Steve Orlando, Eleonora Carlini, and Matt Milla inject new life into the team Marauders in the first issue of their new series. With introductions out of the way, they get right to the adventure, drama, and messiness of it all as the team and their newest, most genocidal member Cassandra Nova blast into space to find the remaining members of the first generation of mutants. Along the way, Orlando continues to show his talent for excavating characters from the Big Two’s past while putting his own spin on staples like the Shi’ar Empire. Seriously, the first scene features a character that debuted in Inhumans; not the well-loved Paul Jenkins/Jae Lee series, but the Rafael Marin and Jose Ladronn one from 2000. However, Marauders #1 isn’t just cameos and throwbacks, and Steve Orlando and Carlini create an adventurous team dynamic with a bit of a dark side that sets it apart from the other current X-teams.
Eleonora Carlini’s manga-infused approach to the art in Marauders plays up the emotions and action up to 11. She combines traditional superhero figures with cartoonish faces and high energy layouts culminating to a double page splash of the Marauders’ new ship in flight. Carlini’s cartooning especially works in tense moments like a reaction shot to Kate Pryde introducing Cassandra Nova as the final Marauder. Even though it’s been obvious that she’s joining the team (Plus the justifications in the data pages.), we get to share in the surprise and even get a laugh from Somnus, who doesn’t know who she is until reading her mind and then going all glowstick on her. Along with the intense facial expressions, Milla goes big and loud with his color palette in a matter befitting a team with characters who project psychic energy into daggers, absorb it and throw it back, or phase through it to name a few. However, there’s a lot of red from Jean Grey confronting Cassandra Nova to the big finale of the issue that blows the series’ status quo up big time.
Like any good superhero book, Marauders has a lot of action from its first page to a space battle where Kate Pryde tries to phase into the mental equivalent of adamantium. However, in the gaps between missions and team construction, Steve Orlando and Eleonora Carlini continue to build up the personalities of the various Marauders. As the newbie, Cassandra Nova is the focus of Marauders #1 with everyone from psychics Jean Grey and Psylocke to team leader Kate Pryde trying to get a read on her and see if she’s actually cured. There are all kinds of panels of her looking at the reader basically saying that putting her on the team was a bad idea even if she’s connected to the mystery box that Kate found.
However, other characters get their moments in the sun like Akihiro and his relationship with his ex Somnus and current partner, Aurora, who are trying to help him overcome the pain of being tortured by Brimstone Love in the previous issue. Carlini turns in a splash showing that this torture and a desire for revenge is the first thing on Akihiro’s mind, and he plays a secondary role in the action with Psylocke and Bishop leading the way in the space fight. However, Somnus and Aurora play roles on the Marauders beyond being there Akihiro. For example, Somnus is making up for literal lost time by going on adventures with the team, and his face close-up on the glass watching Earth fall back in the distance reminds me of the first time I read a comic with the X-Men in space. Orlando also uses the data pages to add depth to the characters without detracting from the story and mystery and brewing space opera even though it would have been even more entertaining to see Dr. Nemesis and Mr. Sinister debate Cassandra Nova’s mutant-ness on panel.
Marauders #1 is full of adventures, flawed, yet badass queer characters, and also features intrigue and deep cuts from the Marvel universe in a nice action mystery package. The team has a focus, but Orlando and Carlini aren’t afraid to explore interesting rabbit trails along the way.
Story: Steve Orlando Art: Eleonora Carlini Colors: Matt MillaLetters: Ariana Maher Story: 8.7 Art: 8.3 Overall: 8.5 Recommendation: Buy
Marvel Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
Steve Orlando, Creees Lee, and Rain Beredo put their own imprint on the Marauders in Marauders Annual #1 with a more active approach to the team’s activities, queer subtext/text, deep cut characters from the merry mutant library, and general mayhem. This issue wisely combines the assembling the team and first mission to make for a satisfying reading experience. It has explosive action and also grapples with Krakoa’s ideology with this issue’s antagonist, Brimstone Love (Last seen in X-Men 2009!)
