Favorite X-One-Shot
Some of the times we do like self contained stories. Nice 1 issue stories. Of course some are better than others of course. So which one-shot pleased you the most? Last year New Mutants: War Children was the big winner. This year the X of Swords one shots were quite popular, even if the are that self contained, but part of a crossover. Here we go...
Number 1: X of Swords: Creation
With 63 points
12 times voted #1
The big opening shot of this years X-over. It was 66 pages of a massive, almost Lord of the Rings styled opening arc. Or like Newsarama said": "It heralds one hell of an incoming epic". When you did see the dark page of the Horsemen watching the battlefield in Dryador, did you get a cold chill as well? Surely I did. Great start of XoS with great writing and awesome art.
Number 2: X of Swords: Destruction
With 61 points
11 times voted as #1
The finale in X of Swords: Destruction delivered on the spectacle of massive fights. Jonathan Hickman and Pepe Larraz pretty much give us in the last issue what most of us wanted a bit earlier in the crossover: Fighting till tou drop! Cyclops and Jean Grey's leading the cavalry of X-Men massively teleporting in and OMG, almost every X-Men in one big splash page! It was an awesome conclusion of a crossover that could have used a bit faster pacing.
Number 3: Giant Size Storm
With 33 points
5 times voted as #1
There is something going on with Storm and the Children of the Vault are to blame. Though we loved the face Serafina made a return, we were shocked to find out Storm was infected. Thanks to the team-up between two former rivals, who hated each other: Jean and Emma. They worked together and it turns out that once they combine the best they are, they are fan-tas-tic.
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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Least Favorite One-Shots
These 3 one-shots were received with little applause. But at least it was not as bad as Major X, the winner of last year, of who never heard about in 2020, guess good riddance. All 3 are Giant Size X-Men issues that served as build-up to the climax in GS Storm.
Number 1: GS Nightcrawler
With 50 points
11 times voted as #1
Nightcrawler and the lesser X-Men in a haunted house story with uneven results. Then also the unpleasant art of Alan Davis only made it worse. We hoped for some focus on Kurt, but it was not. It was $4.99 wasted cash. As such, it felt like a useless interlude to the core Dawn of X titles and a not particularly vital one, unfortunately.
Number 2: GS Fantomex
With 30 points
6 times voted as #1
Well again a Giant Size sole (which not of them actually were) that was not getting a lot of love from thew voters. I must admit I think there were some voters who just gave this isseu votes because they hate Fantomex to begin with. To me this was not to bad, except maybe for the art. But maybe any adventure in The World is disliked because these are sometimes hard to follow? I dunno. But I wonder, will a one-shot with Fantomex, Glob Herman and Kid Omega ever sell?
Number 3: GS Magneto
With 21 points
Twice voted as #1
A very thin plot of Magneto eating with Emma and then buying an island, owned by Namor and.... a wait that was it....!? This could have been written in 3 pages, but they made it into a special one-shot. We recently found out this island will have something to do with the upcoming Hellfire Gala,. Let us hope this one-shot is not a taste of what the quality of that event will be.
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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Favorite Mini Series
So this year Marvel released plenty of nice mini series, however, just a few from the X-Office. Last year House of X and Powers of X were the big winners in this category and was the big turning point for the X-franchise. This year there were not an awful lot to choose from. Though there was one big winner:
Number 1: Empire: X-Men
With 56 points
Votes 13 times as number 1
This arc was a very fun read on its own. A band of fan favorites Archangel, Monet and Magik teaming up against Hordeculture, zombies and plant monsters. Nothing difficult to understand, just a lot of fighting and a great sense of humor. Runner-up was Juggernaut (31 points, two #1 votes)
Last edited by Master of Sound; 01-15-2021 at 07:11 AM.
