Product Description: If you thought Volume 1 was intense, buckle up. The dire consequences of recent actions have put the students of the Xavier Institute in their most dangerous situation yet. Reverend Stryker has replaced his crucifixes and prayers with bullets and hand grenades. Can the kids survive his brand of conversion? Collects New X-Men #24-27.
No holding back! This is what would happen! Crazy people do crazy things. And a group of humans want all mutants dead. People seem to have a problem with the violence in this book. And by no means is it a small factor. People get shot in the head, there head crushed, and so on. Members you know, who you like, who you hate, all will be getting hurt or dying.
For me this is one of the most real events in Marvel cause I feel humans would react like this. Not all humans but some would take this as a sign and destroy all mutants. And so what if it's violent? Do you want them to hurt the kids by giving them flowers? They shoot them in the head...that's how it is when you wipe out a race.
Great volume to show the evil side of some humans and how truly scary it can be to be hunt down.
A correction... Messrs. Yost & Kyle did not make the characters "connectable" or "meaningful", except for X-23. Icarus, the younger brother of X-Men Cannonball (one of the original New Mutants), and Husk (Generation X), first appeared in ROM Annual #3 (dated 1984), written by Bill Mantlo. Chuck Austen gave him the red wings (first seen in "Uncanny X-Men" #437) and healing factor (discovered in UXM #441), in a storyline reprinted in UNCANNY X-MEN: SHE LIES WITH ANGELS (which also contains the dubious scene of Husk and Archangel -- the original X-Man known then as "Angel" -- flying up into the air to make out in front of Husk's mother.)
Dust was created by Grant Morrison and first appeared in "New X-Men" (1st series) #133, which is reprinted in NEW X-MEN: NEW WORLDS (issues 127-133) as well as two hardcover volumes -- NEW X-MEN volume two ISBN-10: 0785111182 & ISBN-13: 978-0785111184 (issues 127-141) and the NEW X-MEN OMNIBUS ISBN-10: 0785123261 & ISBN-13: 978-0785123262 (issues 114-154 and Annual 2001) Notes: the first "New X-Men" series is actually "X-Men" (2nd series) #114-154 & the 2001 Annual. The main characters in Grant Morrison's highly acclaimed issues are Beast, Cyclops, Emma Frost, Jean Grey (Phoenix), Professor X, and Wolverine.
Nunzio DeFilippis and Christina Weir deserve the credit for fleshing out Dust, making Icarus more likeable than he was in SHE LIES WITH ANGELS, and creating the students whose deaths upset and/or alienated some readers, including myself. Most of their issues are reprinted in NEW MUTANTS: BACK TO SCHOOL ("New Mutants" (2nd series) #1-6), three NEW X-MEN: ACADEMY X volumes -- CHOOSING SIDES (#1-6), HAUNTING (#7-11), X-POSED (#12-15 and the special); and HOUSE OF M: NEW X-MEN 16-19 & Secrets of the House of M -- darker than the writers were allowed to be in the other issues). While the earlier stories focused on the New Mutants team, their rivals had a four-issue mini-series reprinted in NEW X-MEN: HELLIONS.
I recommend reading the earlier volumes to really get to know the characters.
amazingggg! In response to the other reviews- yeah, this is more violent and darker than some other comics, but WHO CARES? The fact that people are affected by the death of certain characters shows how incredible the writers were in making the characters connectable and meaningful! It's sad, but beautiful and even neccesary for the poignancy of the plot. I can't wait for the next one!
what is marvel thinking? i have been incredibly disappointed in the new series of new x-men: academy x, and this book is even worse than the first one. my main problem w/ this book is how incredibly (and fairly unnecessarily) violent it is. how in the world did it get by w/ a T+ rating? it's as graphically violent as an R rated movie. and i'm also disappointed w/ the number of characters who are getting killed off. what was the point of having these characters in 50+ books if you're just going to get rid of them all? wasn't it enough to have them depowered? it really makes you wonder what their strategy is for keeping their fans interested in the series. also, the whole stryker thing has already been done at least twice now (and last time less than three years ago in x-treme x-men), and the religious zealots thing has been overdone as well. and killing characters off is such an incredibly cheap way of trying to get readers, which i hate, and which marvel already does too much of. of runaways, new x-men, and young avengers, runaways is great b/c it has great writing and great characters; young avengers is good b/c it has great action and cool characters; and new x-men is waaaaay in the back b/c it has mediocre action and mediocre characters since they keep killing off all the good ones. at least mercury's still alive. here's hoping that marvel gets it together, although i don't see how this series is going to recover its momentum w/ such a tiny number of the original characters remaining. i was a big fan of the writers' work on x-men evolution, but i'm going to be avoiding them from now on.
Good...but.... Why are they killing off almost every major character from the entire series of New Mutants to Academy X? Also, why are the new X-Men comprised mainly of Hellions? Although, yes, the artwork is amazing, the story is positively gripping, why the heck is everyone dying? Nothing like this ever happened to the original X-Men, so why are the writers having such a grim hey-day with the New X-Men? Look, call me a hyprocrite, but you must buy this because it is exceptionl, BUT be forewarned it is one of the most grim, violent TPBs I've ever read...and is so cool.
Anything Goes Trivia
Megaton Man
Not Available Comics
Trevor
