Marvel Encyclopedia Volume 2: X-Men HC

Through all this, the layout looks fairly professional, clear and inviting, which is a definite plus.

Turning to quality, the book is a bit of a mixed bag. There aren't too many typos or punctuation errors, and the occasionally somewhat clumsy and overly contrived prose can probably be excused by the particular complexity of some characters' histories. (From the Apocalypse biography: "After centuries of plotting, planning, and waiting, Apocalypse put his master plan into action when he gathered together twelve mutants who had long been destined to usher in a new golden era for mutantkind. Apocalypse intended to use them to boost his powers and alter reality to his liking. But his plans went awry when the Twelve broke free, and Apocalypse attempted to use X-Man as a new host body to replace his own, which he had nearly burnt out.")

What's more distracting, however, is the lack of a consistent writing style in some places. While the biographies read rather well as long as things stay matter-of-factly and focus on getting information to the reader, there are several instances when they suddenly switch to sledgehammer melodrama, which, unfortunately, doesn't work quite as well. According to the Marauders section, "Where there is killing, where there is chaos, where there is mayhem, there is always something else: Marauders." Further, it tells us, "They embody the deadly combination of sycophant and killer," and that, "In the absence of goodness and mercy there are Marauders." This smacks of bad fan-fiction, frankly. In the Hellions profile, we learn that "The dead survive only as memories now -- terrible ghosts of an idea too awful to come to fruition. And the living are left to bear the legacy of all the young who died too soon." Yeuch. Too awful to come to fruition, indeed.

With regard to accuracy, the Encyclopedia does a respectable job. There are a number of minor mistakes, but nothing too significant. An exception to this is the Acolytes profile, whose account of the group's history, as well as the histories and capabilities of some of its members, barely resembles the actual stories. Since the Acolytes haven't appeared for a while now, though, and are rather unlikely to pop up anytime soon, this is hardly earth-shaking, either.

The profiles, generally, are limited to the essential parts of the characters' histories, which certainly makes sense. In some places, one might argue that the priorities are a bit out of order; there are biographies for the Marauders and the Hellions, groups that haven't appeared in ages, while on the other hand there is no feature on Genosha, which would have been relevant to the current Morrison run. The Rachel Summers biography refers to Rachel's stint as Mother Askani, which was effectively "removed" from continuity, but neglects to mention that she has since returned to the present-day Marvel Universe; the Hellfire Club section ignores the Inner Circle's most recent "Kings," Blackheart and Daimon Hellstrom; and -- for better or worse -- the Dark Beast retcon is ignored, with regard to the Morlocks. Apart from these, there are no major omissions, though.

In order to streamline things and prevent confusion, the terms "X-Factor," "Cable" and "X-Force" are widely avoided and substituted by "government-sponsored team of mutants," "Nathan Summers" and "mutant strike force founded by Nathan Summers," respectively. Fair enough. What's weird is that the characters from Geoff Johns' "Elseworlds" Morlocks series are lumped in with the Marvel Universe Morlocks.

My overall impression of the book, all told, is fairly favorable, in spite of the bugs. The choice of characters is as ambitious as one could hope, allowing an unbiased look at all the major players in the comic's rich history. Whether they're representatives of the "classic" sixties and seventies, the "mysterious" and "edgy" eighties and nineties, or the current, colorful potpourri of retro and deconstructionist stories, if they played a major part somewhere, chances are you'll find them here. While the writing may not always be top-notch in terms of style and grace, the creators and editors are to be complimented for the rather well-balanced biographies, which most of the time pull it off to introduce the characters in a transparent and accessible way, without ignoring the organic complexity and interwoven structure that has become a hallmark of the X-Men and their world in the past forty years.

If you're looking for a competent, comprehensive, up-to-date guide to what's relevant and essential in the X-Men universe in 2003, you won't find anything better than this book.

(Copyright 2003: Marc-Oliver Frisch)


A necessary evil...   November 17, 2005
 6 out of 6 found this review helpful

-What is it? As the name implies, it is a guide to the X-Men and their corner of the Marvel Comics universe that is almost essential to any one who is a long-term or recent fan of Marvel's mutants. It is also a short-sighted marketing tool.

-The Good: The structure of the book is so tidy it's almost obsessive-compulsive. The first section is all current, give or take, X-Men; next come the Acolytes, Alpha Flight, and so on, with a miscellaneous grouping towards the end. The selection of artwork is reason enough to buy the book- a brilliant and breath-taking collection that runs the gauntlet of virtually every person ever paid money to draw the X-Men.

-The Bad: Although the vast majority of the X-pantheon is included, it is more of a quick reference than a full-blown rundown of the history of each character, group or milestone event. This however, is understandable due to the vast ocean of characters they must deal with, but Marvel rubbed salt in the wound by going out of its way to focus on the way of things as they were the exact month the X-encyclopedia was published, to the point where it actually becomes misleading. Examples: X-Factor (along with X-Force and most other mutant spin-off groups) is totally absent from the book, and whenever it was impossible to overlook something X-Factor did the original X-Men were credited with out any clarification or mention that the 5 founding X-Men at one time formed their own team separate from the X-Men. X-Force is similarly referred to not by name but as either a strike force or as the New Mutants, and Cable is only referred to as Nathan Summers.

