Diary of Kyle

He sat on the bus and looked outside, thinking. He thought too much and he thought about love and he won't ever stop as he'd never enough. He closed his eyes. They opened to see commercial sights. There may have been a better way to deploy the spectrum of colours but no alternatives sprung to mind, so he thought about what money to save and how to spend it. He thought too much and he didn't know why he could hear these thoughts but not ever replies. The plastic in his ears provided him with music, which derived from an electrical current he could no longer fathom as he had done at school. The songs sung to him passed by harmlessly as he thought about what this electricity could be used for instead. Soon he would be at his place of employment, where he carried out the daily endurance test of avoiding boredom for as long as possible. Then he would continue to think until such time came as he was required to do. This was alleviated for half an hour in the middle of the day, during which he returned to soundtracked music as he walked the streets. He preferred to eschew the colours to roam amongst the residential greys and for this he received no financial compensation. Upon returning to the centre there were more carbon fumes from the people and machines. Despite his best intentions he would sometimes find himself smiling as he walked in the sun and thought about seeing her. His mind pictured how the letters 'mm-hmm-hmm!' could arrange themselves on a blank page and so almost laughed. While that so almost happened the round man walking in front of him turned and looked behind four times in a row. As he pondered the meaning of this intrusion he narrowly avoided walking into the black cat that sauntered across his path. After this he crossed the road and headed back into his confines. On the way home he thought he saw a window propped open with a shotgun but it was only a coathanger.

Population: Lyle

Greetings, one and all. I have been asked to describe myself but all that springs to mind is "hmm". An infinite space, an expansive reality, a myriad of stars and the eternal possibilities that lie within put me in the here and now to deliver that "hmm". I think too much. Or not enough... especially when it comes to diet... nothing like appreciating beer and pizza, especially after a day of mental graft, knocking science into shape. That sounds too exciting. It mainly involves making coffee, not tinkering in a mad lab! Tinkering with coffee, now *there's* grant-ready material!

Kyle eats more green things than me. I wonder if that's why he ditched science for arts? With a bit of luck we won't ditch one another. Having lived together long enough to be considered unofficially married, we're now in different parts of the world, getting on with things in our equally bumbling ways. It's good to hear things are going well for him. He's even got one of them there women things at long last! Clearly, I was his Kryptonite. No doubt we'll meet up soon and have a merry weekend of beer and pizza and, hell, maybe even Die Hard. It's just good science.

We used to share a flat with Rick too, back in our student heyday (some might say that never really ended!). Then, to use a technical term, he lost the plot, went off the rails whilst looking for it, then kept on drinking rather than getting back on track. I don't know what he's up to now and don't really care, not after getting screwed over for deposit money. I think Kyle had a bigger falling out with him than I did, so it's safe to say we'll not see him again. He's not a bad guy, but he's turned bumbling into an art form and, really, we've nothing in common.

Population: Sarah

There are two great constants in my life - religion and science. Most might think that combining them would be the tricky part, but it isn't. The trick is meeting other people for whom it makes as much sense as it does to me. Or just bugger it all and rely on football instead, whatever works. No point in denying I'm an insecure person, but I'm secure in my beliefs, secure in my knowledge and secure in the sensibility I see in the world at large. Fingers crossed it starts getting smaller, else I'll be tempted to replace football with alcoholism.

At least I can admit when I'm overwhelmed. Steve just denies it and withdraws further into his little world with its stupidly narrow set of beliefs. You might have thought the non-religious would be less likely to be intolerant. If Steve's anything to go by, they're more likely to mock what they don't comprehend. We had a big argument recently about political issues, which is weird, since none of the "romantic" stuff we've discussed pissed me off that much. His interest is more annoying than flattering nowadays. God I can't wait to strike out of this town. My boots wanna walk!!

It was Steve who introduced me to Kyle last summer, during one of his poker sessions with people from work, back when the benefits people made him try working. It was months after that that Kyle and I started spending some time together, alone. It was fun. Maybe it could have been more fun had we met under different circumstances, who knows? I'm not certain enough to risk anything and he doesn't seem interested anyway. But... but then nothing. I'm just being daft. Only sensible thing to do is ditch this place and get to the greener grass of elsewhere!

Population: Steve

My reason is an excuse, an anti-social ism to avoid work, contributions and the aggravations of a society that cracked long ago. Lock it up in a home, give it happy pills, maybe visit at birthdays. Meanwhile, I'll be free, reading books that reaffirm my imaginative creation of a faith to knock it all down and start again; listening to music that strikes the match of my soul, since sadly she never shall; watching harmless shows that cost plenty to make but I can see for nothing, because none of us can avoid stories forever. I live as I feel.

Kyle, on the other hand, lives in the hope that he might feel. He projects himself as a full glass when really he is half-empty and in need of a mixer. His silent sarcasm suggests he sees the world with bemused contempt too, though for some reason he's willing to let himself be pushed by it as he pulls on it. Why bother? Either way it ends in gravity, six feet under, waiting at the grand bus stop of choice... maybe. Sure, we could be mates if we put energy into it, but he's wasting his and I'm saving mine.

Besides, there's Sarah. For years we've gotten closer, me providing her with the companionship her boyfriend can't be bothered to give. She's everything. Part of me always hoped we'd end up together, that she'd finally tire of her older man and we'd do more than talk. All that happened was she stopped talking to me and turned to Kyle instead. Things are changing. The world is reacting to events I never initiated. Now Sarah'll move town with old faithful or stay here and flirt with Kyle. Meanwhile, I'll have my ism and routine. This life, it feels odd.

