Where to start with the X-Men comics?

[Soniku]

So I just finished watching Wolverine and the X-Men, and I want to start reading the comics.

I want to get the full original story for the most part, but I don't really feel like reading 40+ years worth of comics. Not to mention that I hate the artwork in old comic books.

There seems to be two X-Men comic series' that are pretty much be just generic "The X-Men", and not some crazy spin-off series like "Wolverine vs The Marvel Zombies" or "Magneto: A Day In The Life Of A Hasidic Jew, A Documentary".

I pretty much already know the answer to this, but I have to ask anyway:

Do I really need to start off with the 1963 comic series (currently called "The Uncanny X-Men" I think), or can I just take it from the 1991 series (whatever that one's called now)?

 

[RBjakeSpecial]

I was in the same situation. I bought The Essential X-Men volumes 1-4. It has the Phoenix Cycle and all the famous stuff. It is pretty much the Uncanny X-Men.

http://www.amazon.com/Essential-X-M...=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1245229791&sr=8-1

Really awesome read. The only problem is that the essential collections are black and white. The convenience is good.

I don't understand how you can hate the old artwork.. some of it is corny, but most of it is pretty amazing.

 

[RevQuixo]

Easy:

http://www.amazon.com/40-Years-of-t..._1_1?ie=UTF8&s=software&qid=1245241490&sr=8-1

 

[OrochiEddie]

Or screw the cluster fuckery that is the uncanny ex-men and read the ultimate series instead. Nothing ever really progresses in uncanny x-men or hardly any marvel comic. They are still baned by the fact that the writers change allowing dead characters to come back without much logic. They're bringing back Phoenix AGAIN in the x-men right now.

Ultimate does not have this issue, it is very focused and very well put together. I generally don't like comics, but enjoy the ultimate line.

 

[RBjakeSpecial]

Easy:

http://www.amazon.com/40-Years-of-t..._1_1?ie=UTF8&s=software&qid=1245241490&sr=8-1

AWESOME. I didn't know this existed. I might get this after I finish with my black and white copies. Is it easy to use?

 

[RAZO]

I would also suggest picking up X-Men, Volume 1 and 2 (Marvel DVD Comic Book Collection) . Its probably the most bad ass X-men Cartoon that I ever watched if you haven't watched it already. It was released last month. Here is a link.

http://www.amazon.com/X-Men-Marvel-...ef=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=dvd&qid=1245248777&sr=8-1

 

[black_7]

If you really need to just catch up on the story, you don't need to buy anything. Just go to Marvels website. There and a million other informational resources on the internet can give a lot of background on what has taken place.

On the other hand, the links to the other things offered would make great collectors pieces and sentimental tokens. Most likely they would be worth the money.

 

[Comrade Porn King Mikhail]

I collected X-Men comics for ten years but only read them for about three of those because the stories were highly repetitive soap opera crap. Outside of a few main storylines that can do fairly well in a stand-alone TPB, you're better off just reading the summaries on Wikipedia or other X-Men related fan sites.

The stand-along TPBs like Inferno, Phoenix Saga, Xtinction Agenda, can be purchased used and read for enjoyment, but I would not recommend diving into the other 40+ years of history that repeats upon itself numerous times.

The Ultimate lineup is the closest to a cohesive linear story that I've seen from Marvel in years and is the only truly worthy mainstream X-Men title worth reading if you're looking to get into modern comics.

Sincerely,

Mikhail

 

[Nesagwa]

AWESOME. I didn't know this existed. I might get this after I finish with my black and white copies. Is it easy to use?

The disc has an auto loader with a menu that pops up, but all the comics are in PDF and you can just drag them off the CD and view them in whatever you want easily.

Theres also complete Spiderman and Ironman disc collections like that.

 

[HeartlessNinny]

Nuts to all of that, man. Just start collecting Grant Morrison's New Xmen. If you're familiar with the basic cast, you won't really be lost. He did quite a few issues, and most of 'em were really awesome (if a bit zany, but it's Grant Morrison). If you don't want to fuck around, there's an omnibus that collects the whole run, but I think it's out of print.

