Space opera becomes time drama as our mutant adventurers delve back into the past to undo Shi’ar crimes against mutantkind. And by “the past” we mean… 1993? Marauders #5, with writing by Steve Orlando, line art by Andrea Broccardo, colors by Matt Milla, letters by VC’s Ariana Maher.
Ian Gregory: I would say that we’ve been pretty divided on this book so far. We’re in pretty solid agreement about the art, and our disappointment about the lack of focus on Kate Pryde. But I’ve definitely bought into the sci-fi trappings and big ideas more than you have. That said, I’m pretty disappointed in Marauders #5. It felt like it didn’t deliver on any of the things I’ve liked about this series so far.
Stephanie Burt: It’s pretty to look at! And it might just get me to read all of X-Men: 2099! Which I haven’t done yet, but I have high hopes (I like John Francis Moore). Other than that… uh, yeah, nope. Sometimes we say that an issue’s a good jumping-on point. This one feels like a jumping-off point.
Avalon
Ian: Let me call this out right away: regular Marauders artist Eleonora Carlini is on break this issue, so we’ve got Andrea Broccardo on interiors instead. This is something of a trade-off: we’ve really liked Carlini’s fights and big-picture space stuff but have had gripes with her faces. I think we’re dealing with something of an inverse here. I like Broccardo’s faces, but I think the fights and sci-fi elements are understated compared to Carlini. What did you think about the art switch-up for Marauders #5?
Stephanie: I really like Broccardo! He can draw faces that don’t look like animated TV but he can also draw cool scary tech. Look how he renders Nemesis! I’d love to see him draw Nimrod. Or more Shi’ar space nonsense. And energy powers and high-tech interiors. All the space nonsense here takes place inside built environments, so he can’t draw any ship-to-ship combat, which might be what you’re missing, but I think it looks classic. And he’s good with his own inks: materials (flesh and skin, armor, free-floating energy, tentacles, plant matter, etc) differ in texture, which makes one good test for an inker. I looked him up and learned that he’s drawn a lot of Star Wars comics, which makes sense. I’d love to see him draw a Gerry Duggan story. Or a Kelly Thompson joint.
Ian: Here’s a quick summary of all the plot threads being wrapped up in this issue: Xandra, the Shi’ar Empress, is resurrected on Krakoa. Aurora and Daken are fighting the Kin Crimson in the present timeline, and win. The rest of the Marauders head back to the past (Avalon, specifically, loaded with Acolytes and besieged by Nemesis) to retrieve a “chrono-beacon” that will let them save a mutant from the first mutant civilization, Threshold, before they can be assassinated by the Kin Crimson. Cassandra Nova has a symbiote. Kate Pryde is dead, until she’s not. Deathbird shows up with the last Kin Crimson captured, we get the end of A New Hope, and everyone goes home. Then, with Kate back alive, we meet the rescued Threshold mutant, named Cerebra – but more on that later. Did you get all that?
Stephanie: That sounds like a pretty good pitch for a twelve issue series. Or maybe a six issue series. Or, I don’t know, this is a mess. Ian, will you give me a minute? [Disappears, using a chrono-beacon, for ten subjective years]
OK, I just took a look at the “Fall of Avalon” storyline, by Nicieza and Paul Smith and Andy Kubert, from adjectiveless X-Men #42-44, published in 1994 and namechecked in Marauders #5. Avalon is a satellite run by the original version of Exodus, a devotee of the supposedly dead Magneto, who wanted to build a space haven for radical mutants. The satellite, and the Utopian project, fails when Nemesis, the son of Apocalypse, shows up and fights Scott and Jean along with the Acolytes. It’s beautifully drawn, if a bit silly and action-heavy. Like this issue we’re reviewing now! Steve Orlando’s going for early 1990s nostalgia, both in the character roster and in the action-heavy vibe, and he gets it. But the pacing’s still a crowded mess.
