In a generally quiet week for new X-books, we might as well check in on the progress of X-Men: Deadly Genesis, since issue #4 pulls a massive retcon which is going to springboard the next year of Uncanny X-Men storylines.

Marvel are very keen to push this book as a big thing, and Joe Quesada has made no secret of his disappointment with the orders.  His theory is that they need to give away more plot details, which is why Marvel have basically already told us this issue's plot.  Personally, I disagree; I think the problem is that they've overstretched the brand to breaking point, and in particular, they've published too many miniseries with the X-Men name on it that aren't important at all.  If you want readers to believe that every X-Men miniseries matters, it's probably best not to do books like X-Men: Colossus - Bloodline or X-Men: Kitty Pryde - Shadow & Flame, or even X-Men: The 198. 

Quesada comes dangerously close to blaming the readers for not having faith in Marvel to deliver, when the reality is that the readers have every reason to regard X-Men miniseries as almost certainly missable.  If Marvel don't want readers to think that way, then they should stop publishing so much throwaway dross, shouldn't they?  You're the ones stuck in the mentality that every X-book ought to sell automatically, not us.

Anyhow, Deadly Genesis has come in for a bit of understandable criticism for its leisurely pace.  It's certainly taken its time getting to this point, and issue #3 felt like a whole load of padding just begging to be excised.  It also doesn't help that artist Trevor Hairsine has, once again, proved unable to meet the advertised schedule and has had to drop back to doing layouts - although with Scott Hanna as finisher, the end result is still pretty good.

Nonetheless, there's a lot that I like about this issue.  It's a pleasant change to see a Marvel book which is unashamed about being a superhero comic, for one thing.  It also manages to carry me along with its glaring retcon of Giant-Size X-Men #1, which I was expecting to grate.  Admittedly, pulling out the "Xavier wiped everyone's mind" card is a slightly cheap way of covering up why we've never heard of these guys before, but it does beat awkward contortions. And I have no problem with Xavier lapsing into dodgy methods again - he's done it before, and we're talking about somebody who had no problem letting the X-Men believe he was dead when he could simply have phoned upstairs and asked them to leave him alone. 

The four missing X-Men are rather nicely designed, with costumes that actually feel appropriate for lost mid-seventies characters.  I was braced for them to look horribly anachronistic, but in fact they all look like something that would fit for the period.  Admittedly, Sway and Petra are ciphers, but they're only there to make up the numbers - it's Kid Vulcan's story, and the other three don't really matter.

On the other hand, there are definitely problems with this series.  The present day plot is considerably less compelling than the retcon material, given the lack of any clearly defined plan on Vulcan's part.  The flashbacks have to live with the fact that Giant-Size #1 isn't exactly a classic, and in particular, it involves the X-Men fighting Krakoa the Living Island.  He looks fairly good here, but let's face it, he's still a barrel-scraping concept. 

And Vulcan himself is a slightly awkward character.  While the idea of him enthusiastically joining the X-Men and being betrayed works nicely as set-up, his origin story also involves some dreadfully contrived stuff.  ("The only thing he had on him when they found him was a book on the mythology of ancient Rome...")  For that matter, why is Xavier asking exposition-friendly questions about him in the main story when, according to Brubaker's own back-up story, he's already met the guy and taken an interest in him before this point?

Mixed, then.  Despite my better judgment, I'm still rather enjoying it, but I can't deny it's got some definite problems.  Hopefully Brubaker's upcoming Uncanny X-Men run will be able to build on the stronger aspects of this series.

Rating: B

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