When you're done with that, try some of the other new stuff that's good, like Messiah Complex and whatnot.

 

[SouthtownKid]

The disc has an auto loader with a menu that pops up, but all the comics are in PDF and you can just drag them off the CD and view them in whatever you want easily.

Theres also complete Spiderman and Ironman disc collections like that.

And Captain America, Hulk, Fantastic Four/Silver Surfer, Avengers, Ultimate X-Men and Ghost Rider. I've got them all except Ultimate X-Men and Ghost Rider. I like them enough that I'm in the process of getting rid of all my physical copies of those series.

The only problem with them is when you hit a crossover story, which happens a lot with the X-Men in the '90s, and you only get the Uncanny issues of the crossover. Happens a few times with the Avengers and Amazing Spider-Man, as well. Like with the 'Operation: Galactic Storm' crossover, I have the Avengers and Iron Man issues, but no idea what happens in the Quasar issues.

Apparently, Gitcorp was in the process of doing collections for Daredevil and Thor (FUCK! I really wanted that) when Marvel pulled the license and they had to stop. Marvel realized this was WAY too good a deal for consumers at the price they were selling them at, and decided they wanted to find a way to gouge consumers every month without ever letting them actually OWN anything -- which led to their current bullshit digital subscription service.

That also means that all these collections are out of print, and once the copies that exist now are gone, they're gone. So I recommend picking up all the ones you're interested in now, before the prices get too crazy (which has already started... I see the Avengers set is going for $99, when it used to be $39).

 

[Nesagwa]

Theyre easily pirated and pretty available on torrents if you cant find them for sale anywhere.

Might be another reason Marvel went with a flash based sub service.

 

[SouthtownKid]

Theyre easily pirated and pretty available on torrents if you cant find them for sale anywhere.

Might be another reason Marvel went with a flash based sub service.

Ah, well...I guess I can kind of see their point of view, but it still sucks. I was really looking forward to the Thor collection and was more than happy to pay $40 for 40 years of comics.

But I'm never going to pay $60 a year for comics I can't read without an internet connection, and that I'll never be able to read at all once Marvel eventually and inevitably ditches this business model.

 

[genjiglove]

Or screw the cluster fuckery that is the uncanny ex-men and read the ultimate series instead. Nothing ever really progresses in uncanny x-men or hardly any marvel comic. They are still baned by the fact that the writers change allowing dead characters to come back without much logic. They're bringing back Phoenix AGAIN in the x-men right now.

Ultimate does not have this issue, it is very focused and very well put together. I generally don't like comics, but enjoy the ultimate line.

Well, lets not go too crazy with this Ultimate Universe love. After only a decade of publication they have decided to reboot the universe because the continuity is such a cluster fuck right now. And they are doing it with the Ultimatum series, which is by all accounts one of the worst written stories ever. Ultimate X-men was canceled a while ago.

Still though, whats there is generally pretty good. I'd also suggest Morrison's New X-men series. If you are interested in old stuff you could ignore everything until Chris Claremont started writing the series. The series wasn't that great before him (even when Jack Kirby was the artist), it was actually almost canceled. But then they released Giant Size X-men #1 which introduced a lot of the characters you know today (Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler etc.) and also when Wolverine joined the team. Pretty much anything Claremont and John Byrne did together is great stuff.

If you ignore these old stories because of their art you'll be missing out on almost every "classic" X-men story like The Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past for example. Start with the Essential X-men books and go from there.

 

[RevQuixo]

And Captain America, Hulk, Fantastic Four/Silver Surfer, Avengers, Ultimate X-Men and Ghost Rider. I've got them all except Ultimate X-Men and Ghost Rider. I like them enough that I'm in the process of getting rid of all my physical copies of those series.

and Civil War & House of M


Captain America is going for stupid amounts of money now. Still looking for a copy.

 

[HeartlessNinny]

Well, lets not go too crazy with this Ultimate Universe love. After only a decade of publication they have decided to reboot the universe because the continuity is such a cluster fuck right now. And they are doing it with the Ultimatum series, which is by all accounts one of the worst written stories ever. Ultimate X-men was canceled a while ago.

