GAGE TAKES ON X-MEN LEGACY
by Frankie Rodriguez
As most of you know, the X-Men franchise has been given a pretty big overhaul; spending the last several months breaking down the current status quo; Not only in Schism but in Uncanny X-Men and other books. Each X-Men book were dealing with the ingredients that lead to the monumental split between Cyclops's group of X-Men and Wolverine's group of X-Men. X-Men Legacy is no different.
For the past six years, writer Mike Carey has given readers a great journey through the X-Men's existence through the eyes of several characters; most prominently Rogue. And as the recent end of Schism, Carey's last story will be the dividing of the makeshift team he has created over the last year; thus providing an ending to his run and a new jump-on point with the new X-Men Legacy scribe, Christos Gage.As Gage jumps on the book as of #260.1, merely 2 weeks after the end of Carey's six year run. And the writer stated that his run will pick up certain things from Carey's run while giving a fresh start. Gage confirmed that Rogue, who has become synonymous with the title over the last six years, will still be front and center when he takes over. Quote from CBR:
The great thing about Rogue, and I think Mike handled this brilliantly, is that by the very nature of her powers -- borrowing abilities and memories from others -- she is a window into other characters, so while she is very much the headlining character, this can't help but be an ensemble book. I think Rogue is one of the most fully developed characters in comics, having gone from a villain who can't control her powers to a strong leader who can show others how to be their best. I want to explore what it's like for her as she strives to figure out who she wants to be and what she wants to do with her life at a time of great transition -- from Utopia to the Grey School, in terms of what is best for both her and mutantkind, and, of course, that juicy love triangle between her, Gambit and Magneto! So yes, the emphasis on Rogue will certainly continue.
And she won't be alone as Gambit, Frenzy and recently returned Rachel Grey (Summers) will be carried over from Carey's run. Plus, Gage adds in additions Cannonball, Husk and original X-Man Iceman into the mix; providing the cast of what will be a "teacher book" in comparison to his other well known ongoing, Avengers Academy which is a "student book." Gage made it no secret that this cast gives him the most story potential and talked a bit about what their roles in the books as teachers and overall role in the new Jean Grey School for Higher Learning.
Much in the way that Mike did, we'll be using characters from all over the Grey School, but you're right, those characters are the core of "Legacy." I thought they provided the most potential for cool stories -- it's as simple as that. They represent the history of the X-Men from the very beginning to the recent past. And while they have all chosen the same path, they will not necessarily agree on how to walk it.
The X-Men in "Legacy" are all involved in Wolverine's school in some way, and we'll see them in that role, but we'll also see them in their lives outside the school. And the question of what their mandate is looms large. Big picture, their job is to educate, protect and support the students so that they are able to make it to adulthood safely and decide what they want to do with their lives. But since they're carrying on Professor X's dream of human/mutant coexistence, they will also, from time to time, tackle threats to the public in general, just as a team of heroes like the FF or Avengers might.
Gage seems to have great plans for the cast as he hinted that him and new artist, David Baldeon will have these X-Men deal with being teachers while facing all sorts of threats. And their first threat is the extra dimensional demons, the N'Garai. And following that particular threat is dealt with, they face one of the most powerful mutants and old adversaries in Exodus. And as Gage pointed out, last time we saw Exodus, he was convinced that mutantkind can't survive without uniting by Professor Xavier.
When we last saw him, Professor Xavier had convinced him that mutantkind could not survive unless it was united, and he went on a pilgrimage to ponder his role in this new world. Now he's back -- only to find that mutantkind is far from united, and he's not happy about that. Exodus is really going to make our characters examine and defend the choices they've made.
Along with David Baldeon, Gage is prepared to be here for the long haul with Legacy and its characters. And considering the previous history of the team: (for example, Gambit and Rogue's on and off relationship; Iceman's close friendships with Rogue, Gambit & Cannonball) seem to be ripe for the scribe to create all kinds of stories full of character driven plots and great action.
X-Men Legacy #260.1 written by Christos Gage & art by David Baldeon will hit stores in January 2012.
SHONEN JUMP ENDS PRINT & GOES DIGITAL WITH ALPHA!
by Frankie Rodriguez
Yes. Viz Media announced during NYCC that they will be ending their popular Shonen Jump Monthly magazine . . . in print form. What Viz decided to do instead is to making the entire book go digital come 2012. Alvin Liu, Senior Vice President & General Manager over at Viz Media, described the reason behind the change is that it posed an idea of a weekly publication that was more fresh and current. And that while Japan does not see a need for them to go digital, Liu points out that while Japan has book stores and convenient stores all over the country, they don't have them in the States.