Population: Clive

I am a man of taste but not of money. This causes difficulty and leads to work, which leads to more difficulty as work is too easy. Push a button, earn a pay. That's what they say. Whoever they are have the basics correct but the details cause the difficulty, for pushing is a constant, repetitious stream of similarity, several hours a day, leaving little time to enjoy the easy life. However, when those times come, I ensure they are worthwhile. Far better to experience the best via my limited salary in the limited enjoyment time available than to experience the mundane all the time, all the time.

Kyle hears of my fondness for fine beers, meals, books, etc. and says he admires my patience as much as my taste. He is perhaps more scattershot in his purchases but he seems to be training himself to follow suit. His old bedroom was apparently riddled with mindless artefacts and junk, money wasted on distractions for a blink. I didn't know him then but from what he says he was constantly avoiding reality. Now he's brave enough not just to confront it but to find a way to enjoy it. And that’s all it is, really; self-fulfilment, not snobbery.

Kyle and I have been out drinking a few times with Steve, although neither of us really knows what to say to him. There are plenty of common interests and potential conversation starters, but we've never been able to move onto the next course without bumbling awkward silences. Last time we were all together was Kyle's birthday. He seemed more interested in maintaining constant physical contact with his new girlfriend, which is fair enough, and, being a Tuesday and all, I left early. Steve stuck around till the end, drinking fancy drinks with little appreciation for them. Oh, what fun!

All-Star Superman #2

Superman. Hero. Icon. Inspiration. Boring?

Well he certainly has not been particularly exciting for a good long while. The only Superman comics in recent years to have been worthy of wearing the famed S-shield have been Elseworlds titles like Kurt Busiek’s SECRET IDENTITY and Mark Millar’s RED SON. The only place to find a suitable Man of Tomorrow on a regular basis was on the Justice League cartoon and in his own erstwhile animated series. In fact, the general lameness of the Man of Steel has been so obvious that DC eventually had to acknowledge it themselves and it is currently being used as the basis for the INFINITE CRISIS event. The memorable shot that Batman took at Superman in issue #1 of that series (”The last time you inspired anyone was when you were dead.”) was as accurate as it was cheap. Just by reading the words on the page you could feel the impact of fanboys worldwide gasping “Oooh, get you!” and then suddenly realizing that Batman’s antisocial barbs were actually justified for once.

It will be a few months yet until this generation’s Crisis is over and done with. DC has made a song and dance about returning their heroes to genuinely heroic status afterwards. It remains to be seen exactly what that means but in terms of Superman it is inconceivable that they could surpass the version that Morrison and Quitely present to us in this book.

Ah, yes; Morrison and Quitely. Some things work perfectly well by themselves but enter an even higher realm of brilliance when they are combined. Peanut butter and jelly. Chocolate and milk. Me and beer. Getting these two together to work on a Superman book more than lives up to the All-Star line’s vague ethos about “big name creators on big name characters” (even if it does make it near-impossible to get equally gifted replacements). While Frank Miller and Jim Lee pack their ALL-STAR BATMAN AND ROBIN, THE INCREDIBLY LONG TITLE with gratuitous and pornographic sketches that can only possibly work as satire, Morrison and Quitely offer a fundamental yet exciting take on the Last Son of Krypton.

Let’s have a gander, cos lord knows we don’t have enough of those…

The Cover – Okay, first thing’s first; with that slogan and with Superman standing in that position, I can only conclude that Lois has stumbled onto his secret Wanking Chamber.

Page 1 – Lois Lane sits in her car reading the Daily Planet as Superman flies said car over the spectacular Arctic landscape. What, that scenery isn’t good enough for her? She should at least turn the lights off. It’ll only run down the battery.

Pages 2/3 – Superman sets the car down in front of the entrance to the Fortress of Solitude. Lois Lane, who has been trying to prove that Superman is really Clark Kent for some time now, cannot bring herself to believe it is actually true after he revealed it in the previous issue. This is what is known as Woman Logic. It is a disturbing and strangely compelling thing.

Page 4 – Superman opens the door to the Fortress and is greeted by four of his Superman Robots. Stop to consider for a moment the sheer ego it would take to manufacture a veritable regiment of highly-advanced robots and make them all look like you. Yeah. Anyway, he tells them to fix a spot of engine trouble he detected in Lois’ car. Told you the lights should have been off.

Page 5 – Cute Touch #1: Lois is concerned about the size of Superman’s key. She mentions the massive Silver Age version of the Fortress key, which has been replaced by a bog-standard, regulation-sized key and lock… except the key is made of super-dense material and weighs half-a-million tons, so only Superman can lift it. Neat.

Pages 6/7 – Double Splash Fun! Superman introduces Lois to the massive lobby of the Fortress, where various robots are milling around taking care of things. There are various objects in sight, including the Bottle City of Kandor, Joker’s Giant Penny, the Space Shuttle Columbia and a very peculiar chess board. Superman obviously needs a high-speed internet connection.

Page 8 – Lois showers and dresses in evening wear. Yes, we get to see her in her panties. Somehow she still seems elegant though, not sexploited as with Vicki Vale in ALL-STAR SIN CITY. Anyway, she continues to have a big flap as she ponders the logistics of ageing in a long-term relationship with Superman. The word “sagging” is involved, and rightly so. Superman’s big response is to give her some flowers. Sure, they are from Alpha Centauri 4 but it is quite reassuring to know that even Superman doesn’t have a better plan than just giving her flowers.

Page 9 – Superman continues his Alpha Male routine by showing off his wonderful toys to try and impress Lois. The most impressive is a time telescope, which allows him to briefly contact his successors from the distant future. They only get brief and cryptic messages at the moment but it is almost as though this could somehow tie into the plot later on. Huh.

