Since 2012, the
definition of ‘superhero comic’ has changed dramatically with a surge of
all-audiences books like Ms. Marvel, Batgirl, We Are…Robin!, The Unbeatable
Squirrel Girl, and a host of others from the Big Two: DC and Marvel. While most
of these titles do indeed feature young female protagonists designed to speak
to young female readers, they’re all incredibly well-written books that many
outside the target demographic enjoy immensely. There will always be a place
for more traditional-leaning superhero comic books on the shelves, but the
inclusivity presented by these quirky titles is helping make the entire genre
more relatable and emotionally engrossing in an industry fast becoming a
creator-owned market.
Two current Marvel Comics series are helping
redefine the superhero genre using emotional relatability as a core conceit: The Astonishing Ant-Man by Nick Spencer
and Ramon Rosanas, and All-New X-Men
by Dennis Hopeless and Mark Bagley. Of course, these aren’t the only series that are using emotional
character development to cement Marvel’s solo ongoing game, but they’re the
titles I want to talk about right now. Both titles are continuations of
previous volumes, though in different respects.
Nick Spencer and Ramon Rosanas helmed last year’s five-issue
Ant-Man series that led up to the
release of the summer blockbuster of the same name. After an Annual and The Last Days of Ant-Man leading into
the massive Secret Wars, Spencer and
Rosanas’ ongoing narrative featuring Scott Lang relocated to Miami, Florida to
run a security firm with two ex-villains continues in the re-named The Astonishing Ant-Man.
Conversely, All-New
X-Men didn’t undergo a name change, but the cast, mission statement, and
creative team changed. After Brian Michael Bendis wrapped up his years-long
X-Men saga (spanning All-New X-Men [Vol.
1] and Uncanny X-Men [Vol. 3]
with Uncanny X-Men #600, Dennis
Hopeless and Mark Bagley were tapped as the new creative team with a slightly
new roster and endless possibilities after the original time-displaced X-Men
were freed from Bendis’ X-mythos saga.
Hopeless and Bagley take the X-Men back to their roots in
their All-New X-Men, a series focused
on teenage mutants helping anyone and any way they can while learning to control
their powers and maturing both physically and mentally. More than any other
X-title in the past decade, Hopeless and Bagley’s All-New X-Men has already reset the bar for X-Men stories. Instead
of beating the crap out of each other like the adults are so keen on constantly
doing, the younger generation is focused on real-world crises and actually
doing good for good’s sake, not to make mutants look better or to work towards
some agenda. This is the basic difference between All-New X-Men and the concurrent Extraordinary X-Men and Uncanny
X-Men, that Hopeless and Bagley have taken the X-Men back to basics and it
works while the other two titles continue the recycled the doom-and-gloom
X-titles have been stuck on for so very long. Just the past two issues – All-New X-Men #4-5 – prove how well
Hopeless and Bagley handle these characters and the very concept of the X-Men.
In two issues, Hopeless pens an extended montage sequence
that takes the the team from Tokyo to the Ko Phi Phi Islands of Thailand, then
to Paris where an overly-aggressive encounter with between Wolverine and the
All-New Blob (with a more sophisticated taste palate and wardrobe to match)
snowballs into a full-scale battle that eventually involves the entire team.
Much like how TV sitcoms sometimes split the cast into A, B, and C stories that
pair up different characters to see how they interact in more intimate
settings, All-New X-Men #4-5 zones in
on some lingering issues between various members of the “roadtripping throwback
X-Men.”
Angel and Wolverine’s relationship – and its issues – is the
most relatable and authentic comic book romance I’ve read in a long time.
Hopeless does an excellent job clearly defining both Warren and Laura for the
readers while also making their romance believable in the context of
passionate, teenage love; these are teenagers with superpowers who have
traveled into space, fought future and/or past versions of themselves, and
regularly throw down with supervillains and natural disasters around the world,
and they’ve somehow found an attraction in the midst of total chaos. That said,
this doesn’t preclude them from normal relationship issues. Though Warren and
Laura are the same age and both vetted X-Men, Warren – for all intents and
purposes based on when he was plucked from his earlier timeline – hasn’t been a
superhero as long as Laura considering her time as X-23 and serving on various
X-Men and X-Force teams. Warren’s stomach for Laura’s role as the new Wolverine
(basically, the bull in a china shop that can’t die) is tender, and his
discomfort and dissatisfaction with their relationship begins to weight on him
more and more. Conversely, Laura can’t wrap her head around Warren’s stance
when he got with her knowing full well
who she is – the new Wolverine, the best at what she does. Put the superheroics
to the side and you have a justifiably over-concerned Warren at odds with Laura
being asked to be something she’s not. So normal fare, right?
The conversation between Iceman and Kid Genesis gives
incredible context for Bobby Drake’s paradoxical feelings about his own
sexuality. A cute French boy offers his number to Bobby, who initially seems
interested only to balk at the suggestion before walking away altogether. Evan
astutely feels as though Bobby felt judged, and asks why he thinks Evan – the
kid clone of an obsessively genocidal mutant demigod at war with his own nature
– would ever judge him? This leads to a powerful revelation that as much as
society has grown to accept homosexuality, Bobby was plucked from a time when
it hadn’t yet, and that affects Bobby’s feelings toward his situation, not to
mention seeing how angry and disenfranchised the older Iceman who suppressed
those feelings for decades has become. Bobby feels judged because he believes people will judge him, not
because he genuinely thinks Evan is judgmental or bigoted. It’s a stark moment
that Hopeless deftly handles without getting too heavy, and it gives greater
depth and insight to young Bobby Drake than Bendis did in his entire run with
the character.
