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I have a sneaking suspicion that most of
the readers will just skip this review and go straight to the
New X-Men one. Which is great. It means I
can say anything I want about Emma Frost.
In this unique crossover with the universe
of Watership Down, the audience are taken on a
rollercoaster ride of intensity, passion, and anthrax.
Trapped in the body of a dying bunny, Emma Frost must come to
terms with her feelings for Mick Jagger. Catching the
audience entirely off guard from the word go, Bollers and
Green dazzle like a flashlight on a drag queen.
Oh, alright. I'll do it properly.
This is chapter 3 of the six-part "Higher
Learning" storyline. Since we last saw Emma, she's got
over her qualms about using telepathy to pass her exams.
Now she's at the top of the class, and somehow or other she's
popular. I'm a little bit confused about that one, since
there's no obvious reason why she would be. I don't
really buy her suddenly becoming popular just because she's
getting better grades. I suppose the idea might be that
her telepathy helps her know how to deal with other people,
but that's a leap from what's shown here.
Anyhow, we kick off with Emma on a high, as
her rival Matilda is finally kicked out of school for
non-payment of fees, leaving Emma as the alpha female.
Karl Bollers does a pretty decent job here of striking a
balance with Emma's character - she's kept as a basically
sympathetic character, but her more vicious and spiteful
persona is starting to be more apparent.
Still enthralled by her teacher, Emma
decides to follow his advice and go into teaching.
Naturally, her father won't have anything to do with it,
because he's a bad man, and teaching is not nearly impressive
enough as a profession. I'm not quite sure that the
status of teaching has fallen quite low enough for this to
work, but I can see what Bollers is heading for here.
He's giving Emma a combination of motivations for her rather
odd teaching career - an inspirational teacher and a
determination to annoy her father.
Dad is still reading like a bit of a
pantomime villain. He's setting out to derail Emma's
plans, which is fair enough. But his plan for doing so
is so ridiculously contrived that it does send the book
spinning off into the realms of camp. To be honest, if
it wasn't for Emma's actions, it's hard to see how it would
have worked - he was going to try and get Ian Kendall sacked
on the basis that he gave Emma a lift from school? Isn't
that a little inadequate?
Then again, maybe a touch of camp is
precisely what they're going for. There's a fabulously
silly scene in this book with Emma and Ian talking in a museum
cafe, all framed so that appropriate backdrops from the decor
are in shot for each line. It's actually a cute device,
but the background pictures are so over the top that I
couldn't help but laugh. In a good way, though.
I should probably note in passing that this
issue's cover actually has some discernible relationship to
the contents, and doesn't involve any completely ludicrous
poses. Well, it's a start.
I'm still not entirely sold that there was
a need for this book, but I do find myself enjoying it.
It's more than a little silly at times, but that works out.
Rating: B+
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