Page 10 – Superman has seemingly graduated from keeping a mere super-powered Labrador as a pet. Now he has a baby sun-eater and feeds him miniature suns that he creates with a cosmic anvil made on New Olympus. Lois’ response? Standing with her arms crossed, looking unimpressed. Christ, luv, what’s a guy gotta do?

Page 11 – Lois gets distracted as her journalistic streak kicks in. This may or may not be the same thing as being a noisy wee so-and-so but whatever, the point is that she goes into a room, sees a robot monitoring strange experiments with various X-rays and diagrams of a woman on the wall and then Superman ushers her outside and tells her the room is off-limits. You can’t blame her for getting curious now. To be fair, he did leave the door open. Always conceal the Wanking Chamber, Kal-El.

Interlude for a great big, fuck off Mario advert!!!!

Yeah, thanks. Begone, Bob Hoskins.

Actually, do you remember the original Super Mario Kart game? That was awesome in the most immense sense of the word. Only Burnout 2 surpassed it in terms of racing games. Well, that and Supercars for the Amiga 500+. That game went above and beyond, since you got to go shopping for your cars and get into fights with the greasy bloke at the dealership. Ah, memories.

I’m going to buy a Nintendo Revolution just for the SNES back catalogue. Anyway, um, Superman…

Page 12 – Superman puts on his gladrags – sorry, traditional Kryptonian formal wear from the Fourth Age – and goes for dinner with Lois. That’s dinner on the Titanic, which he has added to his Fortress, with the actual menu from the ship’s kitchen, cooked with freshly picked ingredients by Superman himself. We’re into “above and beyond” territory here. Hell, all the 40 Year Old Virgin had to do was take the daughter to a sex clinic. Lois, however, is still suspicious about the whole Clark/Kal connection. We see from her POV for a panel and it is in black and white…

Page 13 – Lois continues to see Superman and the relationship in black and white. She is not at all happy that the biggest story in the world has now simply been handed to her on a silver platter (never mind that it is a silver platter from the Titanic), and is angry at Superman both for lying to her for so many years and for not letting her know why he chose now to confide his secret. Don’t worry, Supes. The Wanking Chamber is always there for you and it asks no questions.

Page 14 – Dinner has ended abruptly, so Lois jots down some notes on her laptop as Superman looks forlornly at his Clark Kent glasses…

Page 15 – Cute Touch #2: He puts the glasses on and looks into the Mirror of Truth, which of course shows him without the spectacles. According to his little mirror confessional, he only told her now because he thinks he is dying and wants to spend some truthful time with her. Lois, meanwhile, is getting herself worked up into a right state and has convinced herself that Superman is plotting something sinister in his secret room to hurt her with. She also gets even angrier when she considers that some part of Superman may actually be the bumbling Clark Kent. You see? Nobody likes Clark Kent. Well, except for Chloe, but she’s dead. Or dying, or will be shortly. Whatever. If a future issue of this title has Chloe in it then I will ejaculate in the street, hollering with glee. Anyway, the interstellar flowers stand in a vase on the table behind her laptop and they glow an eerie blue…

Eerie, Indiana. Is that on DVD yet?

Page 16 – Lois darts off to find herself a weapon from the room she was in earlier. You know, the one with the Time Telescope? Yeah, well, the Superman of 4500AD is standing in it, head wrapped up in bandages…

Page 17 – Lois tries to get a straight answer out of the future Superman before a couple of the robots come in to take her to the present Superman but it proves a little difficult. You see, the future Superman is demanding an answer to a riddle that has plagued his people for many generations. I realise I’m doing a spoiler-filled review here but I just can’t bring myself to ruin the question, you really do just need to go and read it for yourselves. It definitely ranks as Line of the Year Thus Far… It also ranks as Cute Touch #3.

Page 18 – Lois runs away from the robots, grabs a Kryptonite Laser and heads off to confront Superman. She is convinced that the future Superman she spoke to was sporting the Hush line of skincare products because the present Superman is about to be deformed by a hideous accident in his secret room… she must be prepared… is this the way George Bush’s mind processes information?

Page 19 – As before, but more paranoid and with the closed door of the secret room bearing a sign that says “Keep Out: Superman At Work”. Why does he even have that sign when nobody else goes into the Fortress? What an odd fellow…

Page 20 – He comes out of the room and she shoots him with the Green K laser. He is not harmed, merely tickled. It seems that he has become immune due to the massive power boosts he received in the first issue when he was in the sun. Lois immediately comes to her senses but unfortunately she looks a little like Kate Moss the morning after. Come on Frank, mate, you can do better than that.

Page 21 – Exposition!!!! Monologuing!!!! To paraphrase, Superman tells Lois to shut the fuck up and stop being such a bloody cock-tease. He has been using weird funky alien shit to duplicate his powers so that she can spend 24 hours with his super-powers.

Page 22 – Happy Birthday, Lois Lane! She gets a Superwoman costume to put on just in time for issue #3, which should probably be with us before 2007. My Word spellchecker is apparently quite fine and dandy with ‘Superwoman’, though I have no idea when I ever typed it before. I just hope it wasn’t in that letter to the council I typed up earlier on.

Anyway, yeah, she’s fine.

The Final Word: Crazy, sexy, cool, emphatically super and utterly immune to boring.

Rating - 8

The Bruce - Part 1

John Barbour's The Brus was written with the explicit intent of generating passion by appropriating a sensed heroic past for the book's contemporary audience. The opening 36 lines of Book I are little more than an attempt to convince the listener of the truthful nature of the poem, with the secondary value of acting as a memorial for the historical figures described. Compared to most medieval romances, which are often set a long, long time ago in some place far, far away, this was dealing with relatively recent subject matter and so was presumably rather unique. There are many place names included that must surely invite audience recognition, mixed in with classical names that confer heroic stature to the protagonists and furthermore invite the audience to compare the two groups directly.

