Earth X

After co-creating the "Kingdom Come" miniseries for DC, Alex Ross was asked by "Wizard Magazine" to sketch out a similar dystopian future for the Marvel Universe. Those published ruminations and illustrations eventually led Marvel to commission Ross to develop the "Earth X" series, which turns out to be the first of a trilogy that continues in "Universe X" and concludes in "Paradise X." This trade paperback collects "Earth X" issues 0, 1-12 and X, with Ross doing the story, character designs, epilogue and covers, while Jim Kruger contributed to the story development and wrote the script, with John Paul Leon doing the pencils and Bill Reinhold the inks. For those of you that want a comic book with the lofty density of an epic poem by Homer, "Earth X" is going to give you exactly that, with abundance. "Earth X" is an alternative Earth in which the Celestials had implanted a gestating egg. So there are similarities to the "real" Marvel universe, but what is key here are the twists that Ross gives to familiar characters. For example, Ross looks at the irony of Captain America representing a country when "all men are created equal" when Steve Rogers is the first of a new race of super-humans. However, Ross is interested in a most ironic flip of this situation, because in an attempt to transform humanity into Inhuumans and thereby end the persecution of his people, Black Bolt released the mutagenic Terrigen Mists into Earth's atmosphere. When Reed Richards constructed a global network of vibranium power centers to solve the energy crisis, they combine with the Terrigen Mists to mutate humanity into a world where everybody has superpowers. Feeling responsible for what has happened Richards penance finds him taking over the role of Dr. Doom, and his long hair and flowing white bird offer an interesting contrast to the bald-pated Captain America with the "A" branded on his forehead. The initial conflict is between Captain America and his allies against the Skull, who foregoes the red fright mask for the more simple blond-haired Aryan look, but in the end the Celestial egg becomes of prime importance. The framing device for the story has Uatu the Watcher, blinded by Black Bolt so that the alien could not bear witness to what he was doing, bringing X-51 (a.k.a. Machine Man) to the moon to function as his eyes. The strength of "Earth X" is in the twists that Ross and company give to the Marvel icons, although not everything works. Daredevil having a death wish sort of makes sense, but Thor being a woman as he endures Odin's latest lesson in humility is a toss away as far as I am concerned. Having Peter Parker be retired and his daughter fighting the fight does not payoff the way I hoped, but I did like that Tony Stark, one of the few Marvel superheroes who never had superpowers, has gone all Howard Hughes as the last "normal" human on the planet, creating armor suits based on members of the Avengers who have been killed. But in every single

I was a bit put off when i learend that Alex Ross didn't paint the interior art of this tpb, but i was pleasently surprised by the quality of the art by John Paul Leon. The interior art is nothing short than breathtaking. Gritty and with a newspaper-picture feel to it, it makes reading the story a pleasure and a unique experience. Oh, and the story itself is great, especially if you are an enemy of loose-ends, since this book is nothing less than an attempt to explain the whole Marvel universe, with origins of key figures and races aplenty.All in all, I heartely recommend it.

Marvel Comics used to be the greatest thing since sliced bread. It was until the company decided to gouge their young readers for every nickle of their allowance that Marvel was the only universe in graphic art worth reading.But in recent years with the ridiculous slush pile of X-men related books, stories that are senseless, and art that is pathetic, comic books took a massive nose-dive into pulp-ville.Alex Ross writes for those of us who grew up with Marvel, trusted them to deliver characters worth caring about, art worth losing yourself in, and plots that made the imagination soar. He is also given the last word on what really ought to happen to the Marvel Universe. For me, this was the best thing to ever happen to the Marvel Universe. After reading this marvellous series there is no need to ever purchase another Marvel book again. Alex Ross set it all right and delivered the goods that our comic book creator-heroes would have wanted to see.Thanks for the greatest, and merciful, ending to the Marvel Universe Alex. You've done well.

I've been reading comics most of my life. I started out reading mostly Marvel, but switched to reading DC almost exclusively due to storylines like the Spider-Clone thing and Heroes Reborn. Thankfully, with books like this one and the naming of Joe Quesada as EIC, Marvel is making all the right moves and has become great once again.But that's not the point here. The point is that this is an incredible book. Although dark, apocalyptic futures are pretty common in comics (everything from Days of Future Past from Marvel to Dark Knight Returns and Kingdom Come from DC, the latter of which was also an Alex Ross magnum opus), this one is perhaps the best thought-out and complex I've ever read. The story is essentially a "What if..?" style tale, where we see the fates of Marvel's popular characters in a world where, apparently, the entire human race has evolved into superpowered mutants. However, it is also much more than that, as Ross and Kreuger manage to tie almost everything of importance that's ever happened in the Marvel Universe into one coherent story. This is done so convincingly that you almost get the idea that this is exactly what Stan and Jack had in mind back when they created these characters. This book is a beautiful complete story on its own, but also ends with a prelude into the next series, Universe X. This will also be followed by another series, Paradise X; apparently, the three together form a trilogy. I can't wait for those series to finish up and become available in trade paperback form, as they ought to be every bit as good as this one is.A couple of small problems: The story is really dense and hard to get into at first. The character X-51, or Machine Man is a really obscure hero prior to this piece of work; I'd never heard of him, but he seemed to be on a first name basis with all of the major heroes. And lastly, without meaning any offense to John Paul Leon (because his art really is great), but I would have loved to have seen this book painted by Alex Ross. He co-plotted and did the covers, but it would have been even better if he could have done all of the interior art as well.Still, these minor quibbles don't keep this from being an incredible piece of work. If you're a fan of the Marvel Universe, or were in the sixties and seventies, or you're not a fan of the Marvel Universe but do like comics, do yourself a favor and check this out.