Also characters such as the X-Statics (the major space given these clowns is the primary reason NOT to buy the book) and even Alpha Flight take up quite a lot of space (many members get full-page descriptions), even though they are not directly related to the X-Men. Meanwhile characters such as Rachael Summers/Phoenix II (also, Generation X's fate requires a bit of detective work to piece together) that have been along for a number of years who were and are still relevant to the overall on going story were heavily marginalized or given only a third or quarter of a page. There are quite a few characters (and teams) left out all together, even ones that were previously headliners (ex-Deadpool, who at least gets a foot note in the Fantastic Four's guide; and none of Excalibur's foes are included).

Yet another failing is in the entries themselves. There is little correlation between what is written from one entry to the next (ex- Mystique appears a lot in the book yet her entry cuts off with out any recent information, but other entries allude to the fact that she has died, but she apparently had not), or the entries only cover the basics without telling anything about the actual history of the character as seen in the comics (ex-Nightcrawler's entry makes no mention of Excalibur). Finally, the entries for some of the teams seem to go out of their way to be as vague as possible, and groups such as the Brotherhood of Evil Mutants and the Hellfire Club, which both have had many complex incarnations, do not include much detailed information to sort any of this out.

Oh, and the Index in the back lists incorrect page numbers quite a bit also.

-Why one should buy it: The X-Men have a pantheon of characters that almost dwarfs that of Greek mythology. No matter how long you have been reading the book, you WILL eventually stumble across some one and ask you self, "who the heck is this and why do they seem so familiar?" This is why the X-Men Encyclopedia is necessary. Also, anyone who likes to make the mutants subjects of their artwork, there is not any other resource better for a variety of every style and artists, from the sublime to just plain goofy, that has graced the pages of the X-Men, etc..

-Why one should NOT buy it: If you are only buying this to get a full history of the X-Men without purchasing every graphic novel ever printed, or if you are an old fan returning after a long period away from the X-universe, this book will not only lack any helpful information in that regard, it will only make you angry at re-writing past events. It is intentionally vague and provides very little history of the X-Men, but at the same time gives ample space to mostly irrelevant characters (the X-Statics) and entries present conflicting or partial information at times. In essence, it will only get you up to snuff on what happened in 2002-2003, more or less. As I said before, this short-sighted focus actually made the book horribly dated only a few months after it was published.



Pretty Good   May 10, 2003
 4 out of 7 found this review helpful

This book has its highs as well as its lows. While it covers most of the main characters and quite a few lesser known characters, there are some huge omissions. X-Force, X-Factor, and Excalibur are mentioned NOWHERE in this book. If a character was on one of those teams, the book skips over that part of his or her history. And while it nice that they include a lot of obscure morlocks (though most without any written description), obscure Acolytes, etc., more well known characters (but still a little obscure in their own right) like Strong Guy, Shard, D-Ken, Mondo, Master Mold, Game Master, Revanche, X-Treme, Red Lotus, The Nasty Boys, Silver Fox, Mutant Liberation Front, Jean Grey's makeshift X-men members, some members of the Starjammers, some members of X-Factor, some members of Excalibur, etc. are also omitted from the book. Instead of wasting 13 pages on X-Statix, they should have added more characters and expanded some bios.


A MUST HAVE FOR FANS   March 12, 2004
 4 out of 6 found this review helpful

I REALLY do feel that this a book for any xmen fan simply because it lets you know just about everything anybody would want to know about the xmen. there are full character bios that tell about the way they came into the x-universe. there are also extensive information about all the different teams and also all the enemies that the xmen and their team branches fight. there are nifty little guides that tell where each person lies with the regards to energy projection and intelligence etc. it also lists many obscure characters that have graced the pages and any reader will also be reminded of characters they may have forgotten about. i highly recommend this encyclopedia for anyone wishing to have a better knowledge about what makes up one of the greatest comic book universes ever conceived.


Save your money!!!!!!!!!!!!!   May 29, 2006
 4 out of 5 found this review helpful

This book is NOT worth $30+ !! Been reading since the 70's and this is another attempt at slapping an X on something and calling it ice cream. Character bio's were glossed over in favor of awful artwork (for some) and some bio's were innacurate or just wrong on the facts. More time and energy should have been spent on research instead of the "ooooh-ahhh" factor. I only had the misfortune of paying $1.99 for this stinker as part of a online comic order. I paid too much even then. What I Would recommend is either the 40 years of X-men dvd set - can't go wrong there, or, wait til the end of the year as the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe 2006 will be finished and Marvel just LOVES reprinting! You can bet that this will be reprinted in a trade. It appears that they will be doing individual bio's of all team members in one issue ( or maybe two, lotsa mutants lol) But the info is MUCH more accurate and you'll probably save ALOT more money than you would if you bought this "book". I was forced to give this 1 star as there were no negative stars from which to choose. This would be a black hole on the star scale!