By sticking to the broader themes of the romance texts, however, Barbour is obligated to surpress certain unflattering facts about Bruce in order to create a more stalwart character (if indeed he was aware of these facts as modern historians seem to be). These broader themes are certainly present, as showcased by James Douglas' exile to Paris and his subsequent return in pursuit of an ideal. Interestingly, Douglas' introduction (c. 383) paints him as a ready-known figure. Barbour sees Douglas as something of an intertextual icon, a link in the oral storytelling chain.

Regardless of the personal facts regarding Robert I that Barbour may have skimmed over (most crucially the blending of at least three generations of Bruce men into one Super Bruce), he uses Scotland as a background character, effectively the damsel in distress, and paints her as a united kingdom. This was very far from the truth even by the 1370s, with divisions stemming from the Balliols, the Earls of Moray, the Gaelic speakers, the Scots speakers, various classes and more.

Perhaps the most important theme of the entire book, or at least the most memorable, is that dealing with the importance of freedom. Yet is freedom universally a noble thing, or is it merely a thing for nobles? At times (c. 216-18) Barbour seems more upset with the noble gentry being denied certain customs, such as when Welsh knights were forced to do battle without their horses, or when opponents of Edward I were hanged rather than beheaded (deemed an appropriate execution for a nobleman). Again, the perils of mixing a modern dialect with an ancient tongue become evident.

16th Century State

Well, maybe. In sixteenth century Scotland there was a steady dissolution of the absolutist notions of the Divine Right of Monarchs towards a centralised state, or so some historians are seemingly fond of saying. As with feudalism, the term state can be rather misleading when used in a modern context. The word is thought to have originated with Aristotle, who used it in reference to a collection of freeborn citizens that were working for the common good of their polity. Considering how highly regarded studies of Aristotle and his peers were in medieval society, it is perhaps unsurprising that the term caught on.

One of the most important developments to happen in reference to this was literacy becoming more widespread. Jack Goody called the invention of written symbols to represent the oral alphabet a revolutionary event. In medieval Scotland it would certainly have helped trade, giving rise to a number of literate merchants. Before this (rather vague) age literacy was the hallmark of the clerical elite, who could be scribes for charters and other important documents that came to be used in legal matters.

James I was the first well-known literate monarch in Scotland, which would of course have led to many of his nobles emulating him. Whereas it would once have been customary to simply employ literate servants, now the nobles underwent education in order to do it themselves; education that usually followed the humanist scholars of Europe such as Aristotle. By 1496 it became mandatory for the eldest sons of all nobles to stay in school and learn fluent Latin before going on to university.

Eventually the printing presses reached Scotland. The burdens of relying on manuscripts were lifted and so opened a near limitless scope of potential. This may not always have been to the benefit of the nobles, since many broadsheet posters containing criticisms of certain gentryfolk have been found (inc. Mary I).

Under James V's rule there was a move away from clerical government as many knights came to the royal court, leaving their local polities, to hold offices that would once have been the exclusive domain of the clergy. This included most of the Justices of the Peace. Initially, and inevitably, literacy proved to be quite limited. A number of letters would be astonishingly brief, contain a great many errors, and perhaps be completely illegible. In part this may have been due to reading and writing being taught as two separate subjects.

Bureaucracy is the skeletal system of a ruler at war. England certainly depended on it a great deal whilst the Hundred Year War with France rumbled on. For one thing, it helped to keep tabs on the taxes that were being levied in order to pay for the war. The prolonged campaigns created a situation whereby taxation was effectively commonplace. For a king as extravagant as James VI, who was often found wanting for yet more expenses, this must have seemed like a rather peculiar affront. After all, Scotland was not at war. By 1581, this led to an attempt to impose regular taxation. This was a highly controversial matter, since usually taxes were only levied with a prior, specific explanation as to the need.

Match Point

Writer - Woody Allen
Director - Woody Allen
Stars - Jonathan Rhys-Meyers, Scarlett Johansson

A great deal of attention has been given to Woody Allen lately for spurning his life-long lover, New York, and deciding to film in London instead. Match Point is the first product of this tryst but it feels like little more than a drunken kiss under the mistletoe that went slightly too far rather than the passionate love affair Allen has supposedly embarked upon with the other side of the Atlantic.

Not only has he left his trademark New York, but Allen the writer has forsaken Woody the character. It is customary to see the neurotic fellow pop up in any given Allen film, transplanted from Annie Hall, even by proxy as was the case with Jason Biggs in Anything Else. Instead, the film is centred around Rhys-Meyers, who is effectively playing Mr Ripley's less talented brother. He comes from a working class Irish background and, after making a name for himself on the professional tennis circuit, has recently settled in London to coach at an exclusive club. His chief concerns appear to be financial and social status, yet he soon befriends Matthew Goode's executive character and is inducted into the Hewett clan. Before pausing to take breath he is employed by Goode's father, the always welcome Brian Cox, charming the mother, Penelope Wilton, and engaged to the sister, Emily Mortimer, despite clearly having feelings for Johansson; a struggling actress engaged to Goode.

So far so good, yet Rhys-Meyers proves to be rather incapable of carrying the emotional weight of the film. He can handle the business scenes very well, strutting around in a tailor-made suit to network with prospective clients, yet there are no layers to his performance. We are told many times that Johansson is his passion but we cannot see it in his eyes. His character experiences weddings, births and deaths in the film but greets them all in the same detached manner. This is something of a problem considering the choices his character makes as the love triangle tightens a noose round his neck, since his rather far-fetched actions do not feel convincing in the least. Only in a single scene towards the end, when he encounters a couple of detectives played by James Nesbitt and Ewan Bremner, does he begin to show a suitable range.

