Comic Corner: X-Factor #15

X-Factor #15
By Peter David and Pablo Raimondi
MARVEL COMICS

Despite consisting only of still illustrations and dialogue
bubbles, Peter David’s “X-Factor” manages to
bring just the right amount of television sensibility to what could
have just been yet another Marvel comic starting with
“X.” A veteran writer of television, David finally
seems to be telling the cinematic stories he always wanted without
being crippled by an effects budget or the limited viewership of a
cult audience. “X-Factor” is a graphic meld of
deliciously pulpy violence with a startlingly honest look at
ordinary people in extraordinary situations.

Dealing with the aftereffects of last summer’s
“House of M,” where 99 percent of Marvel’s
mutants found themselves powerless and vulnerable,
“X-Factor” follows a group of the few mutants that
managed to keep their powers and their efforts to protect and help
those who can no longer help themselves. Unlike many books
beginning with “X,” David doesn’t let
“X-Factor” devolve into a series of meaningless
crossovers and fight scenes. The characters each have their own
personal agendas, intrinsically tied to who they are and not
whatever massive company event is going on this month. By taking
advantage of these interior landscapes, what once might have been
considered yet another tired reheated team book becomes something
fresh and interesting.

The leader of the team is Jamie Madrox. His ability: to split
into copies of himself at the slightest touch, each an equally
diverse shard of his personality. In the past couple of issues,
Madrox has been hunting down his copies, many of whom have gone on
to live separate lives of their own.

As the illustrator, Pablo Raimondi accomplishes the seemingly
impossible task of not only drawing the same character and his
increasingly multiple copies within a single scene, but effectively
differentiating them through facial expressions alone, so the
reader is never confused.

The last issue saw our hero ambushed by the terrorist
organization Hydra, which mistook him for one of his copies. Now,
in Hydra’s clutches, Madrox must resist torture long enough
to escape. Inventive as ever, David writes an escape that is not
only thrilling, but with that slight touch of horror that forces
the reader to view Madrox’s once-amusing power in a much
darker, disturbing way. David seems to relish in the opportunities
the superhero genre affords him, melding the horrific with the
absurd while still retaining an unwavering optimism that keeps the
books from falling into bland pathos.

And that is where “X-Factor” succeeds most, creating
an X-book that isn’t afraid of crossing the boundary when it
comes to the ethical and moral lives of its heroes.
“X-Factor” is mature not because of excessive cursing,
violence and sex, but because it handles the traditionally
black-and-white world of superheroes in the nuanced strokes of a
brush dipped in gray.

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