As much as I enjoyed reading the above stories play out, my
favorite might be Idie Okonkwo’s confrontation with her creator. In Paris, Idie
visits the Notre Dame cathedral to have words with God. Idie has witnessed more
horrors in her short life than any should have to in a lifetime. She’s watched
her friends die and has taken lives herself. She grew up with a debilitating
self-hatred of her own mutation borne of Christian ideology turned
psychologically scarring. Inside and out, Idie has battled demons her entire
life and she has every right to be angry at the God she wants to love but
cannot excuse. Hopeless could have totally fumbled here and gone high-concept
with flowery language and vague euphemisms. Instead, he chooses to take the
blunt, critical path and presents an angry Idie yelling at the Christian God, a
powerful sequence made better by Bagley’s emotional nuance and subtle body
language. Idie’s monologue is an impressive moment for the character that
proves how well Hopeless can handle these characters. Other writers may have
chosen to be less direct in approaching an issue like religious discord, yet
Hopeless tackles it head-on.
All three of these plotlines very much show how Dennis
Hopeless and Mark Bagley are simultaneously moving the X-Men forward and taking
them back to basics with a series that integrates insightful character
development with fun X-Men superhero action without sacrificing quality in
either regard.
The Astonishing Ant-Man
Last year, Nick Spencer and Ramon Rosanas brought Ant-Man
back in style with the plainly-titled Ant-Man
that led up to last summer’s big-screen blockbuster of the same name. Spencer
and Rosanas aptly took Matt Fraction’s updated Scott Lang (from the incredible
‘Marvel NOW!’ FF series) and gave him
a new thesis: the actual everyman
superhero. Though Fraction’s Hawkeye
grounded Clint Barton more than ever before, Spencer and Rosanas’ Scott Lang is
a charming, lovable klutz who can’t do anything right. The best and worst part
about Scott’s situation is that he knows he’s a major screw-up, and every way
he tries to make it better blows up in his face because he either (a) Didn’t
think it through, or (b) DIDN’T THINK IT THROUGH!
Scott is perpetually stuck in scan mode, unsure of himself
in most regards and unwilling to settle on any one thing for too long. To be
fair, he was killed back in 2004 during Avengers:
Disassembled only to be reborn during Avengers:
The Children’s Crusade, the final chapter of Allan Heinberg and Jim
Cheung’s Young Avengers saga and watch his daughter, Cassie, die at Doctor
Doom’s hand. He then accepted Reed Richard’s request to watch over the Future
Foundation with the Fantastic Four went on an interdimensional family road
trip. During his time in the Earthbound Fantastic Four, Scott learned some
responsibility, but ultimately gambled it on a plan of revenge against Doctor
Doom that put the Future Foundation kids in grave danger, an unacceptable
action by any length. So yeah, Scott’s been through some stuff. Way before he
was ever murdered, he was a con man who stole the Ant-Man helmet only to get
Hank Pym’s blessing after the fact. Scott isn’t a bad guy, really, he just
makes terrible decisions and keeps getting lucky when everyone forgives him.
Spencer doesn’t shy away from giving Scott moments of self-reflection,
sequences where he actually looks within and sees his inadequacies and flaws.
What’s better, even, is that Scott is growing as a person and learning actual
responsibility, like when he finally fesses up to Cassie and tells her he’s
been coming to every basketball game and major life event, only miniaturized so
he can bypass his no-custody status; yes, he’s caught as Ant-Man when he didn’t
want Cassie to know then just admits his actions because he’s on the spot, but
he does it all the same and that’s something.
But Spencer and Rosanas didn’t just give their main star a
facelift; they also filled Scott’s Miami with a great cast of supporting
characters, including two ex-villains-turned-coworkers, an ex-girlfriend in
need of Scott’s security services, his ex-wife and daughter, and most recently
the all-new Giant-Man, Raz Malhotra. There’s an astonishing (no pun intended)
level of depth to every one of these characters that Spencer retains from issue
to issue flawlessly. Grizzly and Machinesmith (they just call him Smith) are
the odd couple ex-villains Scott hires to work for his new security firm, and
their decision to become part of a legitimate organization is humorously
documented when they fumble and almost
sell out their boss in a pinch. Darla Deering makes her return to the Marvel
universe after her tenure as Ms. Thing in Fraction’s FF, though she’s back to being a superstar singing sensation who
decides to enlist Scott’s security services for her time in Miami. But are her
motives pure? Probably not. Scott’s ex-wife has every reason to hate her
ex-con, ex-dead, ex-Avenger, ex-husband, and that sour attitude shines through
every time she appears on-page. Similarly, Cassie’s disenfranchisement with her
deadbeat dad is palpable, and even though she’s been a superhero herself
understands that there are better ways to achieve your goals than the ways
Scott chooses.
Raz Malhotra might be the best new addition to the Marvel
universe since Kamala Khan because he has a healthy dose of self-doubt, a level
of acceptance that he might not know what he’s doing and might be putting
people in danger because he doesn’t know what he’s doing. And when Scott admits
to the Wasp that he chose Raz to be the new Giant-Man because, “He seemed
cool?” it makes the whole situation all the better because it wasn’t
pre-ordained or a legacy pick or even a fanboy – this is just some guy that
Scott see potential in, a guy who stood up to a supervillain (the D-list
Egghead) after being brainwashed and didn’t flinch, a guy who actually put on
the superhero suit sent to him by some other guy he barely knows and tried to
do good regardless. Raz represents an optimistic contrast to the typical
millennial, a young man ready to answer the call to action, learn from his
mistakes, and become a better person through the whole it all.
The Astonishing
Ant-Man is thematically about taking responsibility for your actions and
holding yourself accountable to you. Scott is trying to please everyone else,
so he makes poor decisions as a means to an end instead of accepting that he –
and only he – is responsible for the
state of his life, that he has to learn to do what is right and not cut corners
to achieve his goals quicker.
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