Still though, whats there is generally pretty good. I'd also suggest Morrison's New X-men series. If you are interested in old stuff you could ignore everything until Chris Claremont started writing the series. The series wasn't that great before him (even when Jack Kirby was the artist), it was actually almost canceled. But then they released Giant Size X-men #1 which introduced a lot of the characters you know today (Storm, Colossus, Nightcrawler etc.) and also when Wolverine joined the team. Pretty much anything Claremont and John Byrne did together is great stuff.

If you ignore these old stories because of their art you'll be missing out on almost every "classic" X-men story like The Phoenix Saga and Days of Future Past for example. Start with the Essential X-men books and go from there.

That's a good point. Ultimate X-men was terrible.

Ultimate Spider-Man was good though, but the final issue before the relaunch was crap, they're putting a worse artist on it, they're increasing the price, and (SPOILER!!) it may not even be Peter Parker as Spider-Man. Y'know, because no one likes Peter Parker....

It's like they begged me to drop the book. That's a shame, I have 'em all since issue 14. Oh well.

And don't even get me started on Ultimates 3... The first two series are some of the best comics ever (literally), but that's easily one of the worst.

 

[SPINMASTER X]

HERE IS WHERE YOU START.

Go to wikipedia. Read the articles that summarize the x-men story arcs up until the current arcs then pick up the latest comic. That's what I do.

What I just told you is exactly what I did. I was in Iraq when I got hooked on Comics and Wikipedia saved my life. Once I got back from Iraq I bought comics by the dozens and am still buying them.

 

[SouthtownKid]

I think anyone praising the Ultimate line must have stopped reading them a few years back and doesn't realize what they've become.

As far as Ultimate X-Men goes, I thought the first 5 issues were really promising, but issue 6 killed it. Big, bland disappointment. The second arc was okay. After that, no interest. The writers and artists that came on the book after that seemed to forget that the characters were young, and not the adult characters that have been around for decades in the regular MU books. Mired in mediocrity.

I thought Ultimate FF was pretty great until Millar left. After that, it seemed to turn more and more into what bores me about the regular FF. I don't know if I'd say it was bad, but it definitely wasn't my thing.

Ultimate Spider-Man maintained the highest level of quality for the longest time out of all the Ultimate books, but I agree that the relaunch seems like a great jumping-off point.

Actually, I guess I don't think any of them are terrible comics per se, but they all seemed to lose the daring, innovative spirit that they started with. The problem with them is that if they fall short of being outstanding, there's not much reason to read them, rather than sticking to the regular Marvel Universe books. The really ironic thing is that adding a reboot to the Ultimate line just makes them more convoluted, not less. Just ask DC.

 

[SPINMASTER X]

. The writers and artists that came on the book

eww who wants to read a book after that?

 

[Comrade Porn King Mikhail]

I think that in the end the entire Marvel universe can be viewed as one giant clusterfuck of soap opera rehashing. I don't care what new writers or artists take over every couple of years, they all want to reinvent the characters in their image and rewrite old stories. It gets tiresome of seeing Phoenix die and be reborn a dozen times. Another visit from Apocalypse or some other world ending threat? Great, where do I plunk down my $3/issue for a total of about $25-50 a month.

There are very few independent quality comics that aspire to tell a progressive contunious story meant to last a lifetime like Cerebus. I was hoping that with Ultimate Marvel they would finally create a fresh batch of characters who would be able to age/die/progress, but the universe seems to be stalling.

Comics are a great medium for indulging in one's fantasies and enjoying b/w ink art. But once you get past that, you realize that it's mainly a tired medium for teenage males with sub-par storytelling and no lasting intellectual appeal. And that's a real downer considering how much could be done given a proper handling of the main characters. The best run of X-Men was the 10+ years Claremont worked on it simply because he was given the reigns for a long enough period of time.

