Joss Whedon's Astonishing X-Men

Astonishing X-Men 1-6

Joss Whedon’s X-Men!  This is exactly as good as I remember, which is really damn good.  This is Whedon at the peak of his writing powers, mixing action, touching personal moments, and laugh out loud hilarity with the deftness that he exhibited in the best of his episodes of Buffy, Angel, and Firefly.  

John Cassaday is just as good.  His work here is on par with Planetary, a true apex run.  There are going to be a lot of images coming up…

The first arc covers the mutant cure, the return of Colossus, and the first battle with Ord of Breakworld.  Whedon sets up everyone’s personality, and while they all sound like Whedon, they’re still distinctive and unique.  As Whedon does.  

So simple, so iconic.

Joss is a master of pulling the nostalgia strings on the reader.

Way back in Uncanny 168.

There will be much Kitty/Emma snark in these reviews.

And once in a while it escalates beyond snark.

But mostly it's snark.

Great atmosphere.  Laura Martin on colors.

Hee.

What a reveal.

Cassaday conveys everything Kitty's feeling in these panels.

Over the top?  Maybe.  But priceless nonetheless.  (They're seeing resurrected Peter for the first time.)

They recover nicely.

More nostalgia chills.

I love how Laura Martin colors Cyclops' eye blasts.  I'll be showing more of these.

Regret buying: No

Would buy again: Yes

Would read again: Yes

Rating: Pure joy

Astonishing X-Men 7-12

The Danger arc.  (The Danger Room gains sentience and tries to kill the X-Men.)  Less good, mostly because Danger herself is a less than inspiring character. 

The snark remains top notch, though.

Poor Kitty.

It's the silhouettes that make the eye blast effect pop, I think.

Regret buying: No

Would buy again: Yes

Would read again: Yes

Rating: Good

Astonishing X-Men 13-18

The X-Men fight the Hellfire Club, which turns out to be Emma Frost controlled by Cassandra Nova.  I think.  Whedon (through Emma) performs the most effective dissection of Scott’s psyche that I’ve ever read, it’s pretty impressive.  This isn’t the first or last time someone’s given a false life for nefarious purposes, but the one Kitty has to go through is particularly harrowing and devastating.  I still don’t understand how they end up beating Nova, that part seems to get swept under the rug at the end of the arc.

By the way, Whedon is clearly in love with Kitty Pryde.  She’s the hero of his entire run.  I love it.

It's Cassaday's art that sells this whole bit.

Okay, the writing's got a little to do with it too.

Beer, of course, saves the day.

The pose is a little awkward, but I still got tingles.

(John Byrne in the Dark Phoenix Saga)

Possibly my favorite comic one-liner ever.

She really doesn't like Emma.

I think this is where they win?  It's never mentioned again.

Regret buying: No

Would buy again: Yes

Would read again: Yes

Rating: Really good