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Comic Corner: X-Factor #15

Dafna Pleban (Contact)
Published: Friday, February 2, 2007

X-Factor #15

By Peter David and Pablo Raimondi

MARVEL COMICS

Despite consisting only of still illustrations and dialogue bubbles, Peter David’s “X-Factor” manages to bring just the right amount of television sensibility to what could have just been yet another Marvel comic starting with “X.” A veteran writer of television, David finally seems to be telling the cinematic stories he always wanted without being crippled by an effects budget or the limited viewership of a cult audience. “X-Factor” is a graphic meld of deliciously pulpy violence with a startlingly honest look at ordinary people in extraordinary situations.

Dealing with the aftereffects of last summer’s “House of M,” where 99 percent of Marvel’s mutants found themselves powerless and vulnerable, “X-Factor” follows a group of the few mutants that managed to keep their powers and their efforts to protect and help those who can no longer help themselves. Unlike many books beginning with “X,” David doesn’t let “X-Factor” devolve into a series of meaningless crossovers and fight scenes. The characters each have their own personal agendas, intrinsically tied to who they are and not whatever massive company event is going on this month. By taking advantage of these interior landscapes, what once might have been considered yet another tired reheated team book becomes something fresh and interesting.

The leader of the team is Jamie Madrox. His ability: to split into copies of himself at the slightest touch, each an equally diverse shard of his personality. In the past couple of issues, Madrox has been hunting down his copies, many of whom have gone on to live separate lives of their own.

As the illustrator, Pablo Raimondi accomplishes the seemingly impossible task of not only drawing the same character and his increasingly multiple copies within a single scene, but effectively differentiating them through facial expressions alone, so the reader is never confused.

The last issue saw our hero ambushed by the terrorist organization Hydra, which mistook him for one of his copies. Now, in Hydra’s clutches, Madrox must resist torture long enough to escape. Inventive as ever, David writes an escape that is not only thrilling, but with that slight touch of horror that forces the reader to view Madrox’s once-amusing power in a much darker, disturbing way. David seems to relish in the opportunities the superhero genre affords him, melding the horrific with the absurd while still retaining an unwavering optimism that keeps the books from falling into bland pathos.

And that is where “X-Factor” succeeds most, creating an X-book that isn’t afraid of crossing the boundary when it comes to the ethical and moral lives of its heroes. “X-Factor” is mature not because of excessive cursing, violence and sex, but because it handles the traditionally black-and-white world of superheroes in the nuanced strokes of a brush dipped in gray.