X-Men Unlimited #1 (2021)

[laughing_tree]

Ask anyone and they’ll tell you that I’m always up for trying out new ways to make stories, and this turned out to be a very interesting format. -- Jonathan Hickman

Comments

[deh_tommy]

I’m surprised MARVEL doesn’t take advantage of their Infinity-brand digital comics more often, I always get a kick out of how they play with the panel layout.

How come the minute resurrection on a consistent basis is viable they keep finding ways to totally annihilate Wolverine?

[donnblake]

Blowing up in space is the sort of thing Wolverine used to survive. One could imagine a story where they find out that he's actually come back from "Dead enough for resurrection protocols," and they've got two running around.

'Cause, you know, if there's one thing that the X-books traditionally don't have enough of, it's Wolverine.

[zachbeacon]

I mean, it wouldn't be the first time we saw multiple versions of someone with a healing factor running around. You don't really even need the resurrections when some of these people split like earthworms.
I don't think Logan is at Lobo levels yet but he's come back from some crazy things so it's only a matter of time.

[cainofdreaming]

"Okay, so last you saw Logan he was falling down from orbit, starting to burn up at re-entry. But are you *sure* he's dead?"

"Hope, please..."

"No. My pa specifically asked me to make sure there won't be multiples of that guy."

[scorntx]

"Just to be clear: this isn't motivated by any sort of long-festering grudge because he tried repeatedly to kill you that one time?"

"... no."

[alliterator]

He doesn't die. He survives.

[donnblake]

I wonder if every time the X-men blow up in space Colossus shouts "See! I warned you!"

[zachbeacon]

Jean: I was doing that before it was cool.

[tinygaylaura]

The fact that Colossus waited until the X-men were in space to suddenly remember his brother exploded in space and completely lose his shit about it will forever be one of my favorite bits of complete nonsense from the Claremont run

You'd think he might bring up the whole dead cosmonaut brother thing and be like "You know what this mission sounds really triggering and when your a metric ton of angry Russian living metal losing your shit in space in what is basically a thin metal coffin seperating you from an airless death void is a very dangerous thing to do so I shall sit this one out"

But nope

[scorntx]

Meanwhile, Storm - the one who has even more reason than Piotr to be triggered by being in a confined space with little to no hope of survival if something goes wrong - ... is comparatively chill.

Early Claremont was a wild rollercoaster.

(And then it turned out once Claremont was gone Mikhail hadn't actually died after all, but was EVIL.
Because of course he was.)

[tinygaylaura]

At first he was evil because he was evil and then he was evil because space parasites made him evil and then he was just evil again and then he was evil because he's descended from Rasputin as in THE Rasputin who was a mutant who Mr Sinister knew because of course he fucking did

And then he died and now he's alive again and he's evil because of Communism

Piotr's family is fucking WEIRD and Kitty dodged one hell of a bullet by not marrying this goddamn weirdo

[donnblake]

Plus, it probably would have made hook-ups with Illyana kinda awkward.

[tinygaylaura]

Right?

It would have turned their friends with benefits fucking into one of those weird step-family categories on Pornhub

[donnblake]

"I warned you comrades!"

"Piotr, you literally did not."

"Well... I would have, had I thought of it earlier!"

[tinygaylaura]

Trauma from losing a loved one can be difficult to handle and often its very insensitive and offensive to say there's a "Wrong way" for someone to handle it

That said

Waiting until you and the friends and team mates who are counting on you are in space to suddenly scream "MY GOD! MIKHAIL!" and freak the fuck out, tearing your space suit and turning into a metal man is definitely the wrong way to handle it

[zachbeacon]

MODOK is a lot more menacing remotely than in person.

I like to imagine he's like a turtle if you manage to flip him on his back.

[deh_tommy]

The only time I’ve ever found MODOK menacing on purpose was the recent Avengers game.

[cainofdreaming]

Marvel's Avengers? I need to get back to that again some of these days. Never got further than the beginning missions. Maybe after I finish the new Pathfinder...

[zachbeacon]

I've seen stories where they play up the body horror stuff that makes him pretty scary...

... though I also feel sorry for him because those stories tend to portray him as an unwilling test subject.

(Well, as sorry as you can be for someone who signed on with Nazi scientists)

[silverhammerman]

Shalvey providing gorgeous art, a plot with AIM (the Marvel U's resident stock villains), in-canon but seemingly inconsequential, WOLVERINE: everything about this screams that it's aimed at being a crowd pleaser. It seems successful, but I can't help comparing it to DC's Batman WebToon and seeing this as something akin to Marvel debuting a new kind of horse drawn buggy when DC just built a rocket ship. Then again, perhaps Marvel tying this to a subscription will prove the smart move, since who knows how many of Wayne Family Adventures... 450,000 subscribers (so far) will actually spend any money.

Even the fact that Hickman is talking about this as a formal experiment is indicative of Marvel's approach. It's great that someone as established as Hickman is still looking to experiment and learn, and he lends real credibility to Marvel's latest digital push, but this is very much established territory.

[laughing_tree]

Ironically, from what I've seen of the two, this makes far more use of the vertical scroll format for storytelling purposes than the Wayne Family feature. The latter could easily be converted to a standard physical comic without hassle (though maybe that's on purpose, for the sake of future TPBs).

(I'm only comparing to the X-Men comic. I haven't checked out any of Marvel's other Infinity Comics titles yet.)

[agharta75]

John Scalzi used that joke in one of his "Old Man's War" books.

Power armored future super soldier commandos, doing a computer controlled drop from orbit, without parachutes, in precise line by line formation, to attack the fortress of the Evil Overlord.

Except that the Evil Overlord had hacked and had control of the computer.

Splat!

[tinygaylaura]

More MODOK is always good

Marvel should use their weirder villains more often

[shakalooloo]

Has MODOK always had a Blofeld-scar, or is that an affectation of this AI?

[tinygaylaura]

MODOK had it added to the AI for....

ONE MILLION DOLLARS