On the fifth day of X-Mas: Storm!
Wow, I had forgotten how convoluted X-history was during the
1990’s. In this one, X-Force is living in the mansion under the leadership of
Cable. The X-Men are still based there too, and the groups mingle a bit in
their off time.
Warren Ellis has an interesting concept; an attraction between
Cable and Storm that leads Cable to be the main protagonist in the “regular”
Marvel U while Storm weathers her treatment in an alternate dimension.
That alternate dimension is the home of Gene Nation, the
survivors of a Morlock massacre. Marrow was originally one of these guys, and
boy, she’s a lot less attractive in these early appearances than she was later.
And while Mikhail Rasputin is supposedly the main villain, he’s basically a
flunky doing Apocalypse’s work. The indirect baddie shows up at the close of
the mini. It’s Black Beast (now called Dark Beast) and this was all his plan to
build an army of super-mutants. Weird.
Storm is a lot more proactive than usual in this one. I love
the way Ellis writes her powers as a total sense of the environment, and
casting electrical bolts from each finger is a nice play on her long-time lightning
powers. Her first costume in the series is pretty close to her “classic” one,
but the new look she adopts at the end is very anime-based. Very strange
wardrobe choices here.
Terry Dodson provides the art, and while the seeds of his
future greatness are present, the art is uneven. Faces are lumpy and oddly
morphed, and sometimes the perspective seems off in the action shots. Storm is
sporting some odd cat-eyes too, was that a thing? All that said, the covers are
wonderful and Storm always looks great. In fact, the “stars” in each panel
always look great, even if the background characters aren’t quite as realized.
Fair
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