We’re back! Hellions returns not a moment too soon for an issue by Zeb Wells, Stephen Segovia, David Curiel, and Cory Petit. As these reprobates enter the Star Home For Foundlings, they are forced to face their own trauma in Hellions #2.
Austin Gorton: Well, after the longest trip from Krakoa to Nebraska ever, the newly-formed Hellions are back, and they more or less live up to their name in the first few pages of the series’ second – and first post-pandemic shutdown – issue. Despite that gap in time, it seemed easy to slide right back into this narrative and headspace of this diverse, whacky cast. Liz, how excited are you to have the Hellions back, and was this a seamless pickup from that long-ago first issue?
Liz Large: I am thrilled to be back–I think that the first issue being so good was a double edged sword. I was so hyped to see what happened next, and the wait has been agonizing. I’m glad we can get right back into things without much need for buildup.
Idle Hands
LL: The intro page is a good reminder of where we left off, and I appreciate that we’re officially dropping John Greycrow’s old codename and sticking with “Greycrow”.
AG: Listing the character as Greycrow on the recap page is such an elegant, effective way to confirm the character’s designation going forward, and it is indeed much appreciated. Speaking of the recap page, I love that the title of the story is “Idle Hands”; it’s a perfectly apt title regardless, given the whole saying’s connection to the Devil and the series’ use of demonic/hellish trappings, but also, hilariously appropriate given the time gap between the first issue and this one. I don’t know that Zeb Wells changed it once it became clear this issue would be delayed for months, but either way, it works.
LL: Our opening scene takes us right to the “State Home for Foundlings”, where our team encounters some cops who–within literal moments of first contact–manage to piss off our team. [Ed. note: Once again, it is the police escalating the situation] Psylocke doesn’t want their oversight, and Wild Child….well. One of the cops has a dog with him, and Wild Child attacks the cop in a display of dominance (Dog People, don’t @ me, I don’t know how dogs work). I do really like this opener, since we get to see almost every teammate show their position. Greycrow immediately subdues Wild Child, Psylocke speaks to the police, Empath is a jerk, and Havok also speaks to the police. Alex seems to think he’s a little better than the other members of the team, and while I don’t personally disagree, I can see that being an issue going forward.
AG: Havok certainly seems out-of-place amongst this crew, and it will be interesting to see if his inclusion on the team turns out to be purely the result of plot machinations, or if Wells is going to try to say something about the character via his involvement with this motley crew. You’re absolutely right that these opening pages expertly show off the dynamics of the team – Nanny and the Orphan Maker don’t get much to do here, but they make up for it later! – and also, just what a wild, uncontrollable idea this whole “team of evil mutants cleaning up messes” is; within the first three pages, Wild Child – one of the least evil members of the team, on paper, at least – is already trying to rip out a cop’s throat. [Ed. note: ACAB] And we’re not even into the actual orphanage yet!
I’ll Have to Fill Out a Report
LL: What’s wild about this book is that every page is this full. As soon as we enter the orphanage it’s extremely creepy. I just want to emphasize that it is an orphanage Sinister ran experiments in, so we get the typical “abandoned kids toys” plus the “cursed science” vibes. Nanny starts to lose it. It seems like she’s connecting with the children who passed through, and while that may have set her off initially, it turns out that Empath was messing with her to heighten her reaction. I hate this guy! Fortunately, Greycrow agrees with me. Poor Psylocke will have to fill out a report when they get home, but on the bright side, Empath isn’t in the rest of the issue. I get that the immediate murder of a teammate should be shocking, or concerning, but I can’t stop laughing about it. He’ll get resurrected, it’s fine.
AG: Both the abruptness of Empath being shot in the head, and Psylocke’s resigned reaction to it are hilarious. Who would have thought one of the by-products of the Five’s resurrection protocols was to beauractize death? This is a really effective use of the changed nature of death in the X-universe (or, at least, the change to finally make the out-of-universe revolving door of death textual): it allows readers to be both shocked & amused by the abruptness of Empath’s death & the reactions to it. This sort of tongue-in-cheek approach to death wouldn’t be appropriate everywhere/in every situation, but for what has already shaped up to be a darkly comic series like this, it works.
And speaking of dark, Sinister’s orphanage is indeed creepy as hell. Stephen Segovia & David Curiel crank the creep factor up to eleven, just in their depiction of a rundown, abandoned orphanage filled with empty beds covered in torn sheets, before we even get to the shattered cloning tanks, the zombie Marauders, and their demented queen.
LL: Yes, it’s so clearly creepy that when Havok tries to tell Psylocke he’s fine with this, we don’t need to be a psychic to know he’s lying. But she is a psychic– he of all people should know better than to lie to one!– and reminds him, and the readers, that nobody on this mission is doing okay. Almost immediately, Havok sees a creepy reflection of a beat up version of himself being embraced by the Goblin Queen, but I’m sure it’s just paranoia. Right?
Meanwhile, Greycrow (who is going to throw his back out carrying the team) is setting explosives around the cloning tubes. As Nanny reminds us, these tubes are where he was “born and reborn to do the bidding of Sinister”. I cannot stress enough how creepy some of the dialogue in this book is. Before they can blow up the tanks and head out, Havok notices that blood is dripping onto him from the ceiling. The mangled bodies of the original Marauders are hanging there, and they look pretty dead at first glance. But of course, our team’s not that lucky.