Perhaps even more damaging is that Allen's usual flair for dialogue has escaped him this time around. Only Nesbitt and Bremner seem capable of breathing life into the script with their brief scenes in order to present genuinely charming characters. Mostly the film just plods along through multiple scenes in fashionable eateries and upper-class culture traps, killing time in an increasingly vacuous way. It only seems to want to explore its themes by posing the questions a) isn't London pretty?, and b) isn't Scarlett Johansson pretty? The majority of the audience will answer affirmatively to at least one of those questions but probably without mustering much enthusiasm.

Allen seems to want to make some point about luck; the strength of the influence that it has on our lives and how insecure we feel because of it. This is best summed up in the opening shot, with a tennis ball hitting the top of the net and pausing in mid-air. Does it go forwards, so you win, or backwards, so you don't? Sadly, that is the most insightful the film gets since all explorations of luck are put on hold until a facsimilie of the same shot occurs in the third act to determine Rhys-Meyers' fate. It is probably rather difficult to base a script around luck since it often just feels like a cop-out to the audience, as it does here. It feels more like Allen simply tacked on that opening shot as a pre-emptive apology for what occurs later.

Later still, there will be another Allen movie set in London starring Johansson. Perhaps by then he will be comfortable enough to provide examples of the refreshment this trans-Atlantic fling is said to have given him.

Rating - 4

Romance

No, not like that.

It's another week and another lecture topic, this time on the romantic literary genre. It stems, as with most things, from Latin and from the Romanic languages that followed (primarily French, Spanish, Portuguese and Italian). In these languages vernacular tales of heroic deeds became popular, with the most renowned early example being the chansons de geste that focused on the adventures of French knights. Such storytelling forms became more apparent in other parts of Europe too and soon turned up in English and German. They took the form of chivalric verse or prose, or of a fictitious prose narrative driven by myth, and were characterised by extravagance, idealism and the hopeful love of the protagonist.

Apparently there are six key points to romantic literature:

1. The tale centres on a youthful, often virginal, hero undertaking a rite of passage that usually ends in a form of sexual fulfillment. The hero will often require assistance or companionship, giving an aspect of homosocial attachment to the heterosexual desires that drive the tale forwards. Unfortunately, the tale doesn't drive particularly fast in a lot of cases and the plot tends to be padded with unnecessary tasks.
2. The tale sticks to the cyclical pattern of exile and return, where the self-alienation of the hero allows for transformation and empowering before going home. Joseph Campbell dubbed this structure as Separation, Initiation, Return. He also called it Star Wars.
   
3. The tale sticks to the broad chivalric code of righting wrongs and helping others, which can serve to justify the hero's often self-serving interests by increasing the altruistic aspect of the journey.
4. The tale is usually made easier to digest by being placed in a remote geographic and/or historic setting. This eventually built up to the modern fantasy genre ("A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away...").
5. The tale will often focus on a hero who is chosen by a higher power and subsequently granted supernatural or superlative abilities to make the adventures that much more memorable.
6. The tale will almost always be broken down into simplistic notions of right and wrong, good and evil, with no shades of grey to complicate matters.

That's pretty much that as far as the introduction went. Most of the medieval romancers also stuck to one of the three main Matters - the Arthurian, the Carlovingian or the Alexandrian. Obviously, this meant that there were many different versions of the same characters to be found although they were somehow still recognisable as intertextual icons (in a modern sense, James Bond, Batman, etc.).

Ultimate X-Men

My pull list for this week left me with just one new book – JLA #124. Since that’s already been spoken for but I need to write something, we turn to the fifth hardcover collection of ULTIMATE X-MEN. This collects the first three arcs of Brian K. Vaughan’s stint on the title, “The Tempest”, “Cry Wolf” and “The Most Dangerous Game”. Since I’m a huge fan of Vaughan’s other books it goes without saying that I’ve been chomping at the bit to read his spin on the Ultimate version of the X-Men for quite some time. Collecting all the Ultimate Marvel titles in HC form is great for bookshelf aesthetics but not so good for patience.

The main reason for reviewing this collection, however, is to take a look at the ULTIMATE X-MEN title itself. The regular Marvel Universe X-books have of course been getting all of the attention from the Marvel publicity department lately, what with HOUSE OF M changing something or other that may or may not be made any clearer in DECIMATION before we wind up in a CIVIL WAR that Professor Xavier is set to play a major role in causing. In addition to all of that we have the impending return of ASTONISHING X-MEN, which the aforementioned publicity dogs will drool all over as they proudly announce to the world that, yes, the bloke that made that mediocre sci-fi movie that hardly anybody went to see last summer has again deemed comic books worthy of his attention. Furthermore, there’s the launch of the superfluous WOLVERINE: ORIGINS at some point later this year. Oh, and the small matter of Storm and The Black Panther getting married. How can ULTIMATE X-MEN hope to keep up with all of this in the marketplace?

Frankly, all of the Ultimate Marvel titles are in a general malaise at the moment. ULTIMATES has remained a sales juggernaut, yet the long-term security of the title is uncertain considering a vastly different creative team will be tackling the third volume. ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN and ULTIMATE FANTASTIC FOUR are continuing to produce good stories (or starting to in the latter’s case) but sales have been drifting steadily downwards over the past year or so. ULTIMATE X-MEN is more or less in the same boat as those two titles. At times it feels like Marvel is taking it for granted until the fabled Bryan Singer storyline finally sees the light of day. It is somewhat telling that the only substantial publicity given to the Ultimate line lately has been for ULTIMATE HULK/WOLVERINE and even that boiled down to “written by some bloke from Lost”.

