If you are going to tell a story about the extinction of the X-Men, then a book like this is necessary. In that way, the book feels very much like the team Wolverine has assembled, a brutal and somehow necessary part of the X-Men brand, a publishing line that had lost its direction. As other writers struggle to tell more traditional mutant stories with an overwhelming nihilistic extinction story forced upon them, X-Force embraces the direction of the line and just does what it sets out to do. After all, the species had been pushed to the brink of extinction by the crossover House of M, and that sombre note set the tone for the stories to follow.īased on the decisions and the status quo forced on Marvel’s merry mutants, X-Force is a book that makes sense – indeed, it makes more sense than almost any other book in the line. However, there’s a very valid argument to be made that – whatever about the criticism of the book as a nineties throwback – Kyle and Yost have managed to produce a book that perfectly fits the tone and mood of the entire X-Men line, as dictated by Marvel’s editorial. Indeed, during Yost and Kyle’s farewell miniseries, X-Force: Sex and Violence, the gore does almost get a bit much for me, rendered as it is in loving detail by artist Gabriele Dell’Otto. I’ll be the first to admit that this sort of book probably isn’t the kind of thing I’d usually be interested in. Hell, this was the series that mocked its own excessive blood lust by proposing an all-ages friendly “puppies and rainbows” cover. The covers and (to a lesser extent) the interior art don’t help disprove that observation, as it seems there are absurdly sharp blades and bloody slices every other page. Indeed, the notion of the greatest “trackers and killers” in the X-Men branching off to form a proactive assassination strike force just sounds like “darker and edgier” has been stretched to the realm of self-parody. I have to admit, I mostly enjoyed their work on the book, despite my initial skepticism about the concept. It’s a shame that the pair’s work on the X-Men books is confined to miniseries and New X-Men and X-Force, but such is the way of the world. Then again, I’m surprised at how poorly the major comic book companies seem to treat those who have done such great work with their ideas in television or film – Dwayne McDuffie’s run on Justice League over at DC serving as the most obvious example, where the writer of the much-loved Justice League Unlimited found himself forced to bow to one editorial mandate after another. After all, they write in a medium with a far larger audience than comic books, and I would have imagined that Marvel would have welcomed the opportunity to broaden the appeal of the line. Sure, the pair have written New X-Men and now X-Force, but I’m surprised that they were never granted a shot at Uncanny X-Men, the franchise’s flagship book. Despite their outstanding work outside the medium, I find it so surprising the pair haven’t been given more high-profile assignments within the field of comics. It was their work on the shows that really allowed them to branch into comics, adapting the female Wolverine clone X-23 from television into comic books. The pair have been writing comic books on-and-off, but they are perhaps best known for their work in crafting two well-received animated adaptations of the X-Men – X-Men: Evolution and Wolverine and the X-Men. Craig Kyle and Christopher Yost are two very strange writers.
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