As if my day wasn’t hectic enough already, I’ve decided to take my morning tea break to review comics, sigh…

Up for review: X-Men Legacy #213
writer: Mike Carey
penciler: Scot Eaton

This issue is several issues into an ongoing story arc, so I will try to review it without revealing too much plot, which may turn out to be a little difficult After Xavier got shot in the head at the end of Messiah Complex, his brain was repaired by Exodus, but he is now missing large chunks of memory. Xavier has been trying to trace his history, and the history of the X-Men, and is trying to rebuild memories of his past using other people’s minds. With the aid of Gambit he has now hit the road, to investigate his complicated past. Some of his memories include things not before revealed to the reader from Xavier’s childhood. Namely, how he, Sebastian Shaw, Cain Marko, and Carter Ryking were placed in a testing facility by their parents when they were very young. It seems that their parents were carriers of the latent X-gene, and a geneticist by the name of Nathan Milbury wanted to see what effect having two X-Gene carriers as parents would have on a child.

It was revealed to the reader in a recent issue that Nathan Milbury was really Mr. Sinister in disguise, and he had had contact with Xavier and the others from their early childhood, knowing that they would manifest mutant powers, and wanting to utilize those powers for his own nefarious schemes. In the recent issues we have seen a psychic attack fended off by Juggernaut, and Carter Ryking dropped down dead after a similar attack, and now it seems an attack is being launched against Xavier. In this issue another player enters the field with the aim of assassinating Xavier, and Sebastian Shaw. The plot from then on is rather revelatory, and there is a bit of a surprise at the end, so I won’t ruin it for you.

Mike Carey is writing one of the best X-Men stories I have read in years here, it is a really nice introspective character study of Xavier. It looks back at the many events, and mistakes he has made in his life as leader of the X-Men, and seems to be leading him down a road to redemption by having him rebuilding himself without the sins of his past. Mike Carey has also demonstrated how to do the perfect retcon here. Now, I now retcon is a dirty word, but I am not saying he has gone back and changed X-Men history. He has gone back and inserted retroactive continuity in the interstices between known stories. He has then used this continuity to feed fresh and original plots for future issues, and also shed new light on past events. I can’t quite describe how much I am liking this book. It is head and shoulders above the other X-books, most of which are already very good at the moment. Mr. Carey also seems to be releasing these on a ridiculously frequent schedule, I am sure that less than a month passes between issue

Grade: 9 out of 10 - if you haven’t been reading it grab some back-issues, or get the trade, now is probably not a great jumping on point.

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