Liu hopes that with them going digital and selling Shonen Jump Weekly Alpha for only 99 cents online will drum up more readers, lower piracy and also keep the publication more current with its parent counterpart in Japan. And while Shonen Jump here in the US sold about 125,000 copies monthly, making it one of the highest selling comics in America, Liu states that they should get more with the digital option; as well as open doors to their graphic novels which will still be available in print and digital. Alvin Liu comments:Once we had the possibility of doing a weekly publication digitally, it made the print magazine, not obsolete, but the content is not as fresh. We feel that manga in its native form is a periodical, a sort of live performance, as it were. We went with the print magazine in the first place because it was the closest we could get to that given the limitations that we faced at the time. Once the possibilities of digital came into play, doing something much more live and fresh came into play, having a print magazine lagging behind that became less essential.
And to have an idea of how much more current the new content will be when Shonen Jump Alpha starts in January 2012, Viz stated in a press release that they will end up being only 2 weeks behind their parent anthology in Japan. Only 2 weeks. And Shonen Jump Weekly Alpha will be available through Viz Apps in all iPhones, iPads, iPod Touch and through even some Android apps.
Shonen Jump Weekly Alpha will be available through year long subscriptions . .. 52 issues (one every week) for $25.99 or rent single issues for a month at 99 cents. To even catch up to the new jump on points in Shonen Jump Weekly Alpha, Viz unleashes it's Shonen Jump Digital Warp; which will collect graphic novelization that will summarize and catch up to their starting point in Alpha without taking much away from their previous stories. They recently started with releasing 7 graphic novels of Naruto online in 7 days and added other popular Shonen Jump properties such as One Piece and Bleach.
Shonen Jump Weekly Alpha will debut with Naruto, One Piece, Bleach, Nura: Rise of the Yokai Clan, Toriko and Bakuman and is slated to start January 31st, 2012 while the Final Print issue of Shonen Jump Monthly will be on sale in April 2012.
ANNIE GET YOUR GUN (OR ARROW)
by Special Correspondent, Derrick Jones
It is the comeback of the season and it has everyone abuzz. Ann Nocenti returns to the world of comics
after a fifteen year “break”. The project that brought her out of hiatus is one of DC’s new 52 titles Green
Arrow. Announced recently at the 2011 New York Comic Con, Ann will be taking over writing chores for
the recently relaunched book from J.T. Krul with her first issue hitting stands March of 2012.
Ann was very busy in the 80’s and 90’s in the comic world wearing writing and editor hats, her most
notable and well-remembered work being her Daredevil and New Mutants runs. She is also co-creator
of some popular characters including one of my personal favorites Longshot. Ann got her start at Marvelcomics as an assistant editor, a position she got after bluffing her way into an interview after reading
about the position in the “Village Voice”. While most of her work was at Marvel she did a fair share
at DC but as time went on found other projects outside the comic realm that seemed to speak to her
more. In an interview on Manwithoutfear.com she answered a question thus
“I edit and write for a film magazine now, called Scenario, and I'm in the middle of a mystery novel, so I'm pretty busy with that. Next on my plate as a writer is maybe some TV work, maybe another X-Men prose novel. I had a lot of fun writing the Prisoner X novel. I'd love to write comics again, if the right project crossed my path, with a company and/or editor I trusted. The business has been kind of ugly and traumatic for the past handful of years. Projects I loved stories that are probably my best work, were dumped and never saw print when the industry sales collapsed, companies went bankrupt, and scores of comics
were cancelled. A few years ago I was hired to write a treatment and first issue for a comic called "The Darkness" for the cats at Top Cow. They used my work, but never paid me, never credited me. That experience turned me off to comics quite a bit, and I'm afraid stories like that are typical of the business these days. But hopefully comics are on the rise again, and I'll be able to be part of that.”
When coming back into writing Green Arrow, she commented during NYCC on her approach:
I have a particular way of writing a comic. Comics are short. Yhey are only twenty pages, so you can take a year of comics and that can be your opera, and the opera can have a lot of different passages in it. I kind of believe every issue should be a single story, just a complete story. But there is a momentum that forms like triptychs over it, and then it forms your big overtures, and then the whole thing ends up kind of operatic. I also want a beginning, middle and end, a classic short story approach to every single comic. What I do is I try to figure out, what is the kick in this comic, what is the main feeling I want to get, and everything in the comic has to serve that. I mean, this is real technical writer talk and probably boring for most! [Laughs] I think where comics get in trouble is when they try and plot too much in a single issue. It's only twenty pages and you should leave with a feeling that you get from reading a short story or watching a short film. But most of all I want to have fun, because if I have fun, the book will be fun!
Well Ann, I hope that, for you, comics are indeed on the rise again also and that you will stick around for a
long time.
VIDEO OF THE WEEK:
Was going to put this up last week but . ..
Looking forward to this when it premieres next year.
That's it for this week. More news next week
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