Of course, the main task of the Ultimate line is for the titles to get their collected editions released as quickly as possible and then clean house in the TPB market. By all accounts they continue to do that rather well. Perhaps some of the lowered sales figures could be attributed to more readers deciding to just wait for the trade instead, even though the general stagnation of the titles still plays a major factor. Certainly by this point, nearly six years after the line began, the very same continuity headaches that they sought to escape in the first place are in danger of returning. If that’s the case, why bother to continue with it at all? Have Marvel reached the stage of continuing to churn out the Ultimate books due to financial habit, or are they simply incapable of promoting them better and of offering the same periodic revamps that help the likes of UNCANNY X-MEN survive? More importantly, is there any direction to ULTIMATE X-MEN more substantial than “different continuity”?

Well, let’s see what’s happened so far…

2000 – The book launches in December under the creative control of Mark Millar and is thus hindered from the start. The general goodwill shown towards the Ultimate line at this point was enough to make it a successful debut, but in comparison to the more widely-appealing, ‘classic-school’ approach that Brian Michael Bendis took with ULTIMATE SPIDER-MAN, Millar’s X-Men were hardly the refreshing change of pace that the world was waiting for.

#1 – The X-Men (Cyclops, Jean Grey, Beast, Colossus, Storm) are recruited by Xavier and subsequently rescue Iceman from being squished by some Sentinels, which the government has recently set free to kill mutants.

2001 – The abovementioned refreshment factor did turn up in the X-Men - except it was in Grant Morrison’s NEW X-MEN. Had Marvel switched the creative teams on their two premiere mutant books then perhaps things would have worked out better. Morrison’s early NEW X-MEN stories bring words like ‘hope’, ‘change’, ‘youthful’, ‘rebellious’ and ‘progressive’ to mind. On the other hand “The Tomorrow People” and “Return To Weapon X”, the first two arcs of ULTIMATE X-MEN, only lead to words like ‘smug’, ‘cynical’, ‘hollow’, ‘superficial’ and ‘dour’. Millar’s patented action quotient was fulfilled and those scenes worked rather well, but the moments in between were lacking heart.

#2 – Magneto sends Wolverine to sort out the X-Men.

#3 – The X-Men rescue Wolverine, who has been captured by the government.

#4 – Though the Sentinel program has been scrapped, Beast is in a coma and so the angst-filled Cyclops leaves.

#5 – Cyclops meets Magneto in the Savage Land and hangs out with the Brotherhood, while the government sends the Sentinels (big metal robots) to hunt down Magneto.

#6 – Magneto acts like a bad ass by making George Bush run around naked. Uh-huh.

#7 – The Weapon X program is introduced, along with Rogue and Nightcrawler (who is bafflingly seen shooting people to death).

#8 – As before, only extended.

#9 – Nick Fury turns up.

#10 – The Weapon X people act stupidly.

#11 – Wolverine saves the say and plays nice with Fury.

#12 – Wolverine. Sabretooth. Fight. Xavier. Deus. Ex. Machina.

#13 – Gambit is introduced as a homeless card trickster in NYC.

2002 – The year started with a fill-in issue by Chuck Austen that failed to improve matters. Millar, to his credit, did. Slightly. Maybe the launch of THE ULTIMATES let him get most of the crash-bang-wallop-hey-I-wrote-The-Authority out of his system. Whatever happened, he started to tone down the action in order to take a closer look at the core themes of the title. Issue #20, which focuses on Xavier having second thoughts about the X-Men and discussing them with a brainwashed Magneto that he is controlling, is one of the best stories Millar has ever written. The introduction of the Hellfire Club and the Phoenix was skimmed over but interesting nonetheless, and by the end of the year we were ready for more crash-bang with “Return Of The King”. Unfortunately, while the writing showed improvement there were a fair few fill-in artists used for Adam Kubert. Since the book is catered towards the TPB, simply delaying it is probably the more preferable option.

#14 – Gambit refuses to join the X-Men.

#15 – Xavier is revealed to have been keeping a mind-wiped Magneto in captivity.

#16 – The team goes on a publicity tour while Proteus turns up.

#17 – Proteus turns out to be the child of Xavier and Moira MacTaggart, who is Xavier’s ex-wife.

#18 – The fight goes to Germany. Colossus feels blue.

#19 – Colossus kills Proteus. People begin to mistrust Xavier.

#20 – See above. Also, Scott and Jean get closer.

#21 – Kitty Pryde comes to the school.

#22 – Quicksilver and Scarlet Witch lead the new Brotherhood, which is mainly revamped Ani-Men. Wolverine. Cyclops. Fight.

#23 – Beast has cybersex with Blob. Uh-huh.

#24 – Wolverine and Cyclops bugger off to the Savage Land, while the Hellfire Club continue to play the rest of the team.

#25 – The Hellfire Club tries to bring back their worshipped Phoneix through Jean but Xavier sorts ‘em out.

2003 – Millar and Kubert wrapped up the crash-bang but failed to bring the wallop as “Return Of The King” petered out. Then the new creative team of Bendis and David Finch turned up. Bendis teased the possibility of fleshing out the characters, who were still rather innocuous even by issue #40, but his first arc, “Blockbuster”, felt more like a stale Millar leftover. Then came “New Mutants” and things became a lot better a lot quicker. Hell, he even managed to make Angel interesting. Finch was on top of the artwork, sales went up with Bendis’ arrival and things were looking up for the title. The rest of the X-Books were preparing for the departure of Morrison and the horribly miscalculated ‘ReLoad’ stunt, making the delayed success of the Ultimate version even sweeter.

