After an enjoyable introduction last month, Ellis takes a more focussed route for this second issue, throwing the characters straight into the plot. It’s a masterful example of how to make a chapter of a multi-part comic read like a full story.

The over-arching plot does feel a bit like stock Ellis-Sci Fi with the X-Men dropped in - whatever a “Ghost Box” is, we can be fairly sure it’s not mutant-themed - but there’s still a strong threat at work that makes the story engaging. The X-Men, as an organisation, handle this situation in a noticeably differently manner to any other Marvel Universe team, so in that respect they’re well-placed for Ellis’ tone, if not necessarily his themes.

Ellis manages to continue the sharp dialogue and character moments that elevated Whedon’s run even when the story faltered. Wolverine, as ever, is the focal point of the best jokes, though it’s nice to see a writer not afraid to use the character sparingly - when Wolverine is in a team book he can overpower the other characters, but under Ellis he has a definite function - even if he’s used as a bit of a crowd-pleaser, there’s never too much.

Elsewhere, Cyclops’ new gimmick of telling everyone how he’ll kill if he has to is both a justifiable and entertaining direction for the character, though in this issue it seems a little misplaced. By Scott’s “protect mutants at any cost” reasoning, anyone who attacks the X-Men is automatically eligible for death - admittedly, the guy they’re tracking killed one mutant unprovoked, but it’s not like he’s a mutant serial-killer.

Bianchi’s art is still amazing to look out, and looks unlike almost any other artist in the industy - his work certainly resembles no other superhero artist. Unfortunately, the art is still directly at odds with the printing, and the muted colour pallette combined with Bianchi’s detailed shading causes everything to bleed into one giant, dark mess on the page. Hopefully this has been noticed, and there’ll be some correction within an issue or two, because at this point it’s really the only flaw in an otherwise A-List title.

Tags: Simone Bianchi, Warren Ellis, X-Men
Publisher: Marvel