Broken Frontier

The X-Men and their band of rebels finally face the unholy alliance of Vulcan, Deathbird, and D’Ken. Oh! And a wedding too! What more do you want?

In the penultimate chapter of Ed Brubaker’s massive arc on Uncanny X-Men, all of us grateful readers are getting what we have paid for. As mentioned above, the X-Men face off against the man they have followed across the universe to stop. Along with Corsair and the Starjammers, they invade the wedding of Vulcan and Deathbird. As the action rises Vulcan’s true plans come to fruition, Charles Xavier and Darwin go on another interesting trip, and there is at least one death that will be hard to recover from (even in the Marvel Universe).

Yes, it has been a long ride. Twelve part stories aren’t exactly unheard of these days—Batman, Superman, Avengers, and several others have all walked down that path. Some of them successfully, some of them not so much. Fortunately for those of us who have a pathological attachment to Marvel’s Merry Mutants, Brubaker’s run is successful. He covers the cosmic side of the X-Men unlike anyone since Chris Claremont has but he also keeps them grounded with real personalities, strife, conflict, and even the obligatory romance expected. With the interesting back and forth (one issue focusing on Vulcan’s journey the other on the X-Men’s) the story hasn’t seemed as long as it has been. I look back and cannot believe it has been almost a year now. That is always a good sign.

Good signs are present everywhere in this comic, specifically Billy Tan’s art. He captures the drama of the story with a precision tipped pencil. He can capture the emotion of a five paneled page of wedding dialogue as well as the action of a double-page-spread with power and finesse. Danny Miki and Allen Martinez work in tandem with Tan’s pencils giving readers a clear, crisp view of this universe-spanning story. Frank D’Armata just takes it up a notch with his intense colors and images that are both cool and hot, revealing the grand scope of the universe and this story.

With drama, action, and intergalactic adventure the likes of which the X-Men haven’t seen in far too long, "The Rise and Fall of the Shi’ar Empire" has been quite an amazing run. My only worry now is that Brubaker, Tan, and team will leave when this story is over.