Giant-Size X-Men #1 // Review
Kamala and Bruno are hanging out on a street light overlooking the Manhattan skyline. Things have been awkward for the two of them lately. She’s been in Amsterdam. He’s been inventing a time-travel detector. (Not something that he would have thought to mention until after the things activated.) He doesn’t have much time to explain matters before the two of them are off on an adventure in Giant-Size X-Men #1. The writing team of Jason Lanzing and Collin Kelly open a new story for Marvel Girl with artist Adam Kubert and colorist Laura Martin. It’s an interesting homage to Wein and Cockrum’s original Giat-Size X-Men #1.
As luck would have it, Kamala’s time travel finds her landing in Westchester County, New York in what might be construed by some as being late spring of 1975. The reason why this is lucky has everything to do with the fact that Kamala has met Scott Summers from this era and he remembers her. So she may be stranded in the past, but she’s not going to have to be there alone. And she’s going to be around people who are totally cool with weird powers and time travel. Because...y’know...they’re the X-Men.
Lanzing and Kelly play with iconic bits of Marvel history with a fun sense of wit, humor and action. The story might play it fast and loose with aspects of the periphery of one of the most iconic moments in Marvel mutant history, but it IS fun to see a more contemporary character filter her way through the margins of one of the single best-known X-Men stories ever. It’s a well-executed script that finds particularly clever room for Kamal in and around the pages and panels between the first and second chapters of the original Giant-Sized X-Men #1.
Though the art team DID manage to hit some of the more memorable visuals of the original Giant-Sized X-Men #1, it would have been cool to see Kubert try to mimic the style of original artist Dave Cockrum. Perhaps they could have gone with a more contemporary art style for the scenes set in current day and then switch to a Cockrum-esque style when they go back to story elements that were debuted in 1975. As it is, though, Kubert’s style is respectably well-executed with a style that DOES seem to be a bit of a cross between late Copper Age comics and something much more current.
Having chased the villain out of “1975,” Kamala finds herself pushed forward about a half a decade for the next stop in the series: the Dark Phoenix Saga. That should be an interesting advancement. In theory it might be fun to see this series continue through the subsequent major moments like The Mutant Massacre and The Fall of the Mutants. It would be fun to see where the writing team might go several issues into a retro series like this.
