Favorite Bru X-arc

[jarrod]

Ed Brubaker may be gone, but not forgotten. Which was your favorite arc of his stay on the Xbooks?

[jmc247]

hmmmmm, even though I had some issues with it I would have to say RAFOTSE.

[Vanish]

I thought the Extremists arc was the only one that was what I'd classify as enjoyable.

Skids played an interesting role, Storm was decent...uhh...I promise I have more positive things to say about this! I was just thinking to myself a couple days ago that this arc wasn't bad.

I will get back to you!

But anyway, if the arc did not cause me to realize that I was just so over the Morlocks...

Bliss is awesome though!


Deadly Genesis wasn't bad either; the back-ups were fun and the main story was enjoyable until the conclusion.

[The Black Guardian]

Extremists. It's my favourite because it only somewhat sucks, instead of tremendously.

[Slung]

Wow, when you look at the arcs all together like that it almost makes you wish Claremont had stayed on the title longer.

[creaky]

Kurt in a suit! Homoerotic moments between my boys in their underwear! Kurt frying himself and then spanking Omega Red! The Glory!

Everything else is just really chafy toilet paper.

[justinkos91]

Deadly Genesis was a death machine, death I disapprove of
unless it's done with style or it's big.
Banshee, Petra, Sway, Sentinel Pilot, etc. all died
all to introduce crappy Vulcan. :mad:

I like Messiah Complex and the Sidewalk Stroll best
Extremists coming in second :smile:

[DeadXMan]

none. they were borning

which is wired cause I love his cap and DD

[psycwave]

Deadly Genesis might have killed off Banshee but it brought us SWAY!!!!

Who incidentally got killed off to.

[x_goalkeeper]

I really like Divided We Stand.

[jarrod]

My quick thoughts, as I recently reread it all...

Deadly Genesis: Great art, exciting setup, great cast, real suspense, AMAZINGLY good backups (especially for how short they were)... it ended kinda meh, but really showed some good promise for Bru's upcoming Uncanny run I thought. His characterization was generally pretty great too, especially Kitty, Hank and Kurt. For as messy as it could've been, I actually think the big retcon worked surprisingly well in retrospect. B+


RAFOTSE: And it all falls apart. :(

I think my general feelings on [insertPoképic]RAFTOSE[/insertPoképic] are probably pretty well documented by this point, so I'm going to spare everyone the details. Suffice to say, the thing was just as bad as I remembered. Though it still demands a special shout out to the R'chel/Korvus romance featuring some of the worts dialog in X-history, reading like a mid 80s Planned Parenthood Date Rape pamphlet. D-


The Extremists: Well, things got better, but it's not like they could get much worse. Storm was great, Hep was amusing, Skids was AWESOME, Cal was cute... Bru at least seemed to leave his more terrible characterization and dialog back in space. I think a lot of the improvement comes art side though, and it honestly makes we wish Salva, Choi or Hairsine had gotten the Uncanny job originally. Arc itself played out really slowly though, with not much actually happening throughout and (all three problems seemingly becoming habits for Bru), but overall it was still surprisingly enjoyable. B-


Messiah Complex: This one's kind of difficult to gauge, largely because of the stellar contributions the chapters in X-Factor, X-Men and New X-Men delivered. The Uncanny portions might honestly not have been so bad on their own merits, but it's frankly hard to judge... at the least it was easily the weakest link the chain imo. Still, messy plot bits like Josh's offpanel wall'o'doom and an almost Claremontian dialogue abuse with "Damn it!" bring things down... nasty art rears it's head again with a gulf in quality even just between Bru's bits (Silvestri to Tan). A real missed opportunity. C


Divided We Stand: Schizo-storytelling at it's finest. While half this arc was pretty good, the other half was frankly embarrassing. Going for the latter first, it was a terrible meandering lead in to the new status quo. From Emma's bizarre girl-talk to the (literal) 3 issue sidewalk stroll, near everything was just badly executed. The only bright spot being (possibly) Lady Kitten, and then largely for the visual alone. The "backup" component was a lot more fun, read better, moved at a decent pace and (for the first time in Bru's Uncanny) Kurt seemed handled well. Looking backwards, it sort of makes me wonder if Bru might've been more successful had he not bothered with "big plan setup" arcs so much, and just let things go with the flow? San Fran Snore: C- From Russia With Love: B Overall: C+

[tlp0708]

I haven't read RAFOTSE yet. The rest I hated. Thank god Bru is gone!

