In the wake of House of M, rising from the ashes, comes a new Excalibur title. The first issue is titled, “Here we go again,” and I’m pretty confident that Chris Claremont meant that to be humorous. However, for me, it’s an accurate sentiment for the burnout I have after reading so, so many Excalibur stories. It’s gotten to the point where I almost hate Claremont as much as a I love him. Now, I know the team has its fans—and if either of them are reading this, I intend no offense.
Ahem.
Anyway, this story involves an alternate reality version of the X-Men (because, of COURSE it does) called “Shadow X.” The story opens with Dazzler dealing with a sketchy promoter.
That sequence is fine. But the story goes downhill from there. Dazzler hears that cry for help outside and runs out to find the Shadow X-Men. They attack Dazzler. Evil jean Grey gives her a heart attack and Shadow X leave her for dead. Only she’s not dead. She has brain activity.
And Rachel Summers-Grey revives her.
See what I mean? There is so much wrong with just the opening sequence of this book. Shadow Jean could have melted Dazzler’s brain. She could have levitated her into outer space. She could have used telekinesis to drop any number of heavy things on her. But a heart attack? That makes no sense at all. And then what makes even less sense is that Rachel could tell that Dazzler’s brain was still working when Jean couldn’t, and THEY HAVE THE SAME POWERS.
Ugh.
Anyway, in these first three issues, a new Excalibur team forms to fight off the Shadow X-Men. We do not get a nice “group shot” of the bad guys but at least they all wear black so we can easily identify them. Sage emerges as a confident field leader.
And the cast begin to see themselves as a team.
I like the organic team formation–I just wish the plot holding it all together wasn’t so generic.
They lose when Pete Wisdom turns off Shadow Xavier’s brain.
Then they’re taken into custody of Britain’s MI-5.
The new Excalibur team technically doesn’t form in these issues—but the cast throughout will represent the new team when they start calling themselves Excalibur again in the next story arc. Pete Wisdom asks them all to join his club but nobody wants to play with him. The mutants want to go back to the U.S. and Captain Britain serves the Otherworld. But don’t worry. Like I said, they’ll re-form the team next arc.
If you’re a big fan of the characters involved and like all these alternate reality evil versions that seem omnipresent in Claremont’s post-‘80s work, you’ll like this. If you’re sick of these kinds of stories, you’ll probably think: “Here we go again…”