Review: ‘Exceptional X-Men’ #1 Almost Lives Up To The Title

The last of X-Men From The Ashes’ flagship titles has now hit stands. So how does Exceptional X-Men live up to the rest of the line?

Eve Ewing, Carmen Carnero, Nolan Woodard, and Joe Sabino fit the last major piece of the line into place.

Kate Pryde is defeated. Everything she fought for on Krakoa is dead and gone. And she’s been fighting since she was a young girl. Now, she’s settled into a quiet life bartending and living with one of her best childhood friends. When a random encounter with a young mutant turns violent, Kate Pryde is thrust back into the middle of the life she thought she left behind. Which might be exactly what she needs.

Of the other From the Ashes titles that launched, NYX was the strongest in part because it felt like it was engaging with the history of the franchise, particularly the Krakoa years. Ewing does the same here. It’s through such a specific lens that it elevates the debut even more. 

In this case, by using Kitty, one of the franchise’s best and most well rounded characters, Ewing creates a world that feels incredibly human and deeply human, but also completely fantastic. The issue’s action sequence is entirely based around Kitty protecting and defending a life, not just a hollow batch of punching pages. It’s thoughtful, deep and extremely engaging, but all the work that Ewing did on getting us into Kitty’s headspace — panic attack and all — which Sabino brings to life in both the captions and dialogue.

Carnero’s art absolutely elevates this. Her Kitty is fantastically relatable. We’ve all had moments with the slumped shoulders, the deep breaths, slumping to the couch completely done with the world. But then, she makes the fantastic leap off the page, as we meet the first of the new kids: Bronze. 

Her power manifestation is a wonderfully executed splash page that makes you care about Bronze right away. The action sequence that follows works because of how Carnero plays with POV, choreographs the run through Chicago, and ultimately ends with the catharsis of Kate and Bronze escaping. The whole issue clicks because of what Carnero does with the linework.

Woodard adds so much to this issue by largely making everything feel so ordinary. The world around Kitty isn’t drab, but it’s normal, mundane… until Bronze appears. Suddenly, the colors are bright, the world is focused on them, and Bronze and Kitty pop off the page, as he surrounds them with bright lights and colors.

Where the issue does fall short is some weird narrative choices. Kate deciding to go by Kitty is almost a wink at the reader that everything is being undone. And the most anti-mutant hate comes from Black men, which feels weird and ill-conceived at best. It’s almost like Ewing was trying to make a point about hate but failed to.

Exceptional X-Men #1 is available now from Marvel Comics.