Sigh. Okay, let’s… let’s go ahead and talk about All-New X-Men 40.
Brian Michael Bendis’ run on the X-Men titles has… not numbered among my favorites. Without going into too much detail, I would consider Bendis’ strongest Marvel works to be Daredevil, Alias, and Ultimate Spider-Man. You’ll notice that these three titles have something in common: focus on one main character, giving the reader abundant insight into this character’s thought processes as they interact with their supporting cast. When it comes to team books, however, I feel like every issue written by Bendis devolves into a big yammery crowd scene, in which everybody yells “funny” things over and over, every character speaks in essentially the same voice, and it’s that much harder for all characters present to actually contribute to the story in any meaningful way.
Specifically, regarding his run on All-New X-Men, I have not enjoyed the introduction of the time-displaced Teen X-Men in the present day. The word that keeps coming to mind is “irksome.” It would have been fine for a single story arc, but they’ve all just continued to stick around, haven’t they? From a story perspective, it makes me anxious, as most clearly demonstrated during the Battle of the Atom crossover: Teen Cyclops was near-fatally blasted by a Sentinel, and the timestream nearly tore itself asunder due to paradox. But from a creative perspective, I feel it’s been a huge missed opportunity to really distinguish these characters from their modern-day counterparts. What if the Teen X-Men were actually written like they were from the ’60s? Can you imagine how much fun it would be if they just kept describing their powers out loud in abundant detail while they were using them, and the rest of the modern-day young X-Men just stared at them like they were foreign exchange students? But I feel like that would’ve been too much effort; the only detail I recall liking was early on when Teen Cyclops was in a grocery store wondering, “Why is all the water bottled? Did something happen to the water?” Otherwise, they all just read like standard-issue Bendis characters.
Yes, the Teen X-Men served their intended purpose of facing the modern-day X-Men with their more youthful, idealistic selves. It was an interesting story arc in keeping with the feel of the X-Men (though I might argue that Beast’s scientific expertise runs more towards the genetic than the trans-temporal). Yes, the Teen X-Men’s time in the present has brought about changes to both their personalities and their powers, possibly irrevocably. Nonetheless, I feel like that story has been told, and that having two Cyclops, two Icemans, etc. hanging around only serves to dilute the X-Men – for example, I cannot immediately recall when we last saw modern-day Angel after he encountered his young counterpart in All-New X-Men 8. And some Teen X-Men stories can’t help but feel like retreads: did we need to have Teen Cyclops relegated to awkward eager-to-please son getting to know his long-lost space-pirate dad? Did we need to have Teen Jean halfheartedly tried for her crimes as the Phoenix by the Shi’ar Empire? Furthermore, why are these characters hogging so much of the spotlight? If Bendis wanted to tell a story about idealistic teen mutants clashing with the dour mutant revolutionaries of the X-Men, why not focus on the VASTLY more interesting young recruits in Uncanny X-Men – characters that Bendis himself created? Goldballs, Triage, and Benjamin Deeds (more on him in a sec) are only getting lost in the crowd, without getting a chance to really demonstrate their potential.
But I consoled myself with remembering a valuable lesson I’ve learned in my old age: comics are cyclical, and everything changes if you wait long enough, especially in this modern age of short creator attention spans. (I still proudly own every issue of Chuck Austen’s run on the X-Men titles, because I knew that one day it would end, and that I would want to go back and remember everything we lived through.) And so I was relieved when it was announced that Bendis would be wrapping up his run as of Uncanny X-Men 600, due out in May, and no issues of All-New X-Men have been solicited past issue 41. I hoped that Bendis might not want anyone else playing with these toys after he was done with them, so perhaps my wish would come true and that Beast would face the consequences of his actions, the Teen X-Men would go away forever, and we wouldn’t have to think about them ever again.
And then Teen Iceman was outed as gay. Welp, looks like the joke’s on me!
In this issue, all the Teen X-Men are relaxing after the events of Black Vortex. Surprisingly enough, I think Magik is the real stand-out in this issue: she explains that she’s taking on mentorship of the Teen X-Men while Kitty stays in space, but while she’s treating them to lunch as a one-time deal – “You save the galaxy, you get a hamburger” – she is not responsible for feeding them, nor is she a taxi service. Her character comes through crystal-clear, and I like that. After she teleports away and Teen Iceman makes note of her hotness, Teen Jean pulls him aside and asks him why he keeps saying things like that, because they both know he’s gay. She then argues the point with him until he comes around, and they have some cutesy girl-talk and end up huggin’ it out. This is followed by a scene where Teen Angel – still cosmically-empowered by the Black Vortex – flies away with X-23 to declare that he luh-luh-loves her and they share a tender kiss on a mountaintop. The last double-page spread introduces a ragtag band of mutants on the former X-Men headquarters of Utopia, whom I’m sure our heroes will encounter next month, but with only one issue left of the series, I’m expecting more of a perfunctory and uninspired fight scene than a saga of conflicting ideologies. (P.S. Masque and Random, sure… Elixir, glad to see you’re not dead after all… but Karma? Girl, what are you doing getting mixed up with these nutjobs?)
