(Graphic Novel with art by Ramon Bachs and John Lucas)

The second book of the Decimation series in which the world deals with events of M-Day, when 99% of the worlds' mutants lost their powers.  This book follows reporter Sally Floyd as she tries to tell the stories of these depowered mutants.  Rather than just being a mouthpiece for a commentary, Sally is an interesting character herself.  When we first meet her she's a divorced alcoholic struggling with the death of her daughter.  However, as the story goes on Sally crusades for the suffering mutant masses and eventually reveals the full, and genuinely horrific, story of her daughter's death.  Added to this, Sally is being stalked by a homocidal maniac determined to kill the last remaining mutants.  This is a brilliant story about the personal effects of loss (be it powers or a child) and is made all the better by giving us a chance to see the effects of M-Day on some of the minor X-characters, such as the Blob, Chamber, the Morlocks and Moonstar.

5 out of 5

 

Civil War: Front Line Book 1

(Graphic Novel with art by Ramon Bachs, John Lucas, Steve Lieber, Leandro Fernandez, Lee Weeks, Rob Campanella, Sandu Florea, Nelson, Kei Kobayashi, Kano, David Aja, Sean Chen, Rick Magyar, Roy Allen Martinez and Jorge Lucas)

A tie-in to Mark Millar's 'Civil War', in which the Superhuman Registration Act divides the Marvel universe in two (figuratively speaking).  This book has four main, but completely independent story threads running through it.  The first follows the two reporters Ben Urich and Sally Floyd who, despite being good friends, stand on opposite sides of the debate over registration.  This storyline is the book's strongest factor with both reporters trying to uncover the hidden truths behind the Civil War and not afraid to tread on a few toes to do it.  Sally Floyd continues to be as interesting and well-developed character as she was in 'Generation M'.  The second main story thread is nearly as good; featuring the de-powered Speedball who becomes the scapegoat for the Stamford Disaster which started the Civil War.  Speedball's story is actually about the nature of blame and responsibility and makes for compelling reading.  The third thread in this book is a series of vignettes which make use of real war poetry to connect real-world wars with the Civil War.  Sadly these vignettes seem to be trying to force poignance when, with a story as good as the Civil War one, we really don't need to be spoonfed.  Also the connections between the real wars and the Civil War are tenuous at bess; for example just because there's a flying superhero combatant doesn't mean he's comparable to WWII Spitfire pilots.  Last, and thankfully least, is a storyline in which Wonder Man investigates an Atlantean double agent.  I've never been keen on Wonder Man as a character and his contribution to this book is largely tedious.  The first two story threads are so strong that they could've carried this book, but because of the way it's been put together, with the four stories all chopped up and jumbled, they're too fractured to really be as good as their potential promises.

3 out of 5

 

Civil War: Front Line Book 2

(Graphic Novel with art by Ramon Bachs, John Lucas, Lee Weeks, Nelson, Steve Lieber, Eduardo Barreto and Frazer Irving)

Directly following on from the first book, this one continues the story threads featured there, although Wonder Man is mercifully written out early on.  As before it is the ongoing investigations and tragic disillusionment of Ben Urich and Sally Floyd which provides this book's best element, although their final confrontation with the architect behind all the shadowy goings-on left me feeling pretty unsatisfied.  Robbie Baldwin's story takes on a much darker tone as we witness his physical and emotional transition from Speedball to his new identity as Penance.  The real war/Civil War comparison pieces are still here too and, once more they fell pretty flat with me.  There was, however, one exception; where Jenkins actually draws on the stories of his own relatives.  This personal touch provided a proper expression of the writer's thoughts on war, even if it did have little to do with the Marvel Universe.  Overall, I wasn't hugely impressed with this book, despite some excellent writing, but I'll admit that at least some of that was based on the fact that it seems to finish by choosing the pro-registration side of the war, where I was a supporter of Captain America and his rebels.

3 out of 5

Check out Brian Michael Bendis' 'House Of M'.

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