Back to Reload, and New X-Men #1.

This New X-Men is a new title which inherits the new New Mutants from the old New Mutants title that ended last month.  It's not to be confused with the old New X-Men which has dropped the New and is now just the new X-Men.

I hope that's clear.

Oh, and theoretically this first issue is called New X-Men: Academy X #1.  But the subtitle isn't in the indicia or in any of the future solicitations, so I'm just going to ignore that.

Basically, this just continues where New Mutants left off, but it's very obviously a jumping on point.  Half of the issue is given over to a tour of the building - an unfortunate editorial decision, given that half of this week's X-Men is also given over to a tour of the building.  Poor Josh Guthrie, who attends both tours, must be thoroughly familiar with the layout by now.

Anyway, we get a tour of the building, and we're reintroduced to the characters.  The real meat of this storyline lies in the kids being broken into squads, but that doesn't happen until next month, so instead we've got some time to fill.  DeFilippis and Weir spend that time giving Nori some more page space, and an oddly plotted story where the team have to break into the Danger Room in order to get a missing component for the gauntlets that keep her powers under control.

Of course, it's a device to get the kids into the Danger Room and let them fight some big robots.  Fair enough.  But the plot doesn't make much sense.  Why don't the kids simply ask one of the teachers to let them in so they can hunt for their component?  It's not as if anyone's going to say no.  Nori seems to think she'll get into trouble for asking (and everyone else seems to agree with her), but it's entirely unclear why.

Randy Green debuts as artist.  I enjoyed his work on the first Emma Frost arc, and he fits in well here.  He's going for a slightly broader, more cartoony style here.  Or maybe it's just the costumes that make it look that way.  But it's a style that works for the book - one of the things that's been missing from this title is a sense of the school as a fantasy world, and that seems to be captured here.  I'm slightly irritated by the weird shading on people's hair, which I suppose is meant to be some kind of sheen.  Other than that, though, I like the look of the book.

Readers of New Mutants will probably find this a bit underwhelming.  Really, it's a combination of recap and tour, with a bit of story tacked onto the end.  But if you didn't read the title before, it's certainly a very good place to jump on.

Rating: B

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