X-CORP #1 - A Slow-Paced, But Serviceable Beginning
This story is written by: Tini Howard, with visuals from: Alberto Foche & Sunny Gho.
From what I can tell at least, this is a series that has been a long time in the making, dating back to the original announcement of this reboot all the way back in 2019. Back then, it was more a case of teasing that something like this would be coming, rather than actually being a part of that initial slate of titles, but as soon as the Reign of X was announced, this came along with it. To say that the books that have come after that initial wave have been varying in quality would really be an understatement, as so very many of them are really poor in my opinion, and it is a surprise that the ones that are actually considered the good ones in this whole line are the ones that are getting cancelled (aside from Cable, that deserves the axe).
Before I go into full on rant mode, I think that we should just get straight on into talking about the events of this very first issue, and exactly what I thought of it. Quite honestly, while this was a solid enough debut issue, the brand of corporate drama that Tini Howard is giving to us really did not grab my attention in the way that I thought that it would originally. The main reason for this, at least for me personally, is most likely because of what I have perceived as relatively slow pacing, which takes world building to the absolute extreme, to the point where nothing much of real note actually happens within the main story. This awful pacing is then not helped by the fact that the book itself is just shy of forty pages long, which I see as just an excuse for the book to be as slow has humanly possible, to the point where the reader is just bored by the entire thing. Most times, I can forgive a first issue for being slow, but in this case I do not think that this is going to possible, mostly due to how most first issues are at least ten pages less than this, and if they are going to be nearly forty pages, they will often also have some kind of backup story to pad it out, and make the publisher feel justified in hiking up the price. The only other work of Howard’s that I have read, for Marvel at least, is her giving run on the Excalibur title, which is usually decent every month; while on the other end of the spectrum, her work on the X of Swords event was not at all to my liking, so at the current time, she most definitely has more bad work than good within my sample.
There were also a couple of things in this issue that got me thinking about some other aspects of the Krakoan nation state, that for some reason never really crossed my mind before. This all stems from this issue’s use of time stamps whenever a character was to jump from one time zone to another, as I had never really associated the nation with having it’s own time zone before reading this issue. In a way, it certainly makes sense for this to be the case, as it is literally a massive island in the middle of bloody nowhere, and I would love to know what kind of timings we are looking at in relation to a bunch of other nations in the world, although for some of these, I would certainly have to read this story again, which I really do not want to do at this time. However, this also brought to my attention some other aspects of Krakoa that I am not sure have really been touched upon all that much in the last couple of years. Things like currency, leisure, and general other things for the mutant inhabitants of the nation to get up to in their day-to-day lives should surely be something that we know more about, right? Obviously, we know that, at least for now, Charles Xavier is likely the richest man on the planet, how else would he have been able to do all this Krakoan stuff, but we don’t really get to see the daily lives of many of the other citizens, just the main big teams, which I find a little bit weird. Maybe, at some point during this series, we will find some of this stuff out, but I can’t help thinking that it is purposefully being kept from the readers. In my head, this lot are all just using flowers to trade for amenities at the moment, which is quite honestly a rather hilarious image, but I can’t really see the Blob accepting something like that as payment for his wares at the Green Lagoon Bar.
One final thing that this issue got me thinking about was once again the resurrection protocols of Krakoa, as there were various references to Warren’s “dark side”, presumably referring to that of Archangel. This makes me think that, somehow, Warren has not been resurrected as of yet, as from my understanding the body of one who has been brought back is essentially their perfect, unblemished self. Therefore, in my view, it would not make sense for the likes of Warren or Monet to still be in possession of these “dark sides” if they had been resurrected already. Simply examples of the point that I am trying to make here would be things such as Kate Pryde being reborn, and being able to now pass through Krakoan gates, or that those who had originally had there powers taken away are then reborn in possession of said abilities. There is simply no reason for the likes of Archangel or Penance to exist with all of this in place, and yet they do, which I find rather strange.
If it weren’t for the fact that the second issue of this series was a chapter within the “Hellfire Gala” event, I would say to you all right now that I would not be continuing on with this series. However, I will be likely purchasing every chapter of said event for reviewing purposes (dependant on other releases on those weeks), so it will be with issue #3 that I will cease my reading of this title, as is also the case with the Way of X title.
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