#26 – Xavier. Magneto. Chat.

#27 – A more recognisable Nightcrawler meets the team while Magneto prepares the Brotherhood for attack.

#28 – The X-Men go on the run while Magneto goes on the pill. Or something.

#29 – Turns out Wolverine left Cyclops for dead in the Savage Land to try and fuck Jean.

#30 – Cyclops gets the team to the Savage Land (somehow) to stop Magneto’s doomsday device.

#31 – Jean saves Miami.

#32 – Wolverine. Cyclops. Fight. Xavier agrees to government supervision.

#33 – Xavier. Magneto. Chat.

#34 – Wolverine. Spider-Man. Team-up.

#35 – Ditto, but with Black Widow too.

#36 – Ditto, but with Daredevil too.

#37 – Ditto, but with the rest of the X-Men turning up at the end.

#38 – Wolverine and the X-Men make up. Hugs and kisses.

#39 – Wolverine and Jean save the government.

#40 – Angel turns up and he’s hot.

2004 – Bendis brought “New Mutants” to a close with the death of Beast. Killing off a major character in any other Ultimate book is rather difficult. Doing it in the X-Men book, which has a far bigger cast, is a bit easier so it will be interesting to see if dead does indeed mean dead in the Ultimate Universe. After this, Bendis and Finch buggered off to make room for the Vaughan and a bevy of artists.

#41 – Wolverine kills a kid with a mutant power that kills anybody near him. Brilliant issue, the best of Bendis’ short run.

#42 – Dazzler, Karma, Emma Frost and the Hellions turn up, while it seems the President actually likes mutants but maybe that’s just Xavier’s psychic influence.

#43 – Emma Frost, Xavier’s ex, tackles the youth vote via Dazzler – crime-fighting mutant punk rock chick.

#44 – X-Men save the President again, though Angel turns out to be useless at fighting.

#45 – Beast dies and Storm cries.

Vaughan is far more similar in tone to Bendis than Millar, so hopefully his run will continue to beat the heart of the book and it’s characters… let’s see…

“The Tempest”

#46 – The team deal with Beast’s death in various ways. Xavier is beginning to favour a more militant and violent approach to the mutant cause and has no problems with Colossus and Wolverine beating the crap out of one another in the name of “training”. Emma Frost is rather appalled at seeing him wallow so much and takes off back to her own school in Chicago. Havok goes with her since he doesn’t want to hang around with his brother. Cyclops starts to have a good whinge about all of this but Jean brightens him up by taking him on a psychic journey to Corsair, which is passed off as a childhood fantasy land of Cyclops’ making. Kitty makes an appearance in a rather inappropriate bikini and finds that Storm has been taking Beast’s death very hard and has given herself a drastic haircut. Meanwhile, Angel and Nightcrawler try to recruit the recently-outed Northstar but he runs off. Later on he is lured into an alley by Mr Sinister and shot. Sinister appears to simply be a street thug with a titular tattoo on his arm at this point…

#47 – It turns out that Northstar’s speed meant the bullet that was aimed at his heart missed hitting anything fatal. He wound up in a coma but Jean managed to wake him up just in time to tease a romantic interest in Colossus. Sinister apparently shot and killed four other mutants in the same night as part of a pledge to sacrifice ten lives to his unseen master, Lord Apocalypse. The Bugle refers to this as a ‘mutant massacre’ and so Cyclops begins meticulously training the team, gradually asserting more authority as a leader. Meanwhile, Xavier has been talking things over with Nick Fury and has come to realise that there is no need to put his students in any more danger. Nonetheless, he comes to a compromise with Cyclops and the senior students go out alongside Wolverine to look for Sinister. Nightcrawler has an effective pep talk with Storm to get her involved too.

#48 – The team hits the streets of Manhattan to try and find Sinister. Nightcrawler and Jean get told off for their efforts by a non-famous mutant. Cyclops and Colossus get into a scrap with the Russian gun-dealers Colossus used to work for. Storm and Wolverine have a heart-to-heart then find Sinister’s apartment by hassling his tattooist. Quite brilliantly, Lord Apocalypse turns out to be a hallucination of Sinister’s that he has manifested in the form of a ludicrously attired mannequin. This leaves Xavier giving further training to Iceman, Rogue, Angel and Kitty, who have been joined by a drunken Dazzler. Unfortunately for them, they are Sinister’s new targets.

#49 – Sinister manages to knock-out Xavier with the greatest weapon of all – a flight of stairs. As the senior X-Men rush back to the mansion, the younger members take the fight to Sinister and prove quite adept. Storm prevents Rogue from killing Sinister after finding inspiration in Beast’s legacy rather than depression in his death. Nick Fury turns up to take Sinister off to be detained in the Triskelion. While he is in his cell we get a glimpse at Apocalypse but it is left unclear whether he is the real version or another hallucination. Xavier decides that there is little point in trying to shield the younger X-Men from the dangers that await them in the real world – although he has apparently been spying on them with hidden cameras.

All in all, this was a very well-written superhero team-book story.

“Cry Wolf”

#50 – Nightcrawler and Angel play at Pirates of the Caribbean in the Danger Room, Cyclops and Jean have some alone time, and the rest of the group heads to Coney Island. Dazzler tries to get with Colossus but he’s more interested in beating a rigged test-of-strength machine. Storm and Wolverine have another chat and she gives him a peck on the cheek. Iceman winds up kissing Kitty, which pisses off Rogue, who knocks her out with one punch. Then Gambit turns up and causes all manner of trouble, such as blowing half off Wolverine’s face off. Apparently since his last appearance in the title he has been trained by an unknown group who have sent him to kidnap Rogue for some reason.

