Brandon Borzelli's Geek Goggle Reviews
A vs X: Consequences #1 of 5
Marvel Comics
Gillen, Raney & Charalampiois
The mini-series epilogue to the Marvel event, Avengers versus X-Men, begins with this issue and provides an interesting array of stories that seem to be planting the seeds for further stories rather than tying up loose ends from the event. Basically, this issue is about the mutants that are leftover from the event that played major roles during Avengers versus X-Men. Most of the heavy hitters are touched on in this issue while the others are at least mentioned. It's a decent read but doesn't really launch into anything meaningful in the opening series. It's a promising start but there is going to have to be more progression in the second issue to hold my attention.
The primary focus is Cyclops in jail. This wasn't the best part of the comic book but it at least lays the groundwork for future stories. This established how they are containing Cyclops and what they plan to do with the other mutants once they are caught. It's pretty clear that editorial's direction is to cast many of the mutants as treacherous villains as they seem to be hunted beyond the normal rank and file villains of the past.
The other threads deal with the likes of Hope and Wolverine trying to deal with being on the winning team, but still watching so many of their friends getting hunted down like animals. The stories all seem to be building towards decisions for each of these characters: do they passively side with their mutant brethren or do they definitively go with the Avengers, rejecting mutant-hood.
The artwork is pretty good. There are a lot of qualities in the line work that reminds me of the likes of Bagley or Romita. The characters aren't overly muscular and the details in the wrinkles on their faces show their emotions more realistically than many super hero comics. I liked the artwork but it isn't tested because this issue has so little in the way of action. Captain America's costume was a bit of eye opener, but if you can get past that then seeing Wolverine in a tie for a lot of issue shouldn't bother you too much.
I was hesitant about picking this issue up. I tend to not like the whole post-mortem series for an event and this one didn't really change my mind but I did like the direction that this series is taking. I definitely wanted to know how the rest of the mutant brain trust was going to be handled in the aftermath and this comic lays that framework. This was a decent start to this series.
3 out of 5 geek goggles