Ian: I’m definitely perplexed by the pacing on this issue. I expected us to wrap up this arc in issue six. But instead everything’s getting tied up in montage in issue five. As a result, some of the headier ideas that Orlando’s introduced, like the deep lore on the Shi’ar Empire and the imperialism metaphor, get left by the wayside. Some of the more interesting moments, like the actual rescue of the Threshold mutant from the timestream, take place in a data page. Did you also get the sense that the end of this story got rushed?
Stephanie: Very much so. It’s the kind of writing that happens when a book or a storyline has to end very suddenly because the title, or the main characters, are needed for another plotline, or for a crossover event. Like the Hellfire Gala.
More Than This
Ian: Okay, correct me if I’m wrong, but was this entire diversion into Avalon completely meaningless?
Stephanie: Not if you grew up with Nicieza/ Lobdell-era X-comics! Oh, sorry, you meant was it meaningless for the characters? Did any of the characters in our remarkably large roster change or develop in any way on Avalon? No, they did not. Unless you count Cassandra Nova getting temporarily infected by the Zzxx symbiote, which definitely does not exist mostly as an excuse for Broccardo to pretend he’s drawing Venom.
Ian: I expected the Marauders would attempt to save more than just one Threshold mutant, meaning we would see a series of time-displaced adventures. Instead, we just get an extended battle on Avalon which seemed like a thin excuse to draw a fight with Nemesis and the Acolytes in their delightful 90s costumes. Despite all of last issue’s interesting discussion about time travel, its repercussions, and jokes about its place in mutant culture, Marauders #5 used it as little more than set dressing for a fight.
Stephanie: Bingo. Cassymbiote, or Nova Zzxz (pronounced “Nova Zox”, like “nova lox”), or whatever you want to call them, gets most of a page for a splashy attack pose with a big one-word speech balloon: “Violence!” That’s about it.
Ian: I suppose the reveal that Cassandra Nova saved the “Wet Skin” (aka the Kin Crimson’s symbiote slave) from the Kin she vanquished is supposed to be cool. Symbiote Cassandra Nova! But the only thing more over-exposed than Cassandra Nova is the darn symbiotes, and this reveal did absolutely nothing for me. To top it off, the symbiote is given an extremely brief mention at the end as both possessing an X-Gene and being bonded to Warbird. This whole sequence felt very out of place, and almost like Orlando was just setting up the pieces for some Venom or Guardians of the Galaxy crossover we’re going to see in half a year.
Stephanie: But wait, there’s more! Somnus has now (shades of Doug Ramsey) acquired combat powers, thanks to years spent fighting Red Lotus in the dream dimension.
Remember Warbird? From Marjorie Liu’s majestic and sensitive run on Astonishing X-Men? Trained to be a warrior, cool Klingon vibes on her costume, yearned to be an artist, didn’t much want to go back to space, big crush on Xi’an Coy Manh? Now she’s got extra violence powers, and she looks like Venom with a hairnet . On the other hand I love Warbird so much that I’m kind of glad this issue remembered that she existed.
Ian: The fight with Daken and Aurora against the Chronicle on The Krag (how’d you like all those proper nouns?) is also pretty stale. Daken does the one trick that all Wolverines do: take seemingly lethal damage only to slice and dice harder. It must be tough, having a requisite Wolverine on your team and knowing there’s basically no way to have them do anything interesting in a fight. Their victory here felt so perfunctory that I was legitimately surprised the Shi’ar bothered to reward them for it at the end. There simply wasn’t any tension.
Stephanie: There is, however, a gland. The gland! Daken finishes the Chronicle off by smashing up a fluid-filled cylinder to puncture the gland that’s keeping him alive. Do you think it’s a thymus? Or a pituitary?
Before and After Science
Ian: Speaking of the ending, let’s talk about these last six or so pages. So, the Marauders return from the past with the Time Capsule and the Chronicle is vanquished. Deathbird shows up with a captured Kin Crimson (and Gladiator, who is Just There). Then, upon hearing of Xandra’s death, Deathbird executes the last Kin Crimson. They all go back to Chandilar and wham! Xandra’s alive. Daken gets an honor for killing the Chronicle, the symbiote goes with Deathbird, and Psylocke debriefs John Greycrow back at the Green Lagoon. Then, completely off-screen, we miss Cable rescuing the new mutant from the timestream before she shows up to talk with a resurrected (also offscreen) Kate Pryde. Maybe it’s just because I’m a Cable superfan, but I’m pretty bummed we didn’t get to see “Middle Aged Cable.”
