Submit Your Own Review

 Every few years the major two comic book houses DC and Marvel like to do some spring-cleaning. Often this tidying up comes in the form of a major event that changes the respective universes, including all the respective characters and titles. This past year Marvel staged the dramatic House of M arc, which had, as expected, drastic repercussions for all involved. This was especially true of the mutant population within Marvel’s universe. To be truthful I’ve never been a huge Marvel fan but the compellingly large and significant events contained within the House of M storyline was sufficient to entice me into spending a nice chunk of change on several of the House of M trade paperbacks, notably; the main House of M storyline, House of M: Spiderman, House of M: Hulk, House of M: Wolverine and a general House of M title that encompassed Black Panther, Storm, Captain America, The Pulse and more Wolverine.   

Over the next few weeks I will be reviewing these titles in an attempt to decide how successful this latest shake-up has been, beginning here with the main House of M storyline.

As a kid growing up there were only two main comic book characters that I paid attention to, Batman and Wolverine. Through the fantastic original X-Men cartoon there was a constant supply of Wolverine, and by extension X-Men, related action. This of course lead me to the comics, where I quickly became absorbed with some of the best ever X-Men storylines, particularly the Dark Phoenix arc. The significant number of characters that began to make up the X-Men world always troubled me a little because, Wolverine aside, they weren’t always that appealing or inventive. Eventually this became the reason my interest in the X-Men waned. It was with some surprise then that when I did pick up House of M, most of the main X-Men characters I had always associated as ‘the X-Men,’ were involved. Call me stuck-in-my-ways but Olivier Coipel’s clear lines and classic costumes of the icons really appeal to me and took me back to why I used to enjoy the X-Men. Any trepidation I had about picking up a Marvel title after so long was quickly dispelled both by the fantastic line-up and a storyline that, although involving ‘alternate worlds’, was nowhere near as ludicrous as DC’s epic crossover event Infinite Crisis.

In the recent Avengers Disassembled crossover, Wanda Maximoff, also known as the Scarlet Witch and married to Vision, a fellow Avenger, lost control of her sanity and resultantly her vast, reality-altering powers due to the deaths of the couple’s twins. As a result of her instability a series of events occurred leading to the deaths of Avengers members Scott Lang, Hawkeye and her own husband Vision. Eventually Wanda fell into a coma battling Doctor Strange, leaving behind her a trail of devastation and destruction. Magneto intervened before judgement could be passed on his daughter, carrying her off to the decaying rubble of Genosha. There Magneto asked Charles Xavier to help save his daughter, but after six months of trying the professor could not prevent Wanda becoming worse. Fearing what could happen to the very fabric of reality were Wanda to regress beyond his control, Xavier flew to the Avengers building to call a meeting of some of the most powerful heroes in the Marvel Universe, and decide Wanda’s fate. So begins the House of M storyline.

Whatever the exact nature and definition of ‘Epic’, media labelled with this tag has always done well. It is probably for this reason that the big two shake up their universes every couple of years. House of M is a compelling storyline because it immediately encompasses many of the major names within the Marvel Universe. The first ten pages alone holds a great double-page panel of The Avengers and other famous characters, who then sit around a table arguing with the X-Men over Wanda’s fate. The varying methods of how the teams want to deal with the issue present themselves; the scarred but still loyal Avengers who want to take their time and the X-Men who want to solve the threat before it grows beyond them. In this comparison there is evidence that the writers wanted to play out the storyline with more antagonism and friction than eventually occurs. However the scale of the storyline and it’s need for progression prevents House of M from being an intriguing look at the clash of ideologies between two super-teams. Safe in the Avengers building there is little doubt that the two groups can resolve their differences to forge forward with a plan – they are after all heroes, but like a great ensemble disaster movie, House of M doesn’t give these characters the chance, instead raising the stakes beyond anything they could have imagined.

I’ve always wondered why any super team would allow children of their former enemies to join them, this is doubly true of the Avengers. Having both the Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver, Wanda and Pietro Maximoff, as team mates was always going to cause problems, with Pietro at the meeting Xavier called to decide the fate of his sister, this was never more obvious. Pietro rushes to Genosha once he realises what must happen and, after an unsuccessful plea to his father to save Wanda, convinces Wanda that she can create the perfect world where everyone is happy. In doing so she creates the titular House of M, short for Magnus, and the ascendancy of the mutant race with their father as leader. Nothing though is perfect, and Wolverine remembers his former life before reality was subverted by Wanda. Falling in with Luke Cage a.k.a. Power Man, Iron Fist, Cloak, Hawkeye and several human ‘terrorists’, Wolverine discovers that no one remembers the world that was, except for a young girl with Cage’s group who coincidentally remembers everything and is the key to the plot.

The girl, called Layla, has the ability to make people remember their lives before the change, so Wolverine and Cage’s group use her to ‘round up the gang’ – causing several of them major anguish, particularly Spiderman, as their new lives literally were the ones they dreamed of – and go in search of Wanda and Pietro. The final section is the pay-off for the slow build-up, the House of M and the newly revived heroes throw down in a large-scale battle that ends with Magneto learning the truth and killing Pietro. Wanda completely snaps at her brother’s death, accusing her father of creating all the suffering in his quest for mutant superiority, it ends with Wanda issuing the chilling words ‘No more mutants’ before once again changing reality.  There are a few pages that deal with the aftermath of Wanda’s actions, including the X-Men facing a powerless Magneto who cares nothing about his life or whether they take it. Xavier is nowhere in sight, as he hasn’t been throughout the two changes in reality, and the final panels suggest an ominous event still to occur.

Overall I found the central House of M storyline very enjoyable. The artwork is great and although the writing is a touch slow, the tome is quite thick offering good value for money. There is so much going on, with little nods toward the new realities of the various characters, that it takes a second reading to appreciate what it means for the Marvel universe as a whole and for each character. The premise is solid if a little familiar and sets up the Decimation storyline intriguingly.          

Owen Jones © 2006