Before sending the Marauders on a rescue mission, Orlando and Lee take some time letting readers get to know the new members of the team, namely, Akihiro, Psylocke, Aurora, Tempo, and Somnus. The cold open of Marauders Annual #1 is centered around Akihiro and shows a side of him not usually explored my most of his writers as he investigates a Morlocks graveyard in Greenwich, Connecticut and tries to figure out who’s been preying on mutants. He ends up motivating the Marauders’ first mission. With close-ups of Psylocke’s face, Creees Lee captures the sadness and regret she’s felt after Hellions, and the way her daughter was used to blackmail and manipulate her ends up being her motivation for joining the team.
Tempo’s intro sequence is the most clever, and she uses her powers to fast forward through a breakup conversation with Orlando and letterer Cory Petit turning in one hell of a run on piece of dialogue. He and Lee indulge in some soapiness meets disaster bisexuality by having two of Akihiro’s exes on the team, namely, Somnus (Who gives Iceman the prom night he deserved) and Aurora. All of the Marauders have a heart to help their fellow mutants, but have been through shit in their personal lives so being on this team is an opportunity to turn this negative energy into something positive and productive. The Marauders are a little messier and edgier than the X-Men, but have more of a moral compass than the X-Force and bring more of an inclusive approach to Krakoa in contrast with the cloak and dagger work of the Hellfire Trading Company and Quiet Council even though Kate Pryde and Bishop are still involved in that side of the business.
What makes Brimstone Love such a compelling antagonist in addition to his Tenacious D music video design is that what he’s seeing makes sense in many cases. Krakoa definitely has a cult-ish vibe, and by making a country ostensibly only for mutants, it does go against Professor X’s initial ideas of mutant/human coexistence. (The climax of the comic happening at the long-neglected Xavier School for Gifted Youngsters drives the point home.) The Morlock Carver especially makes some great points about Krakoa only being for “good” and good looking mutants, which makes sense because many of the former Morlocks are kept out of public life and live in a kind of retirement community in Arizona as seen in the previous volume of Marauders. Carver betraying Akihiro undermines his ideas, but it shows that Steve Orlando (and hopefully other “Destiny of X” writers) is critically dissecting the Krakoan experiment and even connecting the current Marauders team to the original mutant-killing one from the “Mutant Massacre” crossover.
On the flipside, what Brimstone Love and his followers use to explain their actions reminds me of what a lot of cis het allies say to queer folks (*cough* Bachelorette parties at gay bars, or having “ally” be a part of the LGBTQ+ umbrella) when they’re mad that we want spaces for our community. For example, a human talks about how the founding of Krakoa undermined his work to fight for “mutant rights” in a way that sounds like a lot of liberals who think that fighting for LGBTQ+ rights ends with the freedom to marry. Because maybe some of us don’t want to be apart of this institution and form relationships in a new way. That’s just an example off the top of my head, and it’s cool to see Orlando and Creees Lee engage with queerness via the mutant metaphor while also featuring a superhero team where the queer members outnumber the straight ones.
Marauders Annual #1 rejuvenates the concept of the Marauders of a team with new members that are sure to bring intrigue, drama, and cool powers. (See the Lee’s visualizations of Somnus and Tempo’s abilities.) Steve Orlando and Creees Lee also use the new-look Marauders to explore things like respectability politics and safe spaces while also including violent brawls against bad guys from the 1990s that look like a fundamentalist preacher’s worst nightmare. I’m all aboard with this new book and am interested to see how Marauders recontextualizes characters from the X-Book’s past while engaging with the metaphorical connection between queerness and being a mutant while having kick-ass, attitude filled fight scenes.
