X-Treme X-Men: God Loves, Man Kills II (X-Treme X-Men)

Rating:
Summary: Poorly written, and the artwork is even worse.
Review: Having reaches his creative peak in 1983, Claremont's second run on UNCANNY was very dissapointing, after his inspired initial run. His first two or three arcs on X-TREME were all right, and Salvador Larroca's artwork was beatiful.

"GOD LOVES MAN KILLS 2" is where X-TREME "jumps the shark," so to speak. This is a very poorly written story. I had high expentations fo this one, considering that Reverend Stryker had been absent since his debut in "GOD LOVES MAN KILLS," which was inspired.

This story serves as little more than a movie tie-in. In it, we encounter Stryker, who's suddenly very close with Lady Deathstrike's family; meanwhile (this part may give away something of its incredibly contrived plot) a robot by the name of Reverend Paul who's doing something fairly devious that ultimately comes to nothing.

Meanwhile, the team runs around accomplishing very little.

Not worth reading.

Not worth looking at, either. Salvador Larroca'scovers are beatiful, but the only purpose they serve is to cover up the crap inside. Kordey claims that they love him in Europe, but I haven't seen any evidence of that. As it is, he regards himself as a visionary because he's made the characters ugly. I'm not convinced that this was intentional.

Really, don't touch this.

Rating:
Summary: One of the better X-Treme X-Men books
Review: Many comic fans have been disappointed with legendary X-Men writer Chris Claremont's run on X-Treme X-Men, but this sequel/remake of his classic X-Men storyline is definitely one of the better story-arcs he's thought of of late. William Stryker, the televangilist who almost wiped out mutantkind years ago, has escaped his confines with the help of his new ally Lady Deathstrike, and he has bigger plans for mutantkind this time around, and he is manipulating Shadowcat as well. On his trail are Storm, Wolverine, Bishop, Sage, and Cannonball as the plot thickens and twists are revealed. The story, even though it is nowhere as profound as the original, is solid Claremont style storytelling. Shadowcat has always been one of the best characters that Claremont has ever written, and in this story we get inside her head as Stryker tries to use her to his advantage. The art by Igor Kordey (New X-Men, Cable) is solid as well, even if he tries to hard to draw Wolverine like Hugh Jackman. The real attraction of this book however, is that the original, and now out of print, God Loves, Man Kills story is included here as well as we see Stryker make his first strike at Professor X and his X-Men (which then included Cyclops, Storm, Wolverine, Colossus, Shadowcat, and Nightcrawler). This story is the story that inspired the superb X2: X-Men United film, and this book is worth picking up for the original story alone.

Rating:
Summary: Another contender for the no star award...
Review: There was a time when I loved Chris Claremont's stuff. Fall of the Mutants, Mutant Massacre, any tale he told of the Hellfire Club, Dark Phoenix...I could go on, but I won't.

Why? Because this interminable, derivative crapfest, as written by Claremont, shows that he's ready to retire. He's obviously out of fresh ideas. Hell, he's ripping his own old stuff off, and badly! And I agree with the other reviewer about Igor Kordey. He should be arrested for gratuitous abuses with a pencil. His illustrations look like he took art lessons at the Braille school. They're not even illustrations, or drawing, even. "Pick-choors" maybe, if you're from Alabama (no offense, go Tide!)

How can someone who gave the X-men his best care so little about them now. It's like catching up with a couple who were passionate after the nuptuals, but can't stand to touch each other while they sleep years later. And the X-men have definitely started sleeping in the spare room...