Gail Simone and Javier Garron’s Uncanny X-Men #6 launches itself into a new arc, one that feels more like the early stages of the book Simone was setting up from the get-go. The new X-kids are past the introductory phase and settling into the book as mainstays and the X-Men seem to be launching into some larger, deeper character-based exploration arcs.
Learning more about the new X-kids is the biggest draw for me as we read Uncanny X-Men, and issue #6 starts us off with a Calico-based issue, putting her at the forefront. Despite the focus on Calico, it’s Ransom who walked away with the best moments, and it was Ransom who I left this issue wanting to read more of. Ransom’s moral compass and steadfast desire to help others made him a quick favorite and stand-out character of the bunch and I can’t wait to read more of him.
For Calico, the look into her early years is the most interesting piece. Her internalized self-hatred stemming from her mother is the angle that makes her most interesting despite her being the X-kid I was least drawn to from the start. Analyzing that self-hatred angle, how parents can drill that into their children, and how children finding community can help them rise above it and achieve self-acceptance is an interesting angle for Calico and the best choice to take this character. Fortunately, that does seem like the angle Simone is going for with her.
The new Louisiana-based school is an interesting new setting for the kids that I’m intrigued to know more about since we’ve never had this backdrop before. The X-Men themselves have their best moments when they focus on their relationships with each other and their desire to help the new kids, but some of the ways they speak and interact with each other still feel noticeably off. There’s a formality with which they speak to each other, whether it’s calling Jubilee “Jubilation” or Rogue “Anna Marie” that feels stiff and a way in which they talk to each other that feels equally stiff at times. Like Kurt talking about fatherhood isn’t anything new for the character, but the conversation seems like the idea is that it’s first time he has spoken about that with Jubilee. Kurt finding the truth about his parentage and that the father he loathed isn’t actually his father would have been the more exciting route for that conversation to take place, especially since he would undoubtedly be rethinking some of his conceptions about fatherhood as a result. But that sense of continuity and evolution in the characters’ stories doesn’t seem to take place yet.
Simone certainly has signed herself up for some lofty goals in terms of longer-term character exploration, particularly with Rogue and internalized shame through her dialect lessons and in this issue, Logan with his PTSD. Judging by her work on previous titles like Birds of Prey, this long-term character study is a goal I know she’s capable of, but I wonder if the medium would let her tackle in the current era. Titles certainly don’t last as long as they did when Birds was being published, but I wish her the best in her opportunity to tackle these concepts. Long-term, character-focused arcs like that are one of many draws to comics when the characters have decades of stories to build off of and it’d be nice to see that kind of character-building take place with such beloved characters.
All in all, Uncanny X-Men is shaping into the title it seems Simone planned for now with the introductory arc out of the way and Garron steps in as the artist in this new phase of the book. The X-kids are still the biggest draw of the book and I am interested to learn more about Ransom, Jitter, and Deathdream in particular.
