Marauders was one of the most surprising books to come out of the Hickman relaunch of the X-line and found its way into the hearts of many readers. It was the most traditional superhero book within the X-office at the time, yet Kate Pryde and Emma Frost’s team took on the moniker of a murderous group of villains from the X-Men’s past. It soon made sense why they took on the Marauders title, and with a lighthearted, team-oriented, swashbuckling tone, the book went on the be a success.
When most X-titles were relaunched in 2022, Marauders got a retooling with Steve Orlando taking over as writer and throwing the team off the high seas and into space. While the narrative was convoluted and difficult to grasp, this final collection of issues from this era of the book is plenty of fun and full of colorful moments to satisfy Marauders fans.
Collecting Marauders #6-12 and the X-Men: Before the Fall – Sons of X one-shot, this book closes out this iteration of the series. I had high hopes for this book upon its relaunch, especially since Gerry Duggan’s run was one of my favorites within that X-line. Even if you failed to pick up the first Marauders trade from Steve Orlando’s run, issue #7 starts a new arc for this book and is a great jumping-on point. Orlando seems to have thrown every cosmic idea he had at the wall with this run: we have Celestial judgment, time travel to save a mutant civilization, and a crossover with X-Men 2099 to boot! There are lots of fun ideas, with the core cast of characters thrown into the expected personal conflict and melodrama, with an ample amount of fan-service thrown in for hardcore fans.
While the reverence of Marvel lore can be appreciated by committed readers to the X-line, many of the plot essentials will be hard to decipher for more casual readers. Orlando seems at his best when he is giving his characters fun moments to interact around, but they get lost in the overall narrative which is hard to grasp in its entirety. I found myself having to backtrack more than once to see if I missed a key plot point that would explain my lack of understanding at a particular moment.
Eleonora Carlini, who handles most of the art in this book, is known for her vibrant, anime-inspired style, and I find it matches Orlando’s script and tone for the book quite nicely. You can’t go more than page without a hyper volatile, Super Saiyan-like explosion of energy, which was engaging to look at. Where this comic suffers is in the application of backgrounds, which seem to have been an afterthought, with many scenes going without them entirely or having them feel like they character in the foreground are poorly transposed on top. This animated style of comic storytelling isn’t for everyone, but in a tale about space travel, Celestials, and crossovers with the X-Men from 2099, it feels fitting.
Marvel went all out when it came to variant covers for this title, with so many created that a majority are only given quarter page reproductions at the end of the book. That’s unfortunate, but understandable consider the vast number constructed.
There have been some home runs and some misses within the X-line since the relaunch following House of X, and Marauders sits comfortably between those two ends of the spectrum. There are some very fun, animated moments and reverence for the lore of the Marvel universe present in this trade, but it does veer towards convoluted plotting as it tries to navigate the narrative. Fans of Kate Pryde and her swashbuckling team of space pirates will enjoy the conclusion to this iteration of the Marauders, but it may be a difficult read for the uninitiated.
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