Gave up after HickXmen#1 - have these books gotten any better?

[Metal Sphere]

I do not disagree with you at all. I think Apocalypse in Excalibur is a villain, I also (and I get this is an opinion) don't consider him an X-Man, Krakoan =/= X-Man. He's clearly an antagonist to the team and pursuing his own agenda. I would put Sinister and Shaw in the same boat, antagonists like Henry Gyrich, or Loki (depending on his characterization) regularly appearing characters, possibly even main characters but not protagonists. TV has a shitload of these types of characters (1/2 the cast of GoT)

You bring up something interesting: Has there been a distinction made between X-Men versus Krakoan in-universe since the establishment of Krakoa?

But yes, I agree that Apocalypse clearly attempting to steal another dimension's powers and colonizing it for mutants is just him up to the same villainy he's always been responsible for. I'll be more alarmed when I see Emma or Beast or Jean or Jubilee do something on that level. And then I'll look to see how many in their support group call them out on it. As someone said in another thread: Krakoa is very clearly a precarious house of cards, the entertainment value will be in seeing our favorite heroes endure all this and show us why we love rooting for them.

[Yohei72]

This was exactly the thread I needed. I've never followed the X-Men much, but I'm a Hickman fan and was really excited by HoxPox. The flagship X-Men wasn't as exciting, but I knew that was kind of inevitable, so I was going to give it some time. Then I opened up issue 2 and one of the first things I saw was narration text telling me about a massive and vital plot twist over in X-Force. I almost immediately lost interest, since it seemed the line would be so interconnected that I would have to follow other titles by authors who don't interest me, and I had one of those "ugh, comics are so much work" moments I'm sure a lot of us have from time to time. So I dropped it from my pull list, figuring I might check out the TPBs from the library eventually.

But this thread encouraged me to give the flagship a second shot, and to check out X-Force, since it seems to be widely the most popular title, and was ground zero for the aforementioned plot twist. I picked up all the intervening issues of both this week, and really enjoyed them, especially X-Men, whose weird sense of humor is surprising and works really well for me (among other elements). I especially liked #3 - "Hordeculture" are hilarious and I hope they come back quite a bit.

There's no way Hickman can sustain anything like the dazzlement of HoxPox, which was a firehose of jaw-dropping Big Ideas and twists, week after week. But he seems to be settling in to dig in to the deeper storytelling and intellectual possibilities of his new status quo in the way I want and expect from him. The dinner talk in #4 was thrilling (though I'll agree with some other commenters that while Yu draws beautiful images, he doesn't do facial nuance well enough to do justice to all the conversations in this series).

I had also bought #1 of New Mutants, again because of Hickman, but abandoned it after that. I had no idea who most of those characters were, and so their relationships and the story meant little to me, and probably as a consequence, I was kind of bored. I'll probably go the library trade route with that.

So while the X-franchise is not entirely living down its reputation as a daunting thicket of characters and backstory... I'm hanging in there for the moment and enjoying the ride. So, thanks for the help!

[TooFlyToFail]

I assume eventually the plot threads that have been presented in main title will turn into a more straightforward narrative. Like other people have mentioned, Hickman's Avengers run also started with a cououple of set-up stories.

It started with setup for Avengers, but New Avengers was what was actually driving the plot.

*sigh* that book was glorious, start to finish.

[Askani5]

In fairness, the storylines has been mediocre after HoX/PoX aside from X-Force. It’s seems to be the only book that has stakes.

[loke13]

This was exactly the thread I needed. I've never followed the X-Men much, but I'm a Hickman fan and was really excited by HoxPox. The flagship X-Men wasn't as exciting, but I knew that was kind of inevitable, so I was going to give it some time. Then I opened up issue 2 and one of the first things I saw was narration text telling me about a massive and vital plot twist over in X-Force. I almost immediately lost interest, since it seemed the line would be so interconnected that I would have to follow other titles by authors who don't interest me, and I had one of those "ugh, comics are so much work" moments I'm sure a lot of us have from time to time. So I dropped it from my pull list, figuring I might check out the TPBs from the library eventually.

But this thread encouraged me to give the flagship a second shot, and to check out X-Force, since it seems to be widely the most popular title, and was ground zero for the aforementioned plot twist. I picked up all the intervening issues of both this week, and really enjoyed them, especially X-Men, whose weird sense of humor is surprising and works really well for me (among other elements). I especially liked #3 - "Hordeculture" are hilarious and I hope they come back quite a bit.

There's no way Hickman can sustain anything like the dazzlement of HoxPox, which was a firehose of jaw-dropping Big Ideas and twists, week after week. But he seems to be settling in to dig in to the deeper storytelling and intellectual possibilities of his new status quo in the way I want and expect from him. The dinner talk in #4 was thrilling (though I'll agree with some other commenters that while Yu draws beautiful images, he doesn't do facial nuance well enough to do justice to all the conversations in this series).

I had also bought #1 of New Mutants, again because of Hickman, but abandoned it after that. I had no idea who most of those characters were, and so their relationships and the story meant little to me, and probably as a consequence, I was kind of bored. I'll probably go the library trade route with that.

So while the X-franchise is not entirely living down its reputation as a daunting thicket of characters and backstory... I'm hanging in there for the moment and enjoying the ride. So, thanks for the help!

The books are definitely more interconnected than in the past which for someone who appreciates continuity is a godsend. That being said you don't need to follow EVERY book. X-Force and Marauders being the flagship title and Hickmans half of New Mutants working towards a Shiar conflict the books have been largely self contained.

[Yohei72]

The books are definitely more interconnected than in the past which for someone who appreciates continuity is a godsend.

There you go - I'm very much not a continuity geek. But I get the feeling that in that regard, I'm in the minority among comics fans.