved like a traditional 'superhero' team, in New X-Men they take on more of a teaching role. A lot of the stories center around the school environment, changes to the way Professor X is viewed by the group and the world following "outing" himself as a mutant, the emergence of 'U-Men', as well as the story of Xorn.

New X-Men introduced a number of fairly large changes to the world of the X-Men.

New X-Men Beast The first one I noticed was the change in the appearance of Beast. I'd always remembered him looking like a furry, sharp toothed umm... well Beast. In New X-Men, he has undergone a "secondary mutation" like makes him look more like a giant pussy cat. Honestly, not a good look for a guy named "Beast".

Emma Frost is a member of the group (she was bad, now she's good), while Jean Grey dies... again!

Genosha, the island haven for mutants is destroyed by a rabid bunch of Sentinals. Prior to the whole Scarlett Witch "no more mutants" House of M thing, the destruction of Genosha caused the biggest reduction in the worlds mutant population since... well I'm not sure since when actually.

A new character that gets a decent run in New X-Men is Fantomex or Weapon XIII. Fantomex is a hybrid human/machine created as a weapon to fight the worlds mutants. His big 'power' is mis-direction. Basically this lets the writers off the hook and gives them a way of explaining any inconsistencies that may pop up in his back story.

The Stepford Cuckoos (no doubt a hat tip to the Stepford Wives) are quintuplets psychically joined. In a lot of ways each one is a mini version of Emma Frost. They play a major role in many of the story lines throughout New X-Men, as well as popping up in future X-Men stories. In the Phoenix: Warsong mini-series, the Stepford Cuckoos are revealed to be Weapon XIV (Wolverine is Weapon X), from the Weapons Plus program, and are actually clones of Emma Frost.

Xorn The new character that makes the biggest impact in New X-Men is Xorn. I've read a bit about this character online, purely just to figure out what happened post New X-Men. Xorn is a guy that supposedly has some kind of star thing in his head that can cause things to go 'boom' as well as heal people. He's supposedly Chinese, and rescued from a prison by the X-Men. Upon his rescue he is persuaded to join the group by Cyclops. He begins teaching a group of the Xavier Schools misfits.

At the conclusion of the New X-Men series the Xorn character is no more, an alias used by a major character... awe heck * spoiler warning * Xorn is revealed to be Magneto around volume 5-6 of the New X-Men trade paper backs. This all makes sense given the build up of the Xorn character. The problem is, that once New X-Men concluded, the powers that be decided they liked Xorn as Xorn, so he was introduced as character in his own right in the follow-up X-Men comics... actually reading that back it makes little sense. The problem with the whole Xorn concept is it's hard to describe without launching into a 10,000 word essay... Xorn summary, Xorn in New X-Men makes sense, Xorn following New X-Men makes zero sense.

Would I recommend New X-Men?

I'd recommend New X-Men for anyone that has been looking to get into the X-Men comics but was put off by the lycra costumes, and convoluted story lines that marked most of the 90's. If you were a fan of the X-Men films, then New X-Men is a good starting point. Grant Morrison basically rebooted the series when he took on New X-Men, with a back to basics approach with a few new elements sprinkled in to keep the existing readers interested. Give it a look, it's worth it.