Similar to their Fantastic Four line up teases, we received this image from Marvel with no explanation whatsoever, just a date, September 10th, 2007. The only words on the piece were:
X-Men: Disassembled
And what is my reaction? *sigh* Really? You’re really going to do that… again?
So it’s safe to assume that on Monday, September 10th, on the day of a retailer’s summit sponsored by Diamond, we’ll find out what this “means.”
What could it mean?
Well it’s fairly obvious that the “Disassembled” logo is similar to that of the “Avengers: Disassembled” storyline that Bendis did a few years ago that pretty much led to House of M, “Decimation,” Civil War, etc.
So could we see a huge status quo breaking moment for the X-Men? Maybe.
Does that freak me out? You’d assume yes, but you know, after thinking about it — I don’t think so. If you ask me, I’m not 100% pleased with the X-Men books these days, they’re ok but not the kickass titles they once were. Much like the state Avengers was in when Bendis took over. And what did that lead to? The New Avengers has been a must-read since it launched. That’s a good thing in my book.
I am a little dismayed that they’re revisiting a device like Disassembled though. Can’t you come up with anything, I don’t know… original? I understand that the Disassembled thing carries some weight to it — but I would hope for more innovation I guess in terms of massive story event positioning.
They just better not relaunch Uncanny X-Men with a new #1…
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They already have a New X-Men book, so will it become New Uncanny X-Men? And I thought repeating “New Avengers” was awkward.
That’s a pretty cool image. Who did it?
Looks a lot like Jo Chen. (see also the Buffy cover this week)
I really liked Brubaker’s Rise of the Sh’iar story, but since then, it’s been lackluster. Mike Carey, for me, is hot or cold, and actually, his X-Man is…lukewarm. Not bad, but not great. I’d love to get back into it, but other than Rise, I’m reading Astonishing (and only until Joss and John are done…I’ll give Warren and Simone an issue or two to grab me).
The word “disassembled” has a certain amount of meaning in Avengers lore; Avengers had been Assembling for decades when the Bendis hit the fan. For the X-Men… it has nothing to do with anything other than as a reference to another event from four or five years ago. A little too inside-baseball for me.
As for the event itself, it seems like in about 1990 the status quo began changing for the X-Men and never stopped. I don’t even know what the status quo is supposed to be, other than the fact that there are half a dozen teams and only the Astonishing one seems to have any X-Men on it. Any change would be welcome.
Inside-baseball? Yeah, but remember only people who frequent comic websites will probably ever see it. Most likely, hopefully, it’s just a placeholder for some further title to describe the event.
I do think the X-Men need something to re-establish it as Marvel’s primary line. Aside from New X-Men and Astonishing it’s been a fairly weak few years. Once Joss leaves AX I might lose interest in that part of the MU completely, which is a complete 180 from when I started as an X-Man fan and had no time for the Avengers.
I think what they need for the X-Men is one central vision. Whedon’s mainly playing in his own sandbox, and it seems that every X-writer is just on their own. Meanwhile the Avengers books are all written by Bendis and there’s generally been a great deal of cohesion with the books of the characters in the Avengers. With X-Men we’ve had two different titles with post-M Day mutant terrorists (X-Factor and Uncanny), 3 or 4 villains-turned-hero turned back to villainy (even if you don’t include Emma). And that’s ignoring the traditional continuity problems, the Wolverine being in every title, stuff that always been around.
The two or three strongest titles (X-Factor, Astonishing and New) have been successful because they’re either been done by strong voices who’ve been able to fully control what they’re doing (Whedon and David) or been largely ignored and able to do what they want (New).
Truthfully they need to collapse some of the titles into Uncanny. I’d say they should copy the Spider-Man titles and make Uncanny a 3 times a month title and merge X-Men, Uncanny and Astonishing into that and then switch off between creative teams.
I am glad too. I haven’t been able to pick up a Uncanny or Xmen in forever. Hopefully a nice reboot will encourage that.
I know I am in the minority but I have been enjoy both of the main X titles for the past year, ever since Brubaker and Carey took over. I wonder if Disassembled is synonymous with Bendis telling this story, or if one of them is going to tackle it?
I think that teaser page is done by the guy that does all the Daredevil covers. I think is name is Dujorveic or something like that (…and yes, I could look that up, but I’m one lazy ass bastard).
As for this event, it could be cool, but I think I would only leap onto a reboot if it was made accessible. The X-Men have been around for so long, with so many titles, it’s an intimidating ass world to get into.
Reboots always bring new life, if only because they remind us of what these characters can be. Hopefully this will be true for the X-Men.
On a side note, I think it would be interesting if this was just Marvel propaganda, and it has nothing to do with a reboot. They just want to make people nervous.
You know, Joss Whedon and crew have been purposefully vauge about when “Astonishing X-Men” takes place in continuity. I tend to think that Unstoppable’s ending will lead directly to this.
As a lifelong X-Fan, I only have one thing to say: Thank Friggin’ God.
The X-universe desperately needs a Bendis-type architect. The X-books have been so aimless for so long! Honestly in the past 15 years Morrison was the only writer who had a clear idea of where he wanted to go with the book.
My only concern is who the talent on the books is going to be. Brubaker and Carey’s runs have been ok, and it does definitely feel like they’re going somewhere with the books, but it’s been kinda hit-or-miss when it comes to the actual stories.
I do think that editorial knows where the books need to be though. Quesada has said many times that the mutant population grew to such a point that it was ridiculous. Mutants no longer felt like a persecuted minority. The one line pitch for the X-men was that they “protect a world that fears and hates them.” At the point it was pre-HOM a lot of the world was them, and the rest just had to kinda begrudginly accept them. And while Decimation was a noble attempt at getting things back to the way they should be, it took it way too far in the other direction. With so few numbers, the mutant population is now irrelevant. How could the X-men work for mutant acceptance when they’ll all be gone in 40 years? On the flipside, why would Magneto care about supremecy? All of the X-characters lose any recognizable motivation. That’s not to say that there aren’t interesting stories that could’ve come out of Decimation, it’s just that no one seemed to want to tell them (save Peter David) until the past few months.
Really, it shouldn’t be that hard to write an X-book. There’s a strong central theme and literaly dozens of characters to choose from, all with well defined personalities. Just make them rebels. That’s what people loved about them in the beginning. They could save the day and people would still chase them away afterwards. The X-Men shouldn’t be The Avengers with a glossy coat of mutant painted on. Hopefully whoever takes over the books will recognize this.
Just when you thought the X-books couldn’t drag themselves down further…
is it me or…I mean, so many different “wild and crazy” mini events going on that it’s just turning me off and making me tired of many titles. Marvel is just making things harder from a continuity standpoint; the whole disparity between Brubaker’s X-Men and the World War Hulk:X Men books was just laughable. I’m just tired of trying to keep up with what team’s gotta “look inside” and figure out what’s wrong.
i mean, didn’t they already breakup the X-Men in one of the books for a while?
I dunno, I am just so confused…
As far as I can tell, September 10th came and went and not a peep from Marvel…
Did anyone hear differently?
Well, there was that announcement of a new Cable book and a new X-Force book (!) the latter of which was accompanied repeatedly by the cryptic question, “After Messiah Complex, who says there will even BE an X-Men?” and the suggestion that a book or two might find itself cancelled at the end. Which was fine by me until I realized they count X-Factor as an x-book whether I do or not.