AG: They are not, and as the zombified Marauders drop down and approach the Hellions, there’s a really intriguing moment as Greycrow attempts to win over his former teammates, telling them he’s found them a new home. Obviously, Greycrow was a Marauder himself, back in the day, but the group as a whole was rarely presented as anything more than a loose association of individuals who liked killing people. Seeing Greycrow speaking quietly and with concern to the Marauders was genuinely surprising, and really made me want to see some flashbacks to the Marauders hanging out between missions, drinking some beers & bonding or something. [Ed. note: I cannot emphisize enough how they did a genocide] In just a couple panels, the Marauders went from fairly one-note characters to something…a little more, at least. I’m not saying I want to come to sympathize with this team of mass murderers, but even heinous villains can be made interesting with a little character development.
But these Marauders want nothing to do with Greycrow or his offer, because they have a new leader. The one, the only, the absolutely fabulous Madelyne Pryor, the Goblin Queen!
Do You Know That You Are Unloved?
LL: She’s here! I love Madelyne, and I am extremely excited about her appearance here. Everything on this mission is so calculated to emotionally damage the Hellions. John facing his old teammates, Alex facing a woman he has….complicated feelings for. If Empath (RIP) was here, he’d be in a similar situation. Alex seems to be assuming this is the real Madelyne, and I don’t see any reason not to, but check this space in six months when it turns out to be an alive plant that thinks it’s her, or something. It’s X-Men, I don’t trust anything. [Ed. not: is it already outdated to ask if she might be cake?]
Madelyne orders her Marauders to attack the team, and while I’m sure they all did a great job, I was too busy being delighted by Nanny. She gets her brain scrambled, she gets bowled across the room, and then she gets stuck to the floor, facedown, repeatedly asking to be flipped over. If we could get this “Nanny is actually a turtle on her back” content every issue, I’d be very happy.
AG: Yes! Nanny & Orphan Maker were hiding in the background earlier in the issue, but now is their time to shine! I in no way condone the physical harming of children, but Nanny’s “I hope you like pants-down spankings, you little monster!” (shortly before getting turtled) is my new favorite battle cry, and Orphan Maker gets in a classic grade school zinger of his own as he declares Zombie Blockbuster to be a “butt-horn”.
To your point about Madelyne, if memory serves, she was left more or less alive and stable (physically…) following her most recent resurrection in X-Men vol.4, so there’s no reason this couldn’t be the real deal Madelyne (for whatever that is worth in comics), but I share your wariness. At any rate, things are not looking good for our crew as the issue draws to a close: Havok is entranced by Madelyne, Nanny is still stuck on her back, and Psylocke takes a few hits from Riptide’s shurikens, which leaves her injured and, in the eyes of Wild Child, no longer the dominant alpha of their pack, making her ripe for his own show of dominance…
LL: What a mess– I can’t wait to see what happens next time. I did want to touch on the data page. We only get one this issue, about “The Conundrum of Mr. Sinister’s (Legacy) Marauders” and it says two things I really fixated on. First, Greycrow came and asked repeatedly about the possibility of bringing back his old Marauder teammates. When coupled with everything that went on when he met them, this is sweet and sad and unexpected.
The second is more big picture– the Marauders were cloned and recloned so many times that the recent versions may not be the most correct versions. In order to bring them back, research would be needed–and these notes raise the idea of resurrecting them “with a little love”. This is unsettling. If they mean “we’ll bring them back and give them a safe place to live, community, etc.” so they want to be better, that’s wonderful. But I worry that this could lead down the road to altering people in other ways (something we’ve already seen a little of in X-Force). Just something that’s been concerning me!
AG: I did appreciate that the text page did some work addressing the functional difference between mutants resurrected by the Five and Sinister’s Marauders clones, given that Sinister was, with the Marauders, essentially doing what the Five do now (albeit better than Sinister, seemingly), but the road it went down in the process does indeed open the door to some disturbing possibilities.
X-Traneous Thoughts
- In a subtle bit of continued world building across the line, we see that word of the finer details of Krakoan society is spreading: one of the police officers in the opening pages knows, for example, that one of the Quiet Council’s rules bans the killing of humans by mutants.
- There’s a great bit during the battle against the Zombie Marauders when Havok, the energy blaster, is fighting Prism, the guy who, you know, refracts and redirects energy, and Havok calls out for someone to switch with him. It was just adorably hapless of Havok.
- It’s almost sad because it shows how used he is to working with a team. Usually he would have gotten assistance in that situation– but nobody here cares about him personally, and the one to actually stop Prism is Madelyn.
- Madelyne greeting Havok as “lover” is also awesomely in-character, in terms of being just the right mix of camp & gothic romance that makes her character so much fun.
- “Nanny has been immobilized! Repeat! Nanny can not move!”
- I cannot believe that in two issues I’ve become a Greycrow fan, but I think it’s happening. The moment Arclight puts on a “human” looking face and begs him for help, he immediately stops fighting and leaves himself open to attack. He really cares for his old teammates that much.
- I’m also interested to know what’s the deal with the Marauders– switching between zombie and alive faces isn’t something we usually see in undead powersets.
- I’m curious who the in-universe author of the text piece is meant to be; Sinister seems the likely culprit, but he also doesn’t refer to himself in the third person often. If not Sinister, then whom?
- Krakoan reads GO WILD
Austin Gorton also reviews older issues of X-Men at the Real Gentlemen of Leisure website, co-hosts the A Very Special episode podcast, and likes Star Wars. He lives outside Minneapolis, where sometimes, it is not cold. Follow him on Twitter @AustinGorton
Liz Large is a copywriter with a lot of opinions on mutants.
