New X-Men: Academy X #1

May 16, 2004

Quick Rating: Very Good
Title: Here is the House (Choosing Sides Part One)

It’s the first day of school for Xavier’s newest students – time for the grand tour!

Writers: Nunzio DeFilippis & Christina Weir
Pencils: Randy Green
Inks: Rick Ketcham
Colors: Pete Pantazis
Letters: Dave Sharpe
Editor: Mike Marts
Cover Art: Randy Green
Publisher: Marvel Comics

Out of all of the “Reload” comics coming out this month, this is the one I find I’m frustrated by – mostly because I hadn’t really intended to pick it up, but this first issue is really very good. Picking up where the second volume of New Mutants left off, Cyclops and Emma Frost take a new group of students on a tour of the school as a group of them try to find a place to fit in.

Not having read any issues of the previous series, I really don’t know which (if any) characters have carried over, but I do find that I like several of the characters we meet this issue. Noriko Ashida is our viewpoint character, the standard “mutant with uncontrollable powers,” forced to keep her electrical abilities in check with special gauntlets. It places her in a role similar to Cyclops and Rogue, unable to control their abilities and therefore walling themselves off to a degree. David Alleyne, whose limited telepathic ability allows him to copy the skills and knowledge of people nearby, comes across as the leader of the team we meet here. He also, like several of the characters, has a pretty original take on a fairly standard mutant power. He’s also somebody who probably has to take his tests in a separate room to make sure he’s being honest.

Randy Green’s artwork is a great match for this book. He has a handle on the young characters and renders the older ones in a style that meshes with their world. Even Cyclops’s new costume, which I’m not wild about, looks a lot better in this book than it has elsewhere.

As big a fan as I was of Grant Morrison’s run, the title New X-Men seems to apply to this book much more than it ever did with him. So blast it all, looks like there’s another X-title I’m going to be keeping an eye on, because with this issue out of the way, I really like these characters and really want to see where this story goes.

Rating: 8/10