Broken Frontier

The truth about Vulcan and his team’s fate on Krakoa is revealed, and Charles Xavier’s place among the X-Men hangs in the balance.

The X-Men have a storied past, and one that has been retconned innumerable times. Deadly Genesis is yet another version of the "new" team’s origin, but one that completely works within the confines of the original story presented in Giant-Sized X-Men #1.

Coming off of last issue, Xavier shows up on Genosha where Vulcan has taken several X-Men as prisoners. Only this Xavier isn’t the one that we’re familiar with; not only is he walking, but it seems that the effects of Wanda Maximoff’s mutant gene erasure (seen in House of M) have taken his psychic abilities. With the aid of Rachel Grey, Vulcan forces Xavier to psychically show the others the truth of what happened on Krakoa, and how, despite losing the remainder of his team, Vulcan survived all this time.

It is because of that storied past that I typically avoid Marvel "616" X-books like the plague, but the excellent track record of Ed Brubaker’s writing talent made this miniseries worth picking up.

Brubaker’s Marvel credits include a duo of critically acclaimed current on-going titles—a revitalization of Captain America and a brilliant continuation of Daredevil that Brian Bendis began and Bru has managed to top in the span of only three issues. Add to that his fine body of work during his exclusive tenure at DC Comics on books like Gotham Central, Catwoman and Sleeper, and you have a writer that is not only on the rise, but possibly at the top of his class at the moment.

Despite the small delay in its release, the art on Deadly Genesis seems a little rushed and uneven yet is still passable. Hairsine has never been known for being quick with the pencils, but with the extra time I would have expected more careful renderings. However, it seems that most of the faults with the art fall on Scott Hanna, who is typically solid but tends to over-ink the pages here to the point that Staples’ colors even appear murkier than usual.

I’m sure the death of one major character and the way Scott treats Xavier after all is said and done won’t sit well with more than a few X-fans. It all opens a lot of doors for the new creative team to explore, though. While many of the questions that lingered throughout the story were answered, this conclusion is a clear launching pad to Uncanny X-Men #475, where Brubaker and Billy Tan take the reigns on what is sure to be an exciting new direction for the remaining mutants of the world.