'Season 10' comics

[lyryk.livejournal.com]

Thought I'd do a bit of a review for the official comics. Haven't seen any reviews on LJ and don't really know what you all think of them, but this was my initial reaction to reading the first one. There are spoilers for the whole series below.

Issue #1 is called "Believers" (Part 1 of 5) and starts with a 'teaser', much as any episode would do. The story is by Joe Harris and Chris Carter, and CC is also credited as the 'executive producer'.



The first page has a 'recap' that starts with Previously on The X-Files...



I'm sure I'm not the only one who thinks the "Mulder the believer" and "Scully the skeptic" description is overly simplistic, but anyway. Moving on.

The 'teaser' shows us a woman being chased in an alley. We can't see her face yet, but we know who she is, if only from the colour of her hair. And her outfit. And the cross she's wearing around her neck. Way to keep up the suspense, guys.



Post-teaser, we move on to an "earlier that day" scene, which starts with Scully attending in the hospital to a little girl named Emily (!). The child's mother is Mrs Van de Kamp (!!). (Never having been invested in the William storyline, I wasn't overly excited by the way in which this story seemed to be heading, but I guess it was nice that an effort was being made to start off 'Season 10' where the series left off.)

Mulder's introduction is much like Scully's, in the sense that we don't see his face in the first few frames.



Shortly thereafter, an old friend drops in. (I have to admit I really enjoyed Mulder's quips, and their voices all seem spot-on. There are also a couple of references to The Magician. Yay continuity.)



Oh, and here's Mulder writing a book. Love the poster.



Things progress rapidly from there, action-wise. Mulder gets an SOS call from Deputy Director Skinner (who'd warned them earlier about something William-related), and a creepily-possessed-or-something Emily greets Scully when she gets home. Scully lands up in the alley being chased by Emily and some shadowy figures.



And there ends issue 1. I read a review that said that the blue light and stuff in this sequence is really impressive, but I didn't really feel it. Not being much of a comics reader, I read a comic like a book; the dialogues are good, and it's nice to see these familiar faces, but the action sequences are a bit lost on me.

In conclusion: I do kind of like the idea of the comics. 'Season 10' also features the Gunmen and Krycek, which ought to be fun. I have the first ten comics in digital format, and would be happy to share if anyone wants them.

Comments

[wendelah1]

I am not usually one for sharing of media but in this case I will make an exception. I did try to buy these as they were released in paper format. If they ever come out with a collection in book format I would buy that because I'm a completeist.

I was not impressed with either the story for the first issue or the artwork, but I'm not a comics reader. After the first one, I read spoilers online for the upcoming issues that made me unlikely to purchase for any reason other than that I own everything else. Frankly, it sounded like bad fanfic.

[lyryk.livejournal.com]

They seem to be available in book format on Amazon. I think they're in separate volumes though.

[wendelah1]

Oh, cool. I'll look for them there.

[mosinging1986.livejournal.com]

Says "access denied".

[lyryk.livejournal.com]

Sorry! The images were set to friends-only. Thanks for letting me know - you should be able to see them now.

[mosinging1986.livejournal.com]

Thanks.

I'd heard of these, but I hadn't seen them anywhere. I'm not a comics reader either, but I quite enjoyed this. The dialogue did seem like them!

[souldreamx.livejournal.com]

I've been really enjoying Season 10 so far. I think just being able to look forward to new, canon-ish X-Files stories every month has been a real treat over the past year or so. At first I was going to try to hold out for the collected volumes, but I've since started making monthly trips to the comic book store near where I work so I can get them right after they come out, which is something I'd never really done before (I do occassionally read comics, but mostly just in collections I buy off of Amazon or something). Now I get into discussions with the comic shop owner about Gillian Anderson. LOL.

I think my favorite part of the comics is the dialogue. All of the characters speak in a way where I can hear the actors saying the lines in my head. I actually bought the scripts for the two five-part mythology arcs (issues 1-5 and issues 11-15) from Joe Harris' Etsy page after reading the script in the Director's Cut version of the first issue. I like how it gives you some additional insight on character motivations, just like reading the script for an episode of the show.

The comic has cycled through a few different artists at this point, but I think my favorite is the guy who did the most recent 5-part mythology arc. I hope he sticks around. (And speaking of that story arc, that's the one that had me impatiently waiting for each new issue all summer!)

