X-Men: Supernovas

X-Men: Supernovas collects X-Men #188-199 and Annual #1 written by Mike Carey with art by Chris Bachalo, Umberto Ramos, Clayton Henry and Mark Brooks.

This book collects three story arcs and one annual, which taken together works as one long storyline. All in all this book contains almost one year worth of X-Men, and it functions as a pretty good jumping on point with a completely new artistic team and new team members.

The plot is pretty complex, so bear with me here. As the X-Men are assaulted by a mysterious group of very powerful bad guys, Rogue takes charge of a new group of X-Men featuring Ice Man, Mystique, Cable, Cannonball and a couple of other less knowns. Even Sabretooth gets to stick around for a while, although more as a captive than a real member. the baddies call themselves The Children of the Vault, and they're pretty badass. Also, they have a flying hangar ship, speak Spanish, and, as an added twist, want to kill all humans AND mutants. In the end the X-Men overcome their opponents, but it is strongly hinted that we have not yet seen the last of them (well, duh...). After that the X-Men go to investigate a lead discovered at a laboratory that experimented with mutants and end up fighting a guy that wants to suck the powers from other mutants. Of course, they beat him up too, but the fight leaves Rogue in a bad state so they hurry on to Providence, Cable's island kingdom, where they're attacked by a weird mind-stealing alien thingy. Also, the Beaubier twins show up as a mind-controlled strike force, new surprising romantic relationships are formed and so on and so on.

I realize now that this is a pretty bad explanation of what is going on in this book, so if you really want to know what happens, I suggest you go read it yourself. This is not X-Men for the uninitiated, this is X-Men as we're used to, with numerous subplots and references to old story arcs, and it's pretty damn difficult to keep pace at times. Especially if you read the book just before going to sleep as I do! But if you do want to read X-Men that builds on top of all the chronology that's come before, this is the book for you. On a side note, if you want to read X-Men that is a little more accessible, I suggest you try Astonishing X-Men, New X-Men by Grant Morrison or Ultimate X-Men.

All in all, the stories are solid but rather standard super hero fare, and whether you like them or not will depend on how much you care for the characters and how they're being portrayed.

The art in this book is very good. With both Bachalo and Ramos you're guaranteed some pretty decent artwork, and this book does not disappoint in that regard. Bachalo and Ramos both have very distinct visual styles, but they share some of the same characteristics, eg. they're both slightly cartoony and do very dynamic action scenes, and in that regard they complement each other well. They each handle their own story arcs, and the book does not feel disrupted due to having numerous artists. This works a lot better than having one good main artist and a bunch of fill-in artists, but I guess you can only expect an arrangement like that on major titles like X-Men. My personal favorite of the two is Bachalo who uses techniques like tone shading and overlayed paintings to great effect.

This is good super hero fare, and a good jumping on point for new readers, but you should be warned that it's a pretty complex read, and you might find yourself consulting Wikipedia a couple of times while reading it. The stories are not wildly interesting, but the action is plenty and the art is good, and you certainly will be entertained for your buck.

6/10