X-Factor (current vol.)

[Velorath]

Just wanted to give this title it's own topic here since this is one of those rare X-books I actually encourage people to read (also pick up "Madrox: Multiple Choice" in tpb.  Peter David has always been a solid writer.  He's not one of those writers whose name alone sells books, nor does he tend to get hired to write the big, universe-changing cross-overs.  He just tells good stories, throws in some humor, and his writing shows respect for both the characters and the readers (something seemingly absent from some of the big name writers today like Bendis and JMS).

It's no secret that for all their talk about long reaching plans, Marvel has very little idea what direction it really wants to take the X-books in.  They cancel books in the name of trimming down the line, then proceed to replaced the canceled books with a bunch of new books.  They've launched books like X-treme X-men and Excalibur (both by Claremont) which start out with a general purpose for the series, which then get abandoned as plot lines are dropped and replaced with unrelated plots.  They have Morrison write one of the best received runs on X-men in a long fucking time, then proceed to undo everything he did right after he leaves.

So the first thing that I want to say about X-Factor is that Peter David at least knows the basic premise of his series, and it's something as simple as a Mutant Detective Agency.  No grand goals like trying to rebuild Genosha or trying to find Destiny's diaries.  The opening arc seems to tie into Decimation a bit so far, but for the most part what we're looking at here is a character driven book and David is doing a good job in that respect so far.  His current take on Madrox alone has enough plot potential to fill a series, especially with the introduction of a dupe that represents one of the worse aspects of the Multiple Man.

I was skeptical about using House of M plot device Layla Miller as one of the main characters I'll admit.  Rather than try to give her a personality though, David simply throws her into his story as a plot device as well and turns her character into a running joke ("I'm Layla Miller.  I know stuff." has become her catch phrase).  While Madrox deals with Rictor's situation, and his dupe problem, Siryn carries the main plot involving this arcs villains, Singularity Investigations. 

M, Strong Guy, and Wolfsbane round out the cast.  M is written much like she was in Generation X, but I'm curious as to why she'd join up with this group.  Guido hasn't gotten much to do yet, and while Wolfsbane hasn't either, her anti-suicide speech to Rictor in the first issue more than made up for it.  Funny shit there.

[Margalis]

Didn't David also write the old X-Factor books where Strong Guy joined up? Google seems to confirm that.

I've always liked David other than his run on the Hulk when Hulk was in his merged Banner + Green Hulk phase, because I thought it made the character really really boring. (Let's see - he's super strong, and smart, and has an even temper?) On the other hand he wrote Hulk: Ground Zero which was great.

[Velorath]

Didn't David also write the old X-Factor books where Strong Guy joined up? Google seems to confirm that.

I've always liked David other than his run on the Hulk when Hulk was in his merged Banner + Green Hulk phase, because I thought it made the character really really boring. (Let's see - he's super strong, and smart, and has an even temper?) On the other hand he wrote Hulk: Ground Zero which was great.

Yep, he wrote the X-Factor that consisted of Havok, Polaris, Multiple Man, Strong Guy, Wolfsbane, and Quicksilver.  While the new book has some of the same characters though, the focus and tone is entirely different.

I actually liked a lot of the Smart Hulk stuff (although the Pantheon seemed really out of place).  David has said that the intelligent Hulk storyline was always meant to be a finite storyline.  I do know that Banner/Hulk's temper started getting the best of him again (and in Future Imperfect we did get to see just how big a problem an intelligent Hulk could be).  Doc Samson tries to point out that Banner is losing control, but Banner doesn't want to hear it.  I think Onslaught might have kept things from playing out like they should have though if I remember right.  Hulk and Banner are split (Banner ends up the the whole Heroes Reborn thing), and even when they're brought back together I don't think we ever see the smart Hulk again.

[HaemishM]

I loved David's run on the Hulk. He went through so many phases with that character... the Grey Hulk, Joe Fix-it, the Smart Hulk, Smart Hulk with Pantheon, and I think it wasn't until Onslaught that it started to go off the rails through no fault of David's.

His X-Factor run was the ONLY X-Factor run really worth reading, other than maybe the few issues Whilce Portacio drew. The first issue of this new X-Factor is pretty damn good, though. It's worth reading, and a lot of angles worth pursuing. The Wolfsbane speech was great. I wish they'd use more characters from Generation X, as that was a good book until they took Lobdell and Bachalo off of it. It was the only good writing Lobdell ever did.

The X-Books need a lot more paring down. Ditch X-Calibur, merge the X-Men books into one book, kill Wolverine off for good and come up with some other reason for them to exist than as a thinly-disguised allegory on racism and discrimination.