It seems a bit thin when summed up, doesn’t it? Because when it comes down to it, not a whole lot actually happens in this comic. As much as I like issues that take a break from events and crossovers to let our characters catch their breath, I did not like Teen Iceman, this character ostensibly from the ’60s, calling Jean a “nosy bitch.” (Which she is, of course, no question. Teen Jean’s #1 job has been to get a story rolling by 1) reading peoples’ minds without permission, 2) throwing a big ol’ melodramatic telekinetic hissyfit, and 3) repeat as needed. I submit that this does not make for a likeable character.) I did not like Bendis’ quirk of having his characters tell him how funny he is, as “Baby Tyke-lops” was not as hilarious as Teen Jean would have you believe. I did not like going the easy sitcom-audience-laugh-track route with S.H.I.E.L.D. director Maria Hill repeatedly thunking her head against a control panel when she receives news of mutant hijinks. But because my heart is not completely made of stone, I did like Teen Iceman snowing himself in the face with embarrassment, and I enjoy this panel for the sheer understated simplicity of it. Teen Beast, you… you are okay in my book.
The thing of it is, believe it or not, there are already currently six gay X-Men: Northstar, Anole, Karma, Bling!, Graymalkin, and Benjamin Deeds. If Brian Michael Bendis actually had anything of substance to say about homosexuality, I’m sure he would have been more than welcome to make use of any of these characters in order to say it. WHICH HE DID. Uncanny X-Men 14 was a breath of fresh air after the non-stop bickerfest that was Battle of the Atom, in that it focused on Emma Frost taking new student Benjamin Deeds under her wing; she singles him out because she expects he has more potential as an infiltrator than a combatant, thanks to his power to unconsciously shape-shift and mimic the features of whoever he’s talking to. (As demonstrated by this awesome montage, not to mention this gorgeous cover.) She takes him to Atlantic City to test out his powers, starting by telling him to go over there and seduce that lady:
“I don’t want to ask her out.”
“You’re not marrying her.”
“I’m gay.”
“I don’t care. What does that have to do with this?”
And that’s it. That’s all the attention they devote to Benjamin’s sexuality, and it’s perfect, because it was incidental to the main story. Now, am I arguing that issues of sexuality have no place in comics such as X-Men? Quite the contrary. I just think when it comes to gay X-Men… it benefits from being handled with subtlety, like in Uncanny X-Men 14 (a true anomaly, since Bendis is usually about as subtle as a hammer). On the other hand, speaking of the Chuck Austen run, Northstar joined the X-Men in Uncanny X-Men 414, which was a seriously strong issue handled with maturity, but still true to Northstar’s established character. Unfortunately, immediately after Northstar joined the team, it felt like nobody really knew exactly what to do with him. He developed a catty friendship with the school nurse, Annie, and an unrequired crush on (sigh) Iceman. While it was nice to see for those of us readers who have been there ourselves, it was as if even among his fellow mutants in the X-Men, Northstar didn’t exactly fit in. It’s awkward because mutant powers are a metaphor for the outsider, ostracized by a society that hates and fears you, and the metaphor applies just as well to race, religion, sexuality, nationality, planet of origin, artificial intelligence, and so on. As such, I think that having a character declare their homosexuality doesn’t necessarily add anything to their character in and of itself (and it’s arguably newsworthy); unless the story is outright about the character’s sexuality – e.g., if Teen Iceman was actually going out on a date, or even actively crushing on somebody – maybe it would be better off just remaining as incidental to the story, rather than the focus thereof.
But to save this reveal until the second-to-last issue of the series? My god, why? The actual coming out is crafted well enough, with these two Bendis characters ostensibly wearing the labels of “Bobby” and “Jean” having a conversation as friends. But what’s the point? Teen Jean herself confirms Iceman is indeed heterosexual. There haven’t been “hints,” it’s not an organic development for his character, it just leaves me frustrated and baffled. I suppose a case could – and that’s big ol’ dancing neon capital letters COULD – be made that this is a holdover from the Black Vortex crossover, where Teen Iceman spent some time as some kind of stupid-looking cosmically-empowered samurai elf. It adds nothing, and it only raises more questions than it answers, mostly about where this leaves poor modern-day Iceman, who didn’t ask for any of this baloney. And don’t talk to me about Iceman not being good at dating ladies, he can’t help it if Kitty Pryde is being written to vacillate wildly between lovestruck schoolgirl and judgmental harpy. (Not to mention poor Opal Tanaka getting all mixed up with those cyber-ninjas!) I have no problem with Bendis writing all the yammery teen coming-out stories he wants. I just have no idea why he elected to use these characters to tell it.
But for all this ado… no one knows what the landscape of the Marvel Universe will look like after Secret Wars. Either the Teen X-Men will be sent back to their rightful point in the timestream – in which case this issue, and hopefully the last three years, can be dismissed as a curious sidebar to be puzzled over by historians at a later date – or it will be revealed that they’re from an “alternate past” or some such nonsense and they’ll stick around indefinitely. And all told, I’m an X-Men fan who feels proprietary and protective towards these characters, and who might not necessarily view these particular X-Men stories as “my X-Men.” So I guess all I can do for now is join everybody else in shrugging, staring vacantly into space, and just waiting to see what happens.