Stephanie: Boccardo gets to draw another big action scene taking up most of a page, where Deathbird slashes Delphos’s body in half. Let the ichor fly! I liked that bit.
Ian: I didn’t mind the scene in the Green Lagoon between Greycrow and Psylocke. I miss Hellions, and it’s good to see a reminder that these characters have, like, actual motivations and feelings. There was even less of that this issue than normal. I’m worried that our cast is going to grow even larger next week.
Stephanie: Me too.
Ian: Let’s talk about Cerebra. We got some pretty sweet designs on the Threshold mutants during the flashback last week, so I guess I’m disappointed that she’s dressed up in a very modern sort of X-Men costume. I’ve never liked the “X” symbol on the navel, and I don’t like it here. Furthermore, Cerebra was a name long in use by a benevolent AI (though I suppose the entire point of this era is that those definitely don’t exist where mutants are involved) who aided the X-Men, so the name recycling gave me pause. Is Cerebra even a name that would have meaning to an ancient, pre-historic mutant? Or wait, is this supposed to be Cerebra from X-Men 2099? If so, I’m double-ultra confused about how the time capsule worked.
Stephanie: Again, the two things we get this issue that really resonate with me are 1. Boccardo’s art and 2. research opportunities.
Here it’s a research opportunity for X-Men: 2099. The newly resurrected time displaced mutant who hero-worships Kate Pryde is definitely Shakti Haddad, Cerebra from X-Men: 2099, not to be confused with the AI Cerebra from Extraordinary X-Men. Haddad/Cerebra was “waiting for us” when Bishop and the other Marauders returned from space. She’s a “chronal refugee,” but one from the future, not the far-off past, and she’s somebody “none of us expected.” She’s the start of a whole new plotline, nothing to do with King Crimson the Crimson Kin. And she’s been on her way to the present, thanks to Cable’s time-sliding powers, since Spider-Man 2099: Exodus #5, which came out a few weeks ago. In that issue, Cable brought her to the present time, Earth-616, in order to get her a mutant resurrection, which she couldn’t have on Earth-928 (where the 2099 stories take place).
Ian: Wait, does that mean that this Cerebra showing up is completely unrelated to the other time traveling mutant that the last two issues have been about? I’ll admit to completely misreading this, but I feel like I can’t be completely blamed for mixing that up. I know this is the X-Men, but how many time travelers do you really need!
In the end, I’m pretty disappointed with the rushed ending on this arc. The ideas I thought were most interesting were abandoned. I didn’t find the fights in Marauders #5 to be particularly compelling on their own. We’re definitely still suffering from having an overlarge cast. The rushed plot isn’t even being offset by a wealth of good character work. I’m frustrated because this feels like such a near-miss: with one more issue and some different priorities, I could see myself really enjoying this arc. I’m hoping that, going into the next arc, we get a bit of course correction from Orlando and crew.
Stephanie: Hard same. But at least our girl Kate Pryde is alive and back in her Red Queen pirate outfit. And she looks good.
SPACE PIRATE BOOTY
- Xavier talking to Xandra was soooo creepy. That dude should not be allowed to have children.
- Maybe this is my (Ian) age bracket speaking, but I’m still a mark for the ridiculous face-helmet-brace things on the 90s Acolytes and Cerebra.
- Justice for Warbird.
Ian Gregory is a writer and co-host of giant robots podcast Mech Ado About Nothing.
Stephanie Burt is Professor of English at Harvard. Her podcast about superhero role playing games is Team-Up Moves, with Fiona Hopkins; her latest book of poems is We Are Mermaids. Her nose still hurts from that thing with the gate.
