Marvel Penguin Picks: October 2022
Above-the-Board Recommendation:
Immortal X-Men vol. 1
At the end of “Inferno,” in the final digital issue I read, there was a teaser for this series. So if you’re looking for an “X-Men” book to read in the wake of Jonathan Hickman’s ambitious, game-changing run, then you could do worse than to consider this one. “Immortal X-Men” is the book about the Quiet Council and it comes to us from writer Kieron Gillen and artists Lucas Werneck and Michele Bandini. Gillen writing the X-Men again would in itself be enough to secure this spot, but I’m even more optimistic about this book’s direction after reading the first issue on Marvel Unlimited.
What I’ve heard of the format of the book is that each issue focuses on one of the Council’s members while also furthering an overall story. Perhaps sensing which character his audience was most eager to see him tackle again, Gillen spends the first issue with Mister Sinister and his plans to try and manipulate the Council into furthering his agenda. It’s great fun to listen to his internal monologue and hear his thoughts on the rest of the cast, but even better fun to see Sinister struggle as his plan only covers most of the angles. The mutant geneticist has a plan for covering the rest of them… and it’s a doozy that builds off of one of HIckman’s best ideas. It’s a great start for this series and I’m eager to read more even if subsequent issues aren’t as Sinister-centric as this one.
Miracleman #’s 0 & 1: Neil Gaiman and Mark Buckingham’s long-awaited continuation of the “Miracleman” saga is finally happening. I mean, they tried soliciting these issues once before, but things didn’t go so well then. Now it looks like we’re finally getting the full “Silver Age” arc which finds Dicky Dauntless, a.k.a. Young Miracleman, brought into the present day only to find that his former mentor has now become its God. Given the tortured history of the “Miracleman” publication rights, I honestly never thought we’d see this story continued. The fact that we’re getting the story now is nothing short of a minor *ahem* miracle. Gaiman writes and Buckingham illustrates the #1 issue while they also contribute a prologue to the #0 issue. The latter issue is also an anthology featuring an eclectic group of creators including Jason Aaron, Mike Carey, Ty Templeton, Lenil Yu, and Peach Momoko.
Spider-Man #1: What could be so special that Marvel is putting out another “Spider-Man” #1? That would be the return of Dan Slott and Mark Bagley to the character. While I’m certainly interested in reading stories about the Wall-Crawler from these creators, I’m not sure if their pairing is generating the excitement Marvel wants it to. Bagley’s a great artist, but he’s spent most of the past few years drawing plenty of “Spider-Man” related titles and pitching in on the main “Amazing” title from time to time. Then there’s Slott, who delivered an incredible eight-year run on the title that was still firing on all cylinders when he left to do “Iron Man” and “Fantastic Four.” His runs on those titles left a little to be desired as neither delivered the commercial or critical acclaim of his “Amazing” run. So returning to “Spider-Man” may be seen as something of a retreat to what worked for the writer before. Given their history with the character, it would be a mistake to write either of these creators off as the first issue involves… the return of Morlun? … He’s a villain who has NEVER been interesting and I have a hard time believing that Slott and Bagley are going to succeed at changing that here.
A.X.E.: Judgment Day #6 (of 6), A.X.E.: X-Men, A.X.E.: Eternals, A.X.E.: Starfox, Immortal X-Men #7, A.X.E.: Death to the Mutants #3 (of 3): Kieron Gillen is writing all six of these comics. He’s not sweating it according to his newsletter as it sounds like all of these comics will make their ship date in October. This does seem like it’ll be the most prolific the writer will be at the publisher in a single month. As for whether or not any of these are more important than the other, “Judgment Day” is the finale to the event, which implies that it’ll be of significant importance to the writer’s work on “Immortal X-Men” and “Eternals.” Then there’s “Starfox” which has the writer taking on a character whose powers have become somewhat problematic in recent years. I imagine that this one-shot will likely be all about rehabilitating the character’s power to make other individuals feel pleasure at his command and I’m veeeeeeery interested in seeing how the writer is going to go about doing that.
Crypt of Shadows #1: This is a Halloween-themed one-shot anthology featuring some of the publisher’s darker heroes. I’m bringing it up here because Adam Warren is one of the creators who’s contributing a story to it and you can always count on him to do something distinctively weird at Marvel. It’s also nice to see him doing any kind of comics work these days as his name has been absent from any of the solicitations or comics news that I follow for a while now.
Namor: The Sub-Mariner #1 (of 5): Why are we getting a new Namor miniseries now? Because he’s being featured as the main villain(?) in “Wakanda Forever.” Anyone who goes to see that movie and comes out wanting to read more about the character is likely going to be in for a surprise if they check out this miniseries. That’s because this Christopher Cantwell-written, Pasqual Ferry-illustrated story picks up about a hundred years from now where the surface of the Earth has been rendered mostly inhospitable to a dwindling population of surface-dwellers. What does this mean for Namor? That he’s now king of the world, by default. I’ve enjoyed Cantwell’s oddball sensibilities in his creator-owned work, and they’ve actually meshed well with the Marvel Universe on “Doctor Doom” and “Iron Man.” I’m not sure if the setup for the story makes for a smooth tie-in to “Wakanda Forever,” but it does sound like something I want to read.
Star Wars: The High Republic #1: It’s a relaunch of the series that appears to be making a clean break with its previous volume. By that I mean the solicitation text makes no mention of Jedi Keeve Treviss or her Master Ssker. Instead, this looks to be about Jedi Vildar Mac and his journey to Jedha as unrest grips the planet. Unrest, and some kind of nameless horror. Maybe the two are connected? The main creators behind the first volume, writer Cavan Scott, and artist Ario Anindito, return for this one, which means that despite the clean break narrative-wise, this new volume is likely to be just as okay as the previous one was.
Punisher vol. 1: King of Killers: Jason Aaron, Jesus Saiz, and Paul Azaceta’s take on Frank Castle, Warlord of the Hand, gets its first collection. There’s been a lot of talk about whether or not it’s appropriate for Marvel to publish comics about the Punisher, given how his iconography has been appropriated by the far-right. Given that Frank has traditionally taken a dim view of the appropriation of his name and image, and of lawbreakers in general, I don’t see why Marvel should stop publishing “Punisher” comics. In fact, I’m still waiting to see a comic where Frank takes on a Jan 6th-style situation. Get Garth Ennis to write it – I’m sure he’s got his own set of opinions about that day as well.
Where was I? Oh, right, Frank Castle as Warlord of the Hand. People have remarked that it’s extremely out of character for him to even consider working for a clan of ninja assassins with demonic backing. While I understand that the Hand offered Frank something considerable in exchange for his services, my guess is that this is a long con being played by the Punisher. Even if they did give him what he’s wanted for a very long time, it’s nothing in the face of his chance to wipe out the great evil that is the Hand.