And can someone please explain to me why Marvel makes shit movies like X3, Origins, Ghost Rider, Hulk, etc, but can't come to their senses and make a Days of Future Past movie with CGI Sentinels taking over the Earth? I mean for crying out loud give us a good movie other than Iron Man!

Sincerely,

Mikhail

 

[OrochiEddie]

I think anyone praising the Ultimate line must have stopped reading them a few years back and doesn't realize what they've become.

As far as Ultimate X-Men goes, I thought the first 5 issues were really promising, but issue 6 killed it. Big, bland disappointment. The second arc was okay. After that, no interest. The writers and artists that came on the book after that seemed to forget that the characters were young, and not the adult characters that have been around for decades in the regular MU books. Mired in mediocrity.

I thought Ultimate FF was pretty great until Millar left. After that, it seemed to turn more and more into what bores me about the regular FF. I don't know if I'd say it was bad, but it definitely wasn't my thing.

Ultimate Spider-Man maintained the highest level of quality for the longest time out of all the Ultimate books, but I agree that the relaunch seems like a great jumping-off point.

Actually, I guess I don't think any of them are terrible comics per se, but they all seemed to lose the daring, innovative spirit that they started with. The problem with them is that if they fall short of being outstanding, there's not much reason to read them, rather than sticking to the regular Marvel Universe books. The really ironic thing is that adding a reboot to the Ultimate line just makes them more convoluted, not less. Just ask DC.

Fair enough. I just have support for the ultimate series because they're daring enough to just keep hacking away characters and have little chance of them coming back.

Mikhail is 100% right. Marvel is just a fucking mess and handing over the same series to different writers just kills and sense of continuity. I think the heroes in comics need to retire. They should each give them one last run and say "no, they're done" but sales figures wouldn't allow it.

I think my biggest annoyance with that is when I compare comics to manga. To be fair, most manga is wretched and fill with weird Japanese cliches and lots of predictive plots. However there are some that shine through, and when they do it is amazing because they have one main writer, so much story, and then that is it. They're done, no more. This is why I dislike comics, they don't know when to stop something.

No one is a bigger victim of this in the marvel universe than Wolverine, poor guy has been raped and reused so much it isn't even funny. So many writers have come and fucked him left and right, frankly I feel sorry for the person who created him because he has to see his creation (which was a pretty cool character) be fucked harder than a George Lucas creation....fuck that.

 

[genjiglove]

Fair enough. I just have support for the ultimate series because they're daring enough to just keep hacking away characters and have little chance of them coming back.

They do bring people back though. Beast was killed and revived in Ultimate.

 

[Soniku]

Man I didn't think I'd spark so much conversation, I should've known better.

Thanks for all the responses.

I didn't realize what a cluster-fuck the whole Marvel universe is. I knew it was bad, but not this bad...

Sounds like the Essential collection is the best way to go, but they're in black and white.

New X-Men looks interesting too, but it's new and not old, so I'll probably wait on that.

Maybe I'll just watch the original cartoon series...

HERE IS WHERE YOU START.

Go to wikipedia. Read the articles that summarize the x-men story arcs up until the current arcs then pick up the latest comic. That's what I do.

What I just told you is exactly what I did. I was in Iraq when I got hooked on Comics and Wikipedia saved my life. Once I got back from Iraq I bought comics by the dozens and am still buying them.

I would do that, but I just wouldn't feel right without having actually read all the comics leading up to the current stuff. I totally know where you're coming from, but that's just not the way for me.

 

[Lagduf]

And don't even get me started on Ultimates 3... The first two series are some of the best comics ever (literally), but that's easily one of the worst.

Ultimates 3

What went wrong?

I read a little bit of Ultimate X-Men and enjoyed it. Not much though, maybe just the first three arcs? One with magneto, one with uh someone else, and then magneto reappearing?

I think there was a crossover with the Ultimates as well.

But I didn't read anything else from the series (based on what my friend reccomended.)

 

[HeartlessNinny]

Ultimates 3

What went wrong?

Man, I remember when Jeph Loeb wrote some awesome comics. Now... Well. Not so much.