- February 9, 2022
Secret X-Men #1 Review
Written by: Tini Howard
Art by: Francesco Mobili
Coloring by: Jesus Aburtov
Lettering by: VC’s Clayton Cowles
I like the mainline X-Men book, a lot. It’s one of my favorite comic books of the year so far. Right now though, I’m actually considering the possibility that the line-up in Secret X-Men might be better.
When they announced that this one-shot had everyone who lost the vote in the Hellfire Gala, I thought it was a weird choice. What connections did most of these characters have? There are a couple of pairs who know each other, but most of them are from a mishmash of X-Men generations. What dynamics could they develop in a one-shot? A lot that I enjoy apparently. It’s crazy that characters like Marrow and Tempo who have seen barely any page time, have more characterization in one issue than Laura has in the main X-Men title. That’s both lame and amazing.
This little romp may have rushed through the building of the team, but it was so fun and comical that I didn’t notice until I was finished. This issue is incredibly well-paced, making a good argument for how these slighted rejects would be a better X-Men than the X-Men team we have. What I said about Marrow and Tempo, is true for nearly all the characters.
Banshee is veteran who challenges Sunspot’s more lackadaisical style of leadership; Strong Guy is the team himbo who bounces off of everyone; Marrow is the team renegade in a “Imma do what I want, which is something cool” kind of way and not in a “I will disrespect everyone” kind of way; Cannonball is the best friend someone could ever have. The only two who I think don’t get much chance to shine are Boom-Boom and Armor story-wise. That’s more forgivable to me since of the characters here, they are two of the more well-known characters, with semi-regular appearances in New Mutants.
The best compliment that can be made about this book, is that when I was finished, I wanted more. I’m in agreement with my Twitter moots, Secret X-Men would make for the best X-Men book with its beast roster. If nothing else, the team uniforms as fire. Nobody is doing it like them.