I'm still not sure how I feel about bringing back all of these dead characters, though. I'm super cool with the Lone Gunmen faking their deaths, because it's something they would do, and I hated that they were killed off in the first place. With everybody else, though... well, I think I'll have to withhold judgement until what's going on is a little better explained, which I'm hoping will be in the next mytharc. I do, however, selfishly enjoy having Krycek back, because I do love me some Krycek. :) I'm also really hoping that the head of the new syndicate is who they seem to be implying that it is, because that'd be pretty interesting.

As for the collected volumes, they're collecting them in 5-issue sets. The first volume is the first 5-part mytharc. Then the 2nd volume is made up of five 1 or 2-part MOTW and character driven issues (with the character-driven stuff tying into the mythology). Then the 3rd volume, which I think is due out next month, will be the next 5-part mythology story. For the next set, it's going to be a 2-part MOTW, which will help to spin off the upcoming Millennium comic miniseries, a character-driven issue to find out what happened to a couple of characters who have been MIA since the first story arc, and then another 2-part story (which has been hinted at containing Fowley flashbacks, interestingly enough). Then after that, another mythology arc is planned.

And then there's supposed to be a Christmas special, so that should be... interesting. Heh. :)


But yeah, I've been getting super into Season 10, so if anyone ever wants to discuss it, hit me up. (Also, if anyone knows of any fanfic based on the comics, please let me know. Especially anything that addresses what happened between issues 13 and 14. *cough*)

[rustingwillpowr.livejournal.com]

When I read #14, I thought it was doing that thing where it starts in the middle of the story and then goes back to the beginning and fills in what you missed...and then it didn't go back and fill in. ha ha

As much as I love MotW type stuff, I have liked the pacing of the 5-parters.

At first, I didn't like that they were relying so much on bringing back dead characters (excluding the Gunmen, of course), but now I'm kinda interested to see what happens. (I honestly have no clue what's going on half the time, though.)

I'm very scared of the Christmas special. lol

[souldreamx.livejournal.com]

Heh, yeah, I was wondering if they were going to go back and fill that in when I first started the issue. Since they didn't, it left it up to the imagination, which is probably even more disturbing than anything they actually could have shown on paper. I'm still hoping they eventually address the emotional repercussions of that beyond Mulder and Scully seeming slightly despondent in issue 15.

I agree about the pacing in the 5-parters. They always leave me really excited for the next issue, even more than the 2-parters seem to.

The description of the Christmas special sounds like the start of some terrible fanfic, but depending on what they do with it, it could be fun. Harris has been mentioning that he's wanted to try his hand at humor in the X-Files, so it could be interesting if they go that route with it.

[rustingwillpowr.livejournal.com]

Great post!

I wasn't too impressed with the first issue. The art was pretty rough in places, although I think Michael Walsh improved a lot over his run, and I started to really like his inks. My biggest complaint has been (and continues to be) with the flat coloring, but I seem to be the only person who doesn't like it. I don't like Matthew Dow Smith's art quite as much as Walsh's, but it is decent. I think my favorite artist was the one who did "Chitter".

I think overall the series is improving and starting to find its footing, so I'll keep reading for now.

EatTheCorn.com has some good reviews for anyone who isn't into comics, but would still like to keep up with the story a bit. I actually read the reviews to help understand the mythology stuff...not that I ever understand the mythology stuff. lol

[souldreamx.livejournal.com]

I really came to appreciate the expressiveness of Michael Walsh's art, though Matthew Dow Smith's art might be a little more consistent and on model. The art in "Chitter" was good, but probably because it was largely taken directly from stills from the show. That made it really on model, but I found it distracting because I recognized the exact shots that a lot of the drawings were taken from. I can't really fault Greg Scott from drawing directly from screenshots, since I know how hard it is to get a real person's likeness down (hell, I do it myself when drawing all the time), and honestly, it's probably not noticeable to those who haven't watched some of these episodes dozens of times. But I do wish he tried a little harder to at least make the art more consistent. Scully's hairstyle kept changing from panel to panel, heh.

The flat colors kind of bothered me at first, but I think I've kind of gotten used to it. I noticed there's a different colorist for the current "Immaculate" storyline, though. I wonder if she's going to be sticking around.