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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Least Favorite Mini series
Like with the one-shots, last years winner was about Major X. This year the worst was a difficult pick, as the winner and runner-up came quite close. My number one vote went to the iWolverine 2020 mini, but I think it was not bought by many, so it barely got points positive or negative. I always like mini series, so let us hope the X-Office brings us quite a few upcoming year.
Number 1: X-Men Fantastic Four
With 53 points
11 times votes as #1
Why release another story in which the X-Men are portrayed as assholes? Many X-Men were written totally out of character and the story was as thin as the pages it was printed on (ha, that's a good one!). =This could have been much better Marvel. Runner-up was the ongoing that turned out to be a mini: fallen Angels. the bad art and uninteresting new villain Apoth was a huge let down. Glad Kwannon is way better used in Hellions nowadays. Fallen Angel had 51 points and was 10 times voted as #1, so a close call indeed.
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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Favorite book cover of 2020.
Sometimes a picture says more than a thousand words is what they say. When it comes to art, many have different styles they like or dislike. What I might find great, you might dislike. I consider comic book covers as art. Some covers got lots of votes because the art was great, others because they captured an important moment in the books. As there were so many, there were lots of covers that received votes, but these are the ones who stood out the most. I must say there were so many to choose from, that none received an awesome amount of votes.
Here is the top 3 (sorry I cannot attach the covers today, somehow):
Number 1: Giant Size X-men: Jean Grey and Emma Frost, with 16 points (1X#1)
Number 2: X of Swords: Creation Mico Suayan Variant with 11 points (2 X #1)
Number 3: X-Men #12 (2 X #1)
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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Least Favorite Cover of 2020
Every artist has a closet full of bad art. Usually they will keep their bad art to themselves, because they are ashamed for it. However, some seem to publish that bad art anyway end no one stopped them. Though bad art is a great deal worse than no art at all, right? Unfortunately we came across some examples of art we rather saw kept in the closet and these were picked by you as the worst ones of 2020. A very divided voting crowd, so not received enormous amounts of votes.
Again I can not attach the covers, so if someone can post the Favorite Cover top 3 and the the covers of these 3, you would be a hero!!
Number 1: New Mutants #10, with 13 points (1 X #1)
Number 2: Excalibur #9, with 9 points (2 X #1)
Number 3: GS: Nightcrawler, with 7 points (1 X #1)
Last edited by Master of Sound; 01-15-2021 at 01:00 PM.
"COURAGE, DON'T YOU DARE LET ME DOWN"
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I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be the cover to New Mutants #10, not 13. I don't think the cover to 13 had a single vote. That was the cover to the X of Swords issue where it looked like Magik wanted to kill Cypher and was slicing up the image. Also looking at the votes I'm pretty sure Excalibur should be issue 11, not issue 9. Again, 9 doesn't seem to have gotten any votes.
New Mutants 10's cover was this monstrosity.
While Excalibur 11 was this
Don't mean to be a nagger. I do very much appreciate your work.
Last edited by sunofdarkchild; 01-15-2021 at 07:45 AM.
I saw a few people voting for New Mutants to be one of the top 3 most popular X-title based on Ayata's first issue.
New Mutants should have been the worst comic for 2020 if not for the votes based on one issue which really should be allocated for 2021.
I'm surprised X-Factor got into the top 3 and GS Nightcrawler to be least favorite.
GS Nightcrawler art is pretty good (at least for me), better than most of the other titles. It's just that people are complaining that it didn't focus on Nightcrawler and really should be retitled GS Cypher.
Last edited by ericng; 01-15-2021 at 08:53 AM.
Awesome, thanks for sharing this, I am very surprised that X Force got done by X Factor, just my opinion.
X Force started slowly but has really improved through the last five or so issues.
I am a Marvel fan preferably cosmic storylines, especially Thanos or Dark Phoenix related, when both the Avengers and the X-Men are involved count me in, loved the original Uncanny Avengers series.
Not a fan of any of the new characters.
(Marvel/DC fan for 44+ years)