[Pach!]

The crappy parts of Messiah Complex were X-factor for me with every character except the X-factor ones feeling completely off (especially the New X-men) I loved the one shot that started it and the X-men versus Sentinels issues was filled with great moments. My only complaint re: the writing would be the excessive dammits but even then its was still miles above the "worst issues"


my favorite is RAFOTSE, followed by the extremists followed by the Hippie arc.

[Seres]

The Extremists: Hep was amusing,

Divided We Stand: The only bright spot being (possibly) Lady Kitten, and then largely for the visual alone.

Hepzibah fan.

[jarrod]

The crappy parts of Messiah Complex were X-factor for me with every character except the X-factor ones feeling completely off (especially the New X-men) I loved the one shot that started it and the X-men versus Sentinels issues was filled with great moments. My only complaint re: the writing would be the excessive dammits but even then its was still miles above the "worst issues"


my favorite is RAFOTSE, followed by the extremists followed by the Hippie arc.
I thought the X-Factor portions were great. Especially the X-Force bits and later Cable and Xavier's interactions. Cyclops and the New X-Men was a corny scene though, yeah.


Hepzibah fan.
Clearly, you are a bad influence.

[Steven F.]

He used Skids, so automatic win for me.

[jarrod]

lol. I was REALLY hoping Skids was going to join up. Honestly, had MX not bulldozed it all, I think The Extremists lineup (Xavier, Storm, Nightcrawler, Warpath, Hepzibah, Caliban & Skids) could've made cool team longer term.

[ClanAskani]

Deadly Genesis wasn't bad, except for all the retcons and Sean's death.

The rest of Bru's run wasn't very good. Even Claremont staying would have been better.

[Josef F.]

Omg, CC staying on would have been worse. Fact.
Also, thankyou jarrod for appreciating Hepzibah.

[jarrod]

Omg, CC staying on would have been worse. Fact.
Also, thankyou jarrod for appreciating Hepzibah.
LOL. The skunk has her moments... though throwing herself at James in the sewer was a bit ugh. Romance is NOT Bru's strong suit.


As far as CC staying on board, well I'm of two minds about it. On the one hand, End of Greys was AMAZING good and had CC stayed his follow up plans wouldn't have been dramatically reworked and he'd have still had (magic) Bachalo at his side... I very much think a CC/Bachalo space epic would've effortlessly kicked the shit outta what we got with RAFOTSE. Realistically though, he got ill around the same time as he was set to move on, so there's the very real possibility that he'd have been replaced regardless (at least temporarily). Plus his post-hospital NEX and Exiles stuff was pretty putrid. I dunno, considering Bachalo went on to deliver (most of) Carey's amazing adjectiveless run and the situation with Claremont's health, I think I'm happy with CC leaving, even what we got from Bru in his place was pretty bad overall. Uncanny needed a change.

[Josef F.]

LOL. The skunk has her moments... though throwing herself at James in the sewer was a bit ugh. Romance is NOT Bru's strong suit.


As far as CC staying on board, well I'm of two minds about it. On the one hand, End of Greys was AMAZING good and had CC stayed his follow up plans wouldn't have been dramatically reworked and he'd have still had (magic) Bachalo at his side... I very much think a CC/Bachalo space epic would've effortlessly kicked the shit outta what we got with RAFOTSE. Realistically though, he got ill around the same time as he was set to move on, so there's the very real possibility that he'd have been replaced regardless (at least temporarily). Plus his post-hospital NEX and Exiles stuff was pretty putrid. I dunno, considering Bachalo went on to deliver (most of) Carey's amazing adjectiveless run and the situation with Claremont's health, I think I'm happy with CC leaving, even what we got from Bru in his place was pretty bad overall. Uncanny needed a change.

Warpath/Hepzibah to me is like Warpath flying. No.

And End of greys was the only worthwhile thing in his run to me.
And it was still a bit iffy to me.
And I could not deal with any more dinosaurs, and as Exiles has taught us.
He is itching to use them as much as humanly possible.