#51 - The group behind Gambit are Fenris, remodelled into some sort of corporate espionage outfit that are kidnapping and then recruiting mutants to gain intelligence for them. Xavier and Jean try to use Cerebro to track them while Wolverine goes off to do things the old fashioned way. Storm follows him and this time gives him a proper kiss.

#52 – Wolverine gives Storm the brush-off. Fenris offer Rogue a magic costume that can control her powers but she is more interested in earning redemption the hard way with the X-Men and turns them down. Since she’s seen too much they try to threaten her into staying, which winds up with Gambit finally coming to his senses regarding his gullibility towards Fenris. The two of them make a break for it but Wolverine has found them and wants some revenge on the Cajun. There’s a lovely astral plane moment with Xavier and Jean too, with Jean dressed in the original Marvel Girl costume that was apparently her third-grade Halloween outfit.

#53 – Wolverine and Gambit have another sick brawl but Rogue brings it to a close and chastises Wolverine for daring to think that someone with his past could ever be the hero. This leads to Wolverine going off in the huff, pausing just long enough to give Storm another brush-off. Gambit convinces Rogue to leave the X-Men and go on the road with him, while soap-opera jealousy runs rampant throughout the rest of the team too. Cyclops thinks Jean is getting a bit too close to Xavier, Iceman and Kitty are dealing with their kiss rather badly, Dazzler is starting to get a thing for Iceman now, while Nightcrawler appears to be rather interested in Kitty.

Vaughan handles the character aspects of the story very well, but the Fenris plot just did not work particularly well in the least and the predetermined Rogue/Gambit relationship was unconvincing.

“The Most Dangerous Game”

#54 – The introductions continue here, with Genosha turning up as a country that has outlawed mutants completely. Some have been put on death row, perhaps falsely, are being used as fodder for a reality TV show run by Mojo. He’s a human albino TV executive doing a version of The Running Man and his current victim is Longshot, who was imprisoned for murdering a prominent Genoshan politician. In a nice touch, Mojo’s operation is based on the island of Krakoa. Xavier sends in Cyclops, Jean, Iceman and Kitty to try and prove Longshot’s innocence. Storm has apparently gone to chase after Wolverine, but the rest of the kids decide to hijack the X-Wing and go to Genosha anyway.

#55 – Colossus, Nightcrawler and Dazzler take a look around Krakoa while Angel stays with the plane, since he’s a bit of a pansy. They take out the transmitter, knocking Mojo’s show off the air, and locate Longshot. There’s a brief appearance by Arcade as the latest hunter for the show but he is dispatched easily enough. Meanwhile, the other four investigate the murder Longshot was convicted of committing but are attacked by some chick with six arms.

#56 – I’m told the six arm chick is named Spiral. She puts up a good fight but Jean throws a Phoenix-wobbler to take her down and foreshadow the inevitable darkness that lies in wait for Ms Grey. Meanwhile, Longshot flirts with both Dazzler and Colossus as the other kids head back to the X-Wing. Unfortunately, Mojo has taken affirmative action by nicking the ship and threatening to kill Angel unless Longshot is returned to him.

#57 – The kids rescue Angel and manage to bring down Mojo’s TV show but Longshot turns down an invitation to Xavier’s and goes off on his own. Jean takes a peek in Spiral’s mind while she is detained. It turns out that she and Longshot were a couple and involved in an underground Genoshan movement. Then she had an affair with the dead politician, the sole prominent MP not to favour the mutant ban, and when Longshot found out about it he did in fact kill the guy. Xavier freaks out about it all and Angel takes the fall, which earns him a kiss or two from Dazzler. The rather naïve Nightcrawler moans to Colossus about the lack of available girls for them now that Iceman and Kitty are paired up too.

A much better crafted story that expands on the Ultimate X-Men mythos in a very constructive manner.

Well, those were the first three arcs of Vaughan’s run on the title and he did indeed do a very good job. For perhaps the first time it feels as though ULTIMATE X-MEN has a legitimate direction and can offer something unique in comparison the regular X-Books. Millar was more concerned with banding about the broad notion of a government that hates mutants, but that’s something that’s been beaten into the ground many, many times already. Bendis tried to bring in a bunch of guest stars and just have fun but it still felt too familiar. His run did act as a transition into the Vaughan issues though, which have done a lot to expand upon each of the characters in the ensemble. Thankfully, he has realised that the key to this book is that it offers readers the chance to see the primary X-Men when they were still in school, dealing with adolescent difficulties and living out their soap opera plots whilst having some superhero action along the way. This is the kind of thing that cannot be done in the regular Marvel Universe with these characters because they are now adults and trying to teach a new generation of school kids. By focusing on this fundamental difference offered by the Ultimate Universe, something that should have been more keenly explored from the start, Vaughan has finally made this title into the refreshing read it always threatened to be.

There are still some long-term subplots to be addressed. The anti-mutant movement theme is self-evident, but finding out exactly what’s happening to Jean and getting some clearer definition of Xavier’s morals will be very interesting indeed. Then there’s Colossus’ sexuality, which shall inevitably be revealed to the rest of the team in due course. Sadly, Vaughan will not be the one to resolve these points though. He’ll soon be replaced by Robert Kirkman, thankfully a writer of similar tastes and talent. It will be a long time before I get to read Kirkman’s UXM stories though. In fact, it will probably be 2007 before the remainder of Vaughan’s run is collected in HC form. Welcome to the weary world of super-fancy trade waiting.