Story: Steve Orlando Art: Creees Lee Colors: Rain Beredo Letters: Cory Petit Story: 8.2 Art: 7.7 Overall: 8.0 Recommendation: Buy
Marvel Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
In honor of Pride Month, Marvel Comics dropped a big 84 pages one-shot celebrating both its LGBTQ+ creators and characters. Beginning with a story from Luciano Vecchio that’s not sure if it’s telling the story of queer characters in the Marvel Universe from an in-universe or more of a real-world documentary perspective,Marvel Voices Pride #1 sputters with a story that basically says aliens and shapeshifters brought the idea of being non-binary, genderqueer, or gender nonconforming to this world followed by a text-heavy Allan Heinberg/Jim Cheung Young Avengers reunion. However, it catches its footing with a cute Karolina Dean/Nico Minoru story, and for the most part, it provides a wide spectrum of LGBTQ+ representation with a special focus on the mutant/X-Men side of the Marvel Universe, who have acted as a mostly metaphorical representation to queer fans like myself. However, it’s nice to see characters like Anole, Prodigy, Destiny, Karma, and Jessie Drake get the spotlight along with more prominently featured cis male gay characters like Northstar (His coming out story in Alpha Flight #106 is reprinted at the end) and Iceman. But fans of non-mutant/Runaways/Wiccan and Hulkling characters may be disappointed as characters like Angela, Sera, Hercules, and America Chavez don’t appear except in small cameo roles.
Marvel VoicesPride #1 kicks off with a journey through the LGBTQ+ history of the Marvel Universe from writer/artist Luciano Vecchio. Even though many of his adult characters look like teens, Vecchio has a beautiful art style and color palette. However, my issue with this first story isn’t the form, but the content. As mentioned earlier, this introductory story isn’t sure if it’s being told from the perspective of the real world or Earth-616 even though it’s narrated by Prodigy. It also has a very self-congratulatory, back-patting tone, especially for a company that recently cancelled a book starring many of its queer characters (X-Factor) and mentions characters like Angela and Sera that haven’t been barely heard or seen from since getting their own title in 2015. Even though Vecchio is a queer creator, there’s big “ally” energy in this first story with a heterosexual character, Captain America getting the spotlight, and the implication that non-binary identities came from aliens and shapeshifters. He does successfully lay out what ended up being a thesis for the anthology, which is the connection between mutants and queer identity.
This story is followed by a one page Young Avengers creator reunion as Allan Heinberg, Jim Cheung, and Marcelo Maiolo chronicle Hulking and Wiccan’s wedding vows. Heinberg’s writing is tender, but this feels like more of a prose piece than a comic. Heinberg and Cheung’s inclusion seems like more stunt-casting to get older queer Marvel fans interested in the one-shot rather than being any kind of substantial addition to their work on Young Avengers. However, Marvel Voices: Pride rights the ship (Pun fully intended.) in its next story featuring two members of Marvel’s other prominent 2000s teen superhero team, the Runaways. Mariko Tamaki, Kris Anka, and Tamra Bonvillain turns in three pages of sweet glances, chatter, and a super adorable kiss as Nico Minoru and Karolina Dean think about what they would tell people if they asked how they met. The long line out of the venue reminded me of the pre-pandemic days when I would wait in line for hours to get a good spot to see artists like Carly Rae Jepsen and Robyn with my fellow queer folks, and Bonvillain’s summery color palette matches Anka’s skill with facial expressions. This story is like the cherry on top of the sundae that he helped build when he was the artist on Runaways and finally put Karolina and Nico in a relationship together.
The next story in Marvel Voices Pride is the first one to feature a trans protagonist, Dr. Charlene McGowan from Immortal Hulk. The plot of Lilah Sturges, Derek Charm, and Brittany Peer is about some “hilarious” misunderstandings when Lady Daredevil aka the artist formerly known as Elektra Natchios and some Z-list, rapping supervillains raid McGowan’s lab when they think she’s producing mutant growth hormone when when she’s actually working on a way to get trans women’s bodies to produce progesterone without taking pills. What follows is Trans 101 with a little bit of ass kicking courtesy Charm, who is in his Bronze Age element with the cheesy costumes and dark shadows. However, other than the fact that’s she a scientist who sometimes makes jokes, we don’t learn anything about Dr. McGowan except that she’s surprisingly cool with microaggressions from A-List Marvel heroes. Kudos to Marvel Voices‘ editorial for getting a trans writer in Sturges to pen this story, but the whole thing feels reductive and geared towards fanboys who know every member of Daredevil or Hulk’s rogues gallery and have never interacted with a transgender person.
In contrast, Leah Williams, Jan Bazaldua, and Erick Arciniega re-introduce Marvel’s first transgender character, the mutant Jessie Drake in a thrilling manner as she appears in her first comic in 27 years. However, Black Cat is the protagonist of this story and is tracking down Steel Raven, a villain who’s been impersonating her, pulling some sloppy heists, and ruining her reputation. Williams’ quippy writing style works well for the fast-paced short story as Black Cat and Jessie meet, flirt, and figure out their next move in catching Steel Raven. Bazaldua plays with space and transforms what would normally be your run of the mill villain warehouse into something more surreal. She and Williams do succeed in building a connection between Jessie and Black Cat as well as showing off Jesse’s empathy-based abilities, but this is just a teaser for a bigger cat and mouse game. Hopefully, there’s room for more batting of eyes, power showcasing, and insight into the character of Jessie Drake, both in her own series or in Black Cat’s current ongoing, which has been a sneaky good read.
Continuing this positive trend is Crystal Frasier, Jethro Morales, and Rachelle Rosenberg telling a wonderful She-Hulk and Titania. But there’s a twist as Jennifer Walters doesn’t appear, but Jennifer Harris, who was inspired by her to come out as trans and cosplay her at a copyright friendly version of New York Comic Con. As someone who came out as bi around the same time Prodigy did in Young Avengers or when Iceman came out as gay in All-New X-Men, I can definitely connect to the inspirational power of fictional characters like Jennifer did with She-Hulk. She and Titania also have some nice banter, and Frasier and Morales also remind readers that She-Hulk was the original fourth wall breaker with some jokes and exploding layouts.
After the She-Hulk story is probably my favorite story of Marvel Voices Pride #1, which is a Prodigy and Speed one from Kieron Gillen, Jen Hickman, and Brittany Peer as Gillen returns to both the X-Men and Young Avengers franchises. The dialogue between Speed and Prodigy sparkles, and Hickman shows off their chops as a storyteller working in eating pizza, stealing glances at Colossus, and empathizing with Kitty Pryde as Prodigy basically tells his bisexual origin story. His story also acts as a critique of how the mutant books have been good about metaphorical queer representation, but not actual queer representation. This is timely because the book that Prodigy was a main cast member in is getting cancelled. However, this is really a lovely story full of hilarious and insightful writing from Kieron Gillen and pitch-perfect images and comedic timing from Hickman as Speed teases Prodigy for having a crush on Colossus when he ran with the New Mutants. Prodigy is true overthinking, chaos bisexual representation, and I’m personally glad to see him get a spotlight in this story even if it’s only a few pages long.
The anthology takes a break from comics for a bit and features an interview with Christian Cooper, one of the first queer editors at Marvel, and he talks about his experiences at the company and the impact comics have had on his life. After this, there’s a timeline of big LGBTQ+ moments in Marvel Comics. It’s followed up with a cute Anole story from Terry Blas, the wonderful Paulina Ganucheau, and Kendall Goode. Blas connects the idea of Krakoa being a mutant utopia to things like Pride, and the ability to unwind at the Green Lagoon with folks who understand your struggles being the goal of all this hard work and fighting. However, it’s not all big metaphors as he and Ganucheau probe into Anole’s body issues leading to him not wanting to date along with his friendship with Jonas Graymalkin. It all ends on a fabulous final page, and this story is worth checking out for Ganucheau and Goode’s soft, colorful takes on the different mutants.
Sticking with the mutant theme, Anthony Oliveira, Javier Garron, and David Curiel go all in with the mutant as gay metaphor in an Iceman story set during the time period of the original five X-Men. They play on the fact that Magneto was played by a gay man in four of the X-Men films and find a real connection between Bobby and Magneto, who takes a break from the missiles to provide a listening ear to this young man struggling with his identity. Oliveira writes Iceman as having a crush on Angel, and Garron nails the longing glances that he throws at the majestic mutant that turn into words when Magneto sits down to chat with him. They take the subtext (For example, Bobby not being interested in Jean Grey when she joins the team.) of these Silver Age text and transform them into glorious text while also showing off the sweeter side of Magneto, a man who would one day break down when he realized that his crusade almost led to the death of an innocent child, Kitty Pryde.
This story is followed up by one focusing on the relationship between Northstar and his husband, Kyle Jinadu from writer/artist J.J. Kirby. It’s touching to see what Northstar is like away from the cameras and public, and what Kyle loves about them. However, Kirby’s 1990s-style artwork with modern, digital coloring is a mismatch for the story, and I spent most of the time wondering why Northstar looked like a vampire or a block of ice instead of the events of the story. Luckily, the misstep is remedied by a thrilling riff on Sherlock Holmes vs. Professor Moriarty from Tini Howard, Samantha Dodge, and Brittany Peer featuring Mystique and Destiny. The story is adventurous filled with wits matching, chess games, and lover’s embraces and shows how iconic a couple these two are while also showing what a big deal it was for them to be open with their love in a time period where being queer got you thrown in jail. Plus it’s a reminder that queer people have always existed in history. (Or fiction.)
Vita Ayala, Joanna Estep, Brittney Williams, and Brittany Peer continue the theme of both mutants and queer women in a Karma story set during the Hellfire Gala after party where Magik gives her a pep talk to dance (and maybe even smooch) Elle, who as far as I can tell is a new, queer mutant created for this anthology. Karma truly gets the spotlight this story and gets to work out some of her issues with her powers and emotions as she’s afraid that if she asks Elle out that she’ll use her abilities to mess with her free will. However, this doesn’t happen, and we get to see a mutant who has been screwed over so many times be happy for once and get the girl in a beautiful sequence from Ayala, Estep, Williams, and Peer.
The final story in Marvel Voices Pride #1 again shows that Steve Orlando is perfect for writing violent, queer characters with a sensitive side as he and Claudia Aguirre tell the story of Daken and Somnus, a new character who can make one night seem like a life time together. He used this power on Daken back in the day during a one night stand and then ended up living a long life without him even though he didn’t divulge his oneiromantic mutant abilities to everyone. However, Krakoa and its resurrection protocols are all about second chances, and Daken gives him one in this story. As well as digging deep into Daken’s emotions, Orlando and Aguirre also use this story to remind readers of queer elders, who because of society’s hate, never came out or came out later in life, and this is what makes Somnus’ second chance so special. Also, his abilities are pretty cool and bring a little Vertigo into the X-Books.
Marvel Voices Pride #1 is definitely an up and down ride. Some of the stories mishandle nonbinary and gender nonconforming identities (Also, there are no nonbinary lead characters in this anthology.) or seem to pander heavily to allies while others have issues with their art or storytelling style. (Northstar/Kyle, Wiccan/Hulkling) But, for the most part, it’s nice to see queer creators and queer characters get the spotlight for once instead of being hidden behind things like the mutant metaphor, which is usually Marvel editorial’s approach. Time will tell if we see them beyond this anthology, but most of the creators in Marvel Voices Pride work on books in Marvel’s main line or have had consistent success at other companies or even television in Allan Heinberg’s case so, at least, that’s something they have going for them.
Story: Luciano Vecchio, Allan Heinberg, Mariko Tamaki, Lilah Sturges, Leah Williams, Crystal Frasier, Kieron Gillen, Terry Blas, Anthony Oliveira, J.J. Kirby, Tini Howard, Vita Ayala, Steve Orlando Art: Luciano Vecchio, Jim Cheung, Kris Anka, Derek Charm, Jan Bazaldua, Jethro Morales, Jen Hickman, Paulina Ganucheau, Javier Garron, J.J. Kirby, Samantha Dodge, Joanna Estep with Brittney Williams, Claudia Aguirre, Jacopo Camagni Colors: Marcelo Maiolo, Tamra Bonvillain, Brittany Peer, Erick Arciniega, Rachelle Rosenberg, Kendall Goode, David Curiel Letters: Ariana Maher Story: 8.0 Art: 8.6 Overall: 8.3 Recommendation: Buy
Marvel Comics